GENESIS 39
See also: Esau and Jacob 54–55 ■ The Exodus 74–77 ■
The Prophet Samuel 110–15 ■ The Crucifixion 258–65A conviction that
prayer of all kinds
reaches God.Petitionary prayer.
Abraham prays for an
heir and is rewarded with
one. Genesis 15:5A prayer in peril.
Moses prays for help
when his people turn against
him. Exodus 17:4Silent prayer.
Hannah prays in her
heart. Samuel 1:13Prayer as confession.
Ezra prays and confesses.
Ezra 9:5–10:4and Eve’s third son Seth has a
son called Enosh. At this time,
Genesis tells us, people begin to
invoke the name of Yahweh.
Many of the earliest prayers are
petitions for the birth or protection
of children. Isaac’s prayer to
Yahweh on behalf of his wife
Rebekah leads to her becoming
pregnant with the twins Esau
and Jacob. The passion of such
petitions is sometimes expressed
in the names given to longed-for
sons. For example, Leah, the first
wife of Jacob, names her first son
Reuben (“See, a son”), because, she
explains, “the Lord has seen my
misery” (Genesis 29:32).
Another particularly poignant
prayer involves Hagar, the Egyptian
concubine of Abraham, Isaac’s
father. The jealousy of Abraham’swife, Sarah, leads to Hagar and her
son Ishmael being banished to the
wilderness, where they run out of
water. Hagar places Ishmael in the
shade of a bush, then sits a short
distance away because she cannot
bear to watch her child die. Her
prayer brings a response from the
angel of God, who calls out to
reassure her of God’s protection.
She opens her eyes to see a well.Prayers of thanksgiving
Another great strand of prayer,
praise and thanksgiving, occurs
when Abraham sends his servant
to Mesopotamia to find a wife for
Isaac. The servant petitions God for
success in his mission. When his
prayer is answered, he bows down
and worships Yahweh, saying:
“Praise be to the Lord, the God ofmy master Abraham, who has not
abandoned his kindness and
faithfulness to my master.” The
addition of such praise becomes
more common later in the Bible.
For believers, biblical examples of
prayer show that humans can
communicate with God and that
God listens and responds. In the
New Testament, prayer is usually
communicated to God in the name
of Jesus Christ, through the Holy
Spirit. Prayer relies on promises of
the Spirit’s aid in prayer and God’s
favorable reception of prayers
offered under Jesus’s authority
(Romans 8:26 and John 14:13–14). ■The names of God
Names in biblical times were
more than just a label: they
stood for a person’s being and
status. Even more significant
were the names of God. The
three names for God most
frequently used in the Hebrew
Bible are El (more than 200
times), Elohim (2,570 times),
and Yahweh (6,800 times).
El was both a generic word
for “god” and the name of the
chief god of the Canaanites—
a benevolent deity portrayed
as an old man with a beard.
El is often used in compounds:
Everlasting God, God
Almighty, Most High God.
Elohim is another generic
word for “god,” emphasizing
God’s universality. It is used
in the first verse of Genesis:
“In the beginning God created
the heavens and the earth.”
Yahweh (or YHWH, since
ancient Hebrew script lacked
vowels) is the personal name
of the God of Israel. The name
is explained in Exodus, during
Moses’s encounter at the
burning bush, where God’s
words are translated: “I am
who I am.”The evolution of prayer
US_038-039_Origin_of_prayer.indd 39 02/11/2017 11:06