Dru Johnson (00:00)
What if our prayers to God actually move him to action? Well, this week I’m going to be talking to Dr. John Peckham, who is a theologian, but not an ordinary theologian. We’ll talk about that. He uses scripture in ways that I rarely see theologians using it. And and so I want to commend his work and his thinking to you.
In this episode, we’re going to talk about prayer and whether God actually responds to our prayer or whether prayer is just for us to shape our thinking and our feeling. his book, Why We Pray, gets into prayer as taking part in a cosmic conflict, and what exactly he means by that and why we should pray more fervently, but less like a cult.
If you like what we do here at the Center for Hebraic Thought, you can like or subscribe to this channel. You can rate us at your podcast outlets. and if you want to give, you can give recurring gifts, which I’m gonna highlight recurring gifts because remember that old Bible first conference on politics, politics and Christianity go well together, but how? well, all of those essays from Miroslav Wolf, Anthony Bradley, who else do we have there? Kirsten Birkhaug
James Wood, Matthew Taylor, others. I can’t remember right now, off the top of my head. All of those talks that they give have papers, and those papers are coming out in this book on Bible and politics that is only available. We will not be selling this to anybody. It’s only available for reoccurring, recurring donations of twenty dollars or more per month. So if you want that book, it is coming out. it is done, it’s edited, and you can get it by
giving those recurring donations. Otherwise you can go to our page, thebiblicalmind dot org slash give. And now to John Peckham.
John Peckham (01:53)
Yeah, I I think there’s a a couple of extremes when it comes to how prayer is sometimes thought of. on one side, I think there is the possibility of underemphasizing prayer. particularly what I’m writing about in this book is petitionary prayer and the problem problems of petitionary prayer. And one of the ways this can be problematic prov problematically addressed is the view
That prayer only affects us or is only therapeutic for us. It’s only for us and not for God. This is a a common view. And I’ll just say as an aside, I I agree that prayer has therapeutic benefits. I agree that prayer should and even must affect the one who is praying. but I think scripture paints a broader picture in which prayer is more than that, particularly petitionary prayer.
does more than just affect us and also affects God. That’s on one side, right? But but there’s always a ditch on both sides. You could go so far in the other direction where you think that everything hinges on prayer or prayer has more of an influence than it possibly could, or that by praying we could even maybe manipulate or control God, or prayer looks like works like magic or like an algorithm. And you find this kind of view also on the other side of an extreme.
And I I’m trying to avoid both of those ditches and and try to focus on what I think is is a biblical presentation of how prayer works and and in some cases how prayer doesn’t doesn’t work.
Dru Johnson (03:32)
Yeah, I know in the Jewish tradition there is a a strong tradition of theurgy, which is that our prayers are moving God. And then of course in classical Christian theology they would be very opposed to that.
John Peckham (03:45)
Yes.
Dru Johnson (03:45)
because well maybe talk about why why and by clo classical Christian doctrine, I just mean Western, Romanized and Protestant theology, why they would be so nervous about the idea that prayer moves God.
John Peckham (04:00)
Yeah. Yeah. I I refer to what what you’re describing as strict classical theism in the book. I try to distinguish between classical theism writ large, because there are some
Dru Johnson (04:08)
Mm.
John Peckham (04:09)
people who refer to themselves as classical theists, and by that they just mean they affirm the creator creature distinction. They affirm that
Dru Johnson (04:15)
Right.
John Peckham (04:15)
God is all powerful, that God is all knowing, that God is present everywhere, that the omni, so to speak, and and and and other traditional Christian doctrines. But there’s there’s kind of a a a bouquet or a subset
Of classical Christian teachings about the divine nature that raise this very problem that you’re putting on the table. And I group those in a in a kind of subsection that I refer to as strict classical theism. Sometimes when people refer to classical theism, that’s just what they mean. But I try
Dru Johnson (04:46)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (04:46)
to make that differentiation because I don’t think even in the patristic tradition, everyone
Dru Johnson (04:50)
Hmm.
John Peckham (04:50)
means the same thing, even when they talk about things like apathea, which is the idea that God is not.
doesn’t have emotions like humans do, or depending on the the the interpretation, doesn’t have emotions at all.
Dru Johnson (05:03)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (05:03)
so basically they’re they’re c strict classical theists are going to be very concerned about the idea that God is moved because they’re going to want to say that God is strictly timeless, strictly immutable, and strictly impassable. Not to mention a strict doctrine of divine simplicity, but we’ll leave that aside for simplicity’s sake, because the doctrine of divine simplicity is anything but simple.
Dru Johnson (05:24)
That
is that is
correct.
John Peckham (05:27)
But they but they generally want to say God is God is timeless. By that they mean not that God has no beginning and no end. We we all affirm that. Christians generally affirm that. They mean that God has no before or after in his life, meaning that he can’t do one thing and then do another. it follows from that that God is strictly immutable, he cannot undergo any changes whatsoever. And here they’re not just talking about changes with regard to his essential nature or his character. I would affirm that as well.
but they are saying God cannot even undergo relational changes. So that means again, he cannot have a back and forth relationship or what I call a covenant relationship. And that in in the non-technical form of as just a catch-all term for back and forth relationship that actually makes a difference to God. And from that it also follows that God is impassable or strictly impassable, by which they mean that God cannot be affected by anything outside of himself. And of course, if you hold to those three.
those three doctrines of strict classical theism, then the idea that prayer would make a difference to God or that God would be moved by prayer or anything else is just on the face of it contradictory to those tenets of strict classical theism.
Dru Johnson (06:38)
Now I can imagine some people who are watching or listening to this will say, Who in the world believes that God cannot be affected by anything except himself? And and like
John Peckham (06:49)
Yes.
Dru Johnson (06:49)
he can’t grow in his affections, he can’t react in it. Like, why so where do these ideas I mean, let’s put the elephant on on the table, as it were, to mix metaphors. Where
John Peckham (06:57)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm. Yes.
Dru Johnson (06:59)
where are these ideas that God is completely unmovable except for by himself coming from?
John Peckham (07:04)
Yeah. Yeah. So the reaction the reaction you just described is the reaction that many of my students have. You’ve probably had the same experience, true. And I have to convince them sometimes. No, really, this is really a big thing.
Dru Johnson (07:14)
Ha ha.
John Peckham (07:15)
it’s not even not even a side issue, right? I’m not setting up a straw man. This is a a quite a prominent stream in the Christian tradition, particularly in the classical Christian tradition. And it is it’s traceable to very strong influence from particular streams of Greek philosophy and Greco-Roman thought.
And so basically, many thinkers in the classical Greek philosophical tradition held to the view, especially, especially Plato is the most seminal, but he’s not the only one by any means. But held to the view that that the supreme being, which when Christianity tried to adapt Christian doctrine to to meet the mind of the Greco-Roman world, of course, the supreme being corresponds to God in Christian thinking. The supreme being must be perfect.
And on at least these streams of Greek philosophy, in order to be perfect, they thought one must not undergo any change of any kind, which they thought entailed that one must not have any temporal temporality in one’s life, because they thought philosophers disagree on this now, but they seemed to think that if if time passes in one’s life, then one is necessarily changing. And they said one argument went like this: if
If God if something changes, it must change for the better or for the worse. So if God changes for the better, that means he wasn’t perfect before he changed. And if he changes for the worse, he’s not perfect after w afterwards. Therefore God can God cannot change. He must be timeless, cannot be affected by anything outside of himself. So there’s this package of what’s come to be known as a particular form of perfect being theology, where there’s a particular streams of of Greek philosophy that became quite prominent.
in parts of the early Christian tradition, especially by the time you reach Augustine, he just systematizes it into the most influential picture of God that has been been a dominant player in the Christian tradition ever since then.
Dru Johnson (09:17)
Yeah, and I think even even as our prowess in mathematics and engineering grew, our v our concepts, our metaphors of perfection became more tightened and have more strictures to them so that so that we can say perfection in a kind of a blah bland sense, but actually these thinkers were putting more putting screwing the screw sorry, I’m messing with my words here. They’re putting the screws to what perfection could possibly be in ways that maybe weren’t even imagined by Augustine in the beginning.
John Peckham (09:47)
Right, right,
right.
Dru Johnson (09:49)
So I would imagine that some people are are now saying, hmm, when I read my Bible, this just does not sound like the God I encounter in scripture. So how do you help people line these things up? You know, with a sympathetic view towards I can understand why God want people to be perfect in this particular way, but how do you help them enter the world of the Bible and the conceptual schemes that you find from the biblical authors?
John Peckham (10:19)
Yeah, yeah. This is a great question. And I have an entire entire chapter on why we pray that’s just about the God to whom we pray. And
Dru Johnson (10:27)
Hm.
John Peckham (10:27)
one of the reasons I wrote this particular book, I had written a book on doctrine of God earlier and a book on on other aspects that that I pick up some some threads from in this book. And one of the the big issues where the rubber hits the road is the question of prayer, right? There’s this this quite traditional view that the way you pray is the way you believe, which is the way that you
Dru Johnson (10:48)
Mm.
John Peckham (10:48)
live.
Lex orandi, lex credendi, lex vivendi, right? And so there’s massive questions about what God is like. And if God is one way, praying to him in a particular way doesn’t make sense if he’s another way, praying to him in the sense of like moving him or in the sense of maybe even affecting what he does wouldn’t make any sense at all. And yet if you look at scripture, at least on a a surface-level reading, and of course I try to do much more than a surface-level reading, but for the sake of the audience, even just on the surface level reading.
It’s very hard to read scripture on its own terms and affirm what it seems to demonstrably teach, and yet deny the claim that petitionary prayers might make a difference to God. Right? That’s just one starting point to enter into the biblical world. So you have this all throughout the Old Testament. You have even texts that say God was moved by prayer. Over
Dru Johnson (11:40)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (11:40)
and over again, he responds to prayer. He even tells his people, if my people will
will humble themselves and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear them. And then in the New Testament you have not only many instances of petitionary prayers that are that that that are described as making a difference, but Christ himself consistently teaches his followers to pray petitionary prayers, asking it will be given to you. The Lord’s prayer itself is just filled with like seven petitions in the Lord’s Prayer. And so that’s already a starting point that creates a problem with the idea if you have a God
Where petitionary prayer couldn’t make any difference to him. Alongside that, if you look at the God of Scripture, God is very repeatedly and consistently described as undergoing emotional reactions to creatures, particularly emotions like being grieved, showing compassion. And this is true all throughout the Old Testament, and it’s mirrored in Christ, who of course he becomes human, and some would say, well, it’s just human emotions. But I think if you compare
The the emotions that Christ displays, and he says, if you’ve seen me, you’ve seen the Father, they map on to the the emotional description of God in the Old Testament. So just on a straightforward reading, you have a God who makes covenants and keeps covenants. You have a God who enters into back-and-forth relationship, a God who who does new things, a God who set who says he’s going to change his course of action in response to what his people do, such as in Jeremiah 18 with the the the the potter and the clay metaphor and onwards. And a God who is
Deeply compassionate and passionate for his people, to the extent that, like in Hosea 11:8, you have this imagery where he is grieving over his people that are apostate from him, and because they’re removed themselves from him, judgment will fall on them, but he doesn’t want to bring judgment on them. So this metaphor of my heart is turned over within me, and all my compassions
Dru Johnson (13:33)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (13:33)
are kindled. And of course, that is idiomatic language, but it still conveys something, I argue at least in my work, it conveys something about who God is.
And the kind of emotional reactions that God has. So on a straightforward reading, it’s very difficult to read scripture and come to the conclusion that God is timeless, immutable, and impassable. And even strict impassableists, they recognize this. They will say, on the face of it, scripture teaches that God has emotional changes, but they say we shouldn’t read scripture that way. We should read it through this these other metaphysical lenses. because if we read scripture that way, we’ll come to a wrong reading that will be out of step with the tradition.
