If you remain in me, and my words remain in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you. (John 15:7)

It is unnecessary to surround every statement about prayer with a warning. If a man covets another man’s wife, he violates the commandment whether he prays about it or not. He needs to repent. Or if he wishes to murder someone and asks God to help him, that is not a matter of faith. But such examples are not representative of the faithful. They do not define the life of a Christian who remains in the word of God. Yet many teachings about the promises concerning prayer treat these as the starting point. They begin with abuse, and then attempt to explain what remains of the promise. Instead of proclaiming the truth, they try to preempt misuse. This casts aside the word of God and burdens the believer with suspicion, placing him in a worse state than before.

Most Christians are not trying to manipulate God. Most are not asking for wicked things. They are praying for healing, for wisdom, for financial supply, for family and for ministry. These are the cries of the righteous, not greed or malice. These are the kinds of things God commands us to pray for in Scripture. They are the product of minds renewed by the word and stirred by the Spirit. Yet even these prayers are often discouraged or diminished. Teachers tell the believer to be careful, to guard against selfishness, and to moderate his expectations. He is made to feel presumptuous for praying for the very things Scripture teaches. He is told that strong desire is dangerous, and that bold asking needs to be tempered. But the truth is the opposite. These desires are evidence of faith. To restrain them is to resist the work of God in the believer.

The kingdom of God does not advance through doubt. It does not expand through people who are too afraid of themselves. It grows through bold prayer and confident action. The man who prays for success in order to serve more, or who asks for healing so that he may labor again, is not selfish. His petition flows from faith, and his faith pleases God. Even the desire for personal relief is not wrong when it arises from a heart shaped by the word. A man may ask for personal victory or for the salvation of his household, and God is glad to give. These are not lesser requests. They are the very outworking of the gospel in a person’s life. To make such a man second-guess his prayer is to introduce oppression where there should be freedom and assurance.

When we mute the faith of the many to protect against the abuse of the few, if abuse is possible in the first place, we commit a kind of injustice. We withhold encouragement from the faithful out of fear that someone might go too far. And what is too far? If a man has faith to move a mountain, let him move it! Instead of building up the church, we weigh it down with caution. Instead of reinforcing what is right, we emphasize what might go wrong. But this is a betrayal of the promise. The ones who are humble, prayerful, and filled with the word are treated as if they are reckless. Meanwhile, the false and disobedient are the ones shaping the rules. This is backwards. It is a theological travesty that punishes the righteous and emboldens the faithless. The church becomes hesitant where it should be decisive.

Caution is not the virtue that many suppose it to be. In some cases, it is wise to examine motives. But when caution becomes the starting point of theology, it disfigures the message. It reorders the emphasis of Scripture and turns promises into warnings. What Jesus gave as a confidence becomes a cause for restraint. What he said to embolden becomes a reason to hold back. When teachers place more attention on avoiding excess than on encouraging faith, they rob the church of its power. They teach to produce fear instead of joy, suspicion instead of liberation. They blunt the edge of the sword and call it safety. But in the battlefield, it is a death sentence.

The only proper foundation for teaching prayer is the command to ask. Jesus said it plainly. He did not pad his words with caveats or soften them for balance. He said that if his words remain in us, we may ask whatever we wish. If we are filled with his words, then our prayers are never presumptuous. He told his disciples that the Father loves to give, and that the one who asks will receive. He did not begin with a lesson on failure or abuse. He did not preach caution before he preached power. In fact, he never said anything about caution in prayer at all. He never expressed any concern that we would go too far, but only that we would not go far enough.