Speaking in tongues is a gift of the Holy Spirit meant to help us pray. When it comes to praying, you can either pray yourself or you can ask someone to pray for you. All these methods are acceptable in the Bible.
In 1st Thessalonians 5:17, the Bible tells us to pray without ceasing. That automatically means we have to learn to pray ourselves. But in 1st Timothy 2:1 the Bible urges us to make intercession for one another.
If you have been a believer for a while, you must have observed that majority of believers rely on men of God to pray for them. There are downsides to relying on a man of God to pray for you.
God in His wisdom puts us under men of God so that we may learn how to pray. At some point, God expects us to mature to a level where we can pray for ourselves.
Believers who rely on men of God to pray for them all through their lives are lazy believers who don’t want to grow in prayer.
God is wise such that the problems He allows you to go through gradually become complex. In the beginning, men of God can pray for you and your problems get solved but as you progress, you get to a point where even if men of God pray for you, problems don’t end.
God expects you to have learned to pray for yourself by the time you get to the level where the prayers of men of God can’t solve your problems.
Problems that come with Relying on the Prayers of Men of God
1. Unreliability
Men of God are men, which means they are naturally unreliable. Even the best men of God will usually have bad days where they don’t feel like praying for anyone.
Every so often people ask me to pray for them. Sometimes I’m not in the mood of praying for anyone and I decide to ignore their request. Even though I desire to be there for others and pray for them, it is hard to do it 100% of the time.
After having failed to pray for a number of people who requested me to pray for them, I decided to focus more on equipping people to pray on their own rather than to rely on me. I felt that was a better move.
Your Apostle will never be 100% reliable. He is human and there is nothing wrong with that.
Some men of God are technically impossible to access. If a man of God has a church with over 5000 members, do you think he will ever find time to listen to your prayer request, leave alone pray for you.
I have heard some cases of believers who get angry at their Pastors for not giving them attention. Any wise believer should understand that a Pastor is a human being and can never be 100% reliable.
If servants of God could be 100% reliable then God would lose meaning. God is the only one who is 100% reliable and that makes Him better than all men of God.
If you have been relying on a man of God to pray for you, it is time you start working to be independent. That is what God desires. We are all His children and He wants all of us to take our requests to Him ourselves.
2. Poor Quality Prayers
When you ask a man of God to pray for you, the prayers he makes are never going to be perfect. Some men of God are good at making wise prayers but others are not.
A man of God can be good at making prayers but when you request him to pray for you, he makes a casual prayer because he feels your issue is not a big deal.
There have been times where someone came to me to pray for him and even though I usually pray fervently, I couldn’t pray for the person with the same fervor.
Prayers heavily rely on the state of the heart. If you feel a matter deeply, you automatically pray fervently for it. If you don’t care about a matter, you make casual prayers.
Take the example of the night Jesus was arrested; the disciples of Jesus didn’t know what was coming and so they didn’t think it was a big deal for them to pray. They slept while Jesus prayed in anguish until His sweat appeared as drops of blood. Jesus was aware of the gravity of the situation.
The only person who will fully understand your situation is you. That means the most fervent prayer that can be made for that situation will come from you.
If someone asks me to pray for him to get a wife, I will pray because he has requested but because I don’t know what it means for him to get a wife, I will not take it seriously as he would if he prayed for the matter himself.
Prayers that a man of God makes for you are always going to be of poor quality. That is why God requires us to outgrow relying on men of God for prayers.
3. The Yoke of Men of God
Jesus said “Come to me all who labor and are heavily laden and I will give you rest”. The only person who can give you rest is Jesus. Men of God can lift a few boulders off your shoulders but they can’t give you rest.
The only way men of God can give you rest is if they show you how to get Jesus to give you rest.
I have seen many believers who became slaves of men of God just because they relied on the men of God to pray for them.
The Bible has warned us not to put our trust in men. If God sees you putting your trust in a man of God, He will cause that man of God to be a snare to you. The man of God will become Egypt for you.
God wants us to learn from men of God how to pray but not to use men of God as our prayer backbone.
Unfortunately, some men of God don’t even know that they should not be prayer backbones to their members. The work of the men of God is to show people how to pray.
If Jesus taught His disciples to pray and asked them to pray on their own, who does a man of God think he is to make himself a prayer machine for his members?
The burden of praying for people is too heavy for anyone to carry and that is why Jesus took it up so that none of us would carry it.
Rejecting the offer Jesus gave us will cause enmity between you and the man of God for no reason.
Relying on a man of God to pray for you is guaranteed to make you feel like a slave and God does not want you to feel like a slave; Jesus came to set you free.
Why Speaking in Tongues is Superior to a Man of God Praying for you
When we are still young in salvation, God puts us under the care of men of God. But as we grow, God expects us to cultivate an intimate relationship with the Holy Spirit and rely on Him to pray for us.
Has the Bible not told us that we do not know how to pray as we ought to but that the spirit of God intercedes for us with groans that are too deep for words in Romans 8:26?
God knows that we need help when it comes to praying. The Holy Spirit is the one assigned by God to help us in that area.
1. The Holy Spirit is Reliable
No matter the hour of the day, the Holy Spirit is always ready to intercede for you. You can speak in tongues anytime you want.
While a man of God may not pick your call because he is having time with his children, the Holy Spirit is always available for you.
The man of God may get overwhelmed listening to you as you describe your problem but the spirit of God always listens to you no matter how much you have to say.
There are problems that a man of God cannot pray for you but the Spirit of God will intercede for all your issues.
In addition, you never have to worry about bothering the Holy Spirit with your endless requests because He is more than able to intercede for all your requests.
2. The Holy Spirit always makes Perfect Prayers for you
The Bible tells us that no one knows the thoughts of a man except his spirit and likewise no one knows the thoughts of God except the Holy Spirit.
You are guaranteed perfect prayers if you rely on the Holy Spirit to intercede for you. When you speak in tongues, you are making perfect prayers.
A man of God will pray for you based on his understanding and of course his understanding is limited but the Holy Spirit knows exactly what you need.
3. The Holy Spirit enables you Pray for others as Well
Mature believers rely on the Holy Spirit to help them pray. Apart from the Holy Spirit praying for you, He can also lead you to pray for others.
Jesus prayed for His disciples because He was full of the Spirit. The more you practice relying on the Holy Spirit to intercede for you the more you will be able to pray for others without feeling burdened.
We don’t get born again only to pray for ourselves but also for others. God rewards us when we pray for others and that is only possible if we first learn to rely on the Holy Spirit ourselves.
I have prayed for people and God answered them because I prayed willfully. When the Holy Spirit leads you to pray for someone, you don’t struggle and God rewards you.
Why Speaking in Tongues is better than a Man of God Praying for you: Conclusion
We all begin our prayer journey by learning from men of God. It is God who appoints those men of God to be our leaders. But God expects us to outgrow relying on the prayers of the men of God.
God requires us to grow and start relying on the Holy Spirit to lead us in prayer. After we become masters at relying on the Holy Spirit for prayer, God gives us other young people in the faith for us to pray for them and guide them in the same path we were guided through.
Therefore, at whatever stage you are operating at right now, seek to grow and become the servant God ordained you to be.
Peace!