I I take a different view. I think number one, I don’t think the tradition is monolithic, even if there’s a dominant stream. And number two, I want all of my theological conclusions to be normed by scriptures, uniquely normative. And if that departs from tradition, without being dismissive of tradition, right? But if that departs from the Christian tradition, then I think we we should allow scripture to correct the tradition, not the other way around.
Dru Johnson (14:32)
yeah, I think that’s called classically what’s the word, re re reformed. Yeah, that’s what it is.
John Peckham (14:38)
Yes, yes.
Dru Johnson (14:41)
well, you made a move there, and it’s actually what I’ve very much deeply appreciated about your thinking and your writing over the years is that a you understand scripture very well, that you you kind of work in the classical theological tradition and in systematic theology.
And and as much as I hate to say these words, you’re one of the few people who actually is doing this work from scripture and faithful to scripture. but I think a hidden premise in everything you just said, correct me if I’m wrong, is that that scripture has a robust intellectual world that is worth listening to and putting toe to toe with you know, the Greek intellectual world as it were. Is that is that correct?
John Peckham (15:27)
Yeah, I think that’s right. And let me just say I’ve appreciated you and your work on this this this very question. the idea that the Bible presents its own philosophy, right? Maybe not in the same way that you would think of a Greco-Roman philosophy. It’s not always asking the same kind of questions, and we probably shouldn’t expect to derive all of the same kinds of answers. but I do think that scripture provides its own metaphysical framework, its own ontology, its own view of the nature of reality, that is to say.
its own view of the nature of knowledge or epistemology. And I think by attending to that framework, we arrive at a very different picture of reality and what God is like. If on the other hand, we come with a framework that comes from outside of Scripture that actually runs counter to what scripture teaches, then we’re going to have to reinterpret a lot of things that we find in Scripture. And that I think unfortunately, it pains me also to say this, but that I think is what is happening at least in in some streams of
traditional Christian theology, where you have a metaphysical framework that’s from outside the text. and it’s not just a problem that it’s from outside the text, but it runs counter to I think the very what you would call Hebraic philosophy or Hebraic thinking, right? Which I think is is quite consistent throughout the old and the New Testament that would push back against this idea that God is timeless, that God is strictly immutable, that God is strictly impassable.
Of course, as you know better than I do, not everyone will agree that scripture provides its own philosophical framework, its own metaphysical conclusions. but I I I would I would push back gently on that and just say the kinds of if we just stay at like the what some sometimes we might call the messo level of of discrete Christian doctrines, I would make a case that the claims, at least the biblical grounding of those claims and the way scripture teaches those doctrines hold metaphysical implications.
That if those metaphysical implications aren’t true, you can’t hold those doctrines consistently. And so I don’t think we’re at liberty to say, scripture doesn’t really give us a philosophical framework, doesn’t really give us metaphysical conclusions, but we want to derive doctrinal conclusions from it. I don’t really see how you can make that move consistently in a way that’s not only faithful to scripture, but also it is internally consistent. And I try to hold myself to those two standards. I’m not saying I always achieve this.
But I I want all my doctrinal conclusions that I hold with confidence to meet what we might call the standard of biblical warrant, that it has sufficient grounding in what scripture actually teaches, carefully considered in light of all that scripture teaches, and that it is also systematically coherent or internally consistent with itself. And I do think that scripture provides, again, without claiming that it answers all the kinds of questions that philosophers in the Western world ask.
some questions are underdetermined, or at least some answers, and sometimes
Dru Johnson (18:18)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (18:18)
asking different questions. I do think it provides a very robust philosophical and metaphysical framework that I think I’m thankful for people like you that are that are dealing with it, but not many people are actually engaging scripture on those terms.
Dru Johnson (18:34)
w can you give us a brief what do you mean we keep saying metaphysical, what do you mean by metaphysical?
