Not Knowing What to Pray For

…our weaknesses, and so on (Romans 8:26). “But the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (Romans 8:26). It is our own spirit, plainly, that intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words; for at times we groan when we are eager to make our supplications to God. So this too we learn in the Holy Spirit, for the Spirit is wise, just as the Son is.

But since he says, “We do not know what we should pray for as we ought” (Romans 8:26), let us look into this. And yet we have already been taught by Christ how we ought to pray, for he says plainly, “Pray, then, like this: Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as in heaven” (Matthew 6:9–10), and all that follows. Since, then, we know the fitting way to make our supplications, tell me, what would be the sense of the apostle’s words? Or at what would the words spoken through Paul’s voice be aimed?

We say, then, that we do pray, seeking to ask for good things, and before all else for what serves the glory of God, and for the things by which we may live rightly and achieve a life that is truly approved. But “having the firstfruits of the Spirit, we ourselves also groan within ourselves, waiting for adoption, the redemption of the body” (Romans 8:23); and it is in this respect, at least, that “we do not know what we should pray for as we ought” (Romans 8:26). For if “no eye has seen and no ear has heard, nor has it entered the human heart, what God has prepared for those who love him” (1 Corinthians 2:9), what shall we ask for when we draw near? Or how could we know what we have not seen, or rather, things that lie beyond the mind and are not known to human hearts? What the redemption of the body will be, or what its refashioning is, and how it is re-formed into incorruption and glory, only he who is the craftsman of these things would know.

The Savior’s disciple, too, said somewhere to some who did not know how to pray as they ought, “You ask and do not receive, because you ask wrongly, to spend it on your pleasures” (James 4:3). It would therefore be quite fitting, and with good reason, for those in such a state to say, “We do not know what we should pray for as we ought” (Romans 8:26). So with groanings too deep for words we ask in the spirit for things that we believe will come to be, though we are wholly ignorant of the manner in which they will come.

“We know that for those who love God all things work together for good, for those who are called according to purpose” (Romans 8:28). All things do work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to purpose. But according to whose purpose? And what is meant by “according to purpose”? “According to purpose” would mean “according to will.” Then according to whose will have those under discussion been called: that of the one who called them, or also that of those who were called? Now every longing that carries us toward righteousness would come to us from God the Father; for Christ said somewhere (John 6:44), “No one can come to…