John Peckham (18:40)
Yeah, I use metaphysical framework as just a catch all for the the view of the nature of reality and the view of the nature of knowledge and the view of the the God world relationship, right? So you have the metaphysical framework is this you could just call it the philosophical framework if you want. But it’s these these first principles or largest categories of thought that affect the way we view everything else, right? So even if somebody hasn’t thought this way before, if you think that
reality is fundamentally timeless, that’s going to have a cascade of implications for everything else at every other level of your reading of scripture, your theology. If you think he is not timeless or temporal, at least has temporality in his life, whatever that means for God, that’s going to have a cascading effect on the other side all the way down. And so I the metaphysical framework is kind of at this this macro level where you have these philosophical first principles. And also I would I would even put one’s doctrine of God at that level because it affects
Everything else. And the doctrine of God is is bound up with what we think about these metaphysical questions or these questions about the nature of fundamental reality, ultimate reality, even beyond the confines of of our created reality and our human experience. And while most people probably are not used to thinking in these categories, I would argue that they’re they’re doing it all of the time.
Dru Johnson (20:07)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (20:07)
Whether
they recognize it or not. So when it comes to the doctrine of God, for instance, I don’t not not trying to go down this track or take us off track, but in like j if you just take Genesis 1-1, I use this example with my students all the time. In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. When Christians or anyone reads that, they’re supplying a lot of information if they’re reading that text
Dru Johnson (20:25)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (20:25)
in isolation, right? in the beginning, what’s the beginning? What beginning is it talking about? God, who is that? And and everybody supplies what they think they know about God, right? And and as soon as you make that, especially
level of God, you’re making all kinds of philosophical metaphysical judgments, even if you’re doing it subconsciously or unconsciously, God, yeah, I know who that I know who that is, and I know basically what God is like. Created, what does that mean? The heavens and the earth. What are the heavens and the earth, right? And without trying to to answer all of those questions, what I argue with some of my students is that there’s a a minimal not minimalist, but a minimal upshot of what Genesis 11 teaches in its own context at what I call the micro exegetical level.
There’s a minimal upshot at the macro level that has metaphysical implications, right? So Genesis 1.1 doesn’t tell us that God is all powerful, at least not in so many words, but it does say it does entail that God is very powerful. Why? Because
Dru Johnson (21:21)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (21:21)
he said it says he created the heavens and the earth. And so it has a metaphysical entailment. Now, of course, we don’t want to overinterpret that or or or or run beyond what the text entails. But I would say that that’s consistent throughout the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament.
That the doctrinal claims it makes often have metaphysical entailments. Now, those need to be dealt with very carefully again, so we don’t read into scripture things that are not actually there or make judgments that go beyond the text in a over-interpreted way. Some things are underdetermined. Absolutely. But I but that’s what I mean when I’m talking about a metaphysical framework and how I think it connects to the text and a philosophical framework that can be derived from the text itself. At least in part.
Dru Johnson (21:59)
So I yeah,
I that’s very helpful. I hear you using categories first principles, metaphysical frameworks. So these are all we would say descendants of Greco Roman thinking, the the style
John Peckham (22:11)
Mm-hmm.
Dru Johnson (22:12)
of thinking there. So I correct me again if I’m wrong, but I take it that you don’t think this is cum a completely wrong way to go about. the the way that they analyze concepts. so what what is the problem, I guess? If if you can appropriate some of the
the skills and the tools of Greco Roman Enlightenment philosophy, Amer the American Philosophical Project. where are the boundaries? If if there’s a field we can play in, where are the fences, I guess?
John Peckham (22:41)
Yeah, no, that’s a good question. So I think what I would say is I think I think the labels come from that from that tradition, and I use those labels in the categories because that’s where most of the discussion is taking place. but I wouldn’t necessarily adopt the entire mechanism or even the methodology that’s used. to put it kind of in the simplest terms, I think that
The the Western philosophical tradition, I think it asks a lot of really good questions. I think it provides a lot of good analytic tools and conceptual tools, but I’m not very confident in the answers that it provides as a tradition, right? And so in simplistic terms, I would say that’s for me, that’s where the boundary resides. Like I’m not very confident, not just in the in the in the Western tradition, I’m not confident in in in in in human reasoning in general to be able to arrive at
confident conclusions about some of these transcendent truths. I’m not confident in my own reasoning, certainly, to be able to provide those kinds of answers without dismissing the very difficult work and deep thinking from which I have learned and benefited from in both the Western philosophical tradition and and what I what I would argue is a a biblical philosophical tradition that runs in some cases counter to that tradition. And so we’re to me for me the boundary is where we derive confident answers from. I want to do
Theology and philosophy and philosophical theology with this standard biblical warrant. So I’m always trying to derive answers, at least answers I hold with confidence, from scripture in a way that is discernible, demonstrable, and defensible, right? And so discernible meaning if you ask me where do you get that from, I I could show you. I don’t mean just like a proof text or one single text. I mean from the the broad warp and woof and scripture. Discernibly, I’m actually.
It’s actually grounded there, at least if I’m if I’m interpreting scripture correctly. demonstrable, I can I can discern in the text, I can show it to you and demonstrate it to you. And defensible minim minimally that you could respond to at least the kind of obvious objections that someone would raise, right? doesn’t mean you convince them. but on the basis of scripture. So for me, that’s that’s kind of the boundaries of of this sandbox that we’re playing in. but I don’t think.
that one can do Christian theology in the Western world in the twentieth century in a way that entirely ignores, and I I wouldn’t advocate that anyone do that anyways, entirely ignores the Western philosophical tradition because we’re just we’re just bathed in it. And Christian theology is bathed in it, right? And so if you if we don’t use any of those categories or we don’t deal with those terms and the questions that are being asked, I think we’re even more likely to just baptize whatever our own cultural judgments are, our our own
social imaginary, so to speak, and we end up just kind of reading them into the text unwittingly, in a way that I
Dru Johnson (25:35)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (25:35)
think ends up in the other ditch, right? So again, I think there’s always two ditches on both sides. On one side there’s the ditch, I in my opinion, it’s a ditch to take a metaphysical framework or or lenses about answers to the biggest questions of life, philosophical questions from outside of scripture and impose it on scripture. But there the equal problem is is on the other side where I don’t even recognize that those categories are at play.
Dru Johnson (25:58)
Hm.
John Peckham (25:58)
Regardless
of what terminology I use, those big questions of life are questions that scripture itself is asking, even though it might frame them differently. It certainly doesn’t use the same kind of categories like first principles and metaphysical frameworks, but it’s asking those kinds of questions. And if I’m not aware, even aware of that or even pay attention to it, I I’m even more likely to just read my own answers, even if they’re subconscious, unwitting answers, into the text at every turn, which we’re prone to do even if we try not to, right? I mean, we’re
Dru Johnson (26:25)
Mm-hmm. Right.
John Peckham (26:26)
humans after all.
And we’re doing it all the time. But ideally we’d be aware that we are doing that and at least try to mitigate the influence of our own presuppositions doing that to allow the text to speak. This is a never ending process. I don’t I don’t claim to do this with with any with any great skill, but but this is my aim at least.
Dru Johnson (26:44)
Hmm. Yeah, I I studied philosophy right out of seminary, and I think I came to a very similar conclusion where I I thought, they’re they’re not asking any different questions over here in philosophy. Maybe the the starter questions take them down different roads to different questions that I might not be asking myself. but there was I I was shocked by the conceptual overlap and what they were concerned with and how scripture deals with those those questions. so we haven’t
w we wanted to talk about prayer, so we I need to I need to get us back on track here, although I’ve really enjoyed this aside. so maybe we could take Jesus’ parable about a woman who goes to an unrighteous judge, which I I love because God is the unrighteous judge in that parable. and he says to himself, Though I neither fear God nor man, you know, like he it’s it’s a it’s a like a very overtly obvious what Jesus is doing there.
And he notes that because she goes to him regularly, he will finally give her what she wants. so
John Peckham (27:47)
Uh-huh.
Dru Johnson (27:48)
what do you think is going on prayer-wise? And let’s just assume that her going regularly is doing something to her as well.
so we can just put that
John Peckham (27:56)
Mm-hmm, mm-hmm.
Dru Johnson (27:57)
one on the back burner. But what else is
John Peckham (27:59)
Sure.
Dru Johnson (27:59)
going on?
John Peckham (28:01)
Yeah. Yeah, that’s a great question. So I take that the par that parable, the parable of the persistent window widow, as it’s sometimes called. I take that, first of all, to be a kind of contrastive example and making a call the home argument. In other words, the the judge is unrighteous. Of course, initially you read the parable and it’s this is this is representing God, but then there’s a twist, right? Because God is not unrighteous. He’s he’s
Dru Johnson (28:24)
Mm. Right.
John Peckham (28:25)
quite the opposite of that. And so in the parable, an unrighteous judge
doesn’t want to give the widow what she wants, but because she keeps coming to him over and over again, eventually he gives her what she wants because of his persistence. And the takeaway, at least as I read it, is that Jesus is emphasizing if if even an unrighteous judge, right, from from the lesser to the greater, this in Hebrew thought, Qal Vahomer argument, if even if even an unrighteous judge will respond and give a good gift to this widow because of her persistence, how much more will God give to give good gifts to those who ask him?
And so the question though is, why would why would this make any difference in the first place? And then more particularly, why would persistence kind of make a difference, right? And so with the with with respect to the broader question, one might initially think that asking God to do something couldn’t move him, even putting aside like the strict classical theist issues, it couldn’t move a God who is all knowing, all powerful, and perfectly good.
Why? Because he’s all knowing. He already knows what you need before you ask him. Jesus just says that straight out. He’s all powerful. So it’s not like you’re he needs power. and he’s entirely good, which means if it’s something that would be good for you, presumably he would already want to do that thing. So how could prayer make any difference at all? And to that I would add there’s maybe a number of other premises that one that one could add. And one is that perhaps there are things that God already wants to do.
That God has the power to do and that he knows are already good things to do. But maybe the way he operates in the world is conditioned with respect to the agency of creatures, participation with creatures, free will, and even some broader frameworks, perhaps, of what I call a cosmic conflict. It might be that there are many things that God wants to do, but the way the world is ordered is such that prayer opens up.
Avenues morally or legally for God to do those things that might not otherwise be available to Him. Right. Now, the the straightforward, simplest way to think of it at one level, although the book goes far beyond this one level, because I don’t think this level is sufficient. But at one level, if if you take a view that God grants creatures free will of some kind of significant sense, and God has committed himself to not take back whatever kind of free will he gives humans and take back their agency entirely.
It might be that in some cases, for God to do what he wants to do for us would require that he override our free will in order to do it,
Dru Johnson (30:58)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (30:59)
unless we ask for it. And
Dru Johnson (31:01)
Mm.
John Peckham (31:01)
then we give him permission to do things more, and then it wouldn’t be overriding our will, right? that’s an easy way to see how there could be maybe some kind of a permission structure. Not that God needs permission, he’s all powerful, but if he if he himself binds himself morally to operating within a kind of covenantal back and forth relationship, and I and I make this argument throughout the book.
Then even God is not going to go beyond our free will, and there may be some other constraints on God. So if if that’s true, and I make a a much larger case for why I think that might be true and how it might work, then you could see how prayer could make a difference to open up avenues for God to do what he already wanted to do, what he already knew was a good thing to do and already had the power to do, but it might give him more license to do it.
in r with respect to the way the world is ordered. Then of course we could also ask, well, gonna even if so, why would it matter if one is persistent and comes back over and over and over again? I don’t know if you want me to try to to address that question or you want to pick up on one of the other threads.
Dru Johnson (32:03)
Well, I I well, no,
it’s that’s good. I I was actually gonna just say, can you give just a very quick where do we see God just obviously binding himself or restraining himself? ‘Cause you kinda have this
John Peckham (32:16)
Yeah.
Dru Johnson (32:16)
tension in here that he’s self restrained and then waiting to be opened up. So where where would you like you you can prove text here for the podcast?
John Peckham (32:24)
Okay, okay. So I think there’s a I think there’s a lot of places and here I mean I mean in the sense of a of a of a morally binding divine commitment, right? So it’s it’s adjacent to what some people some people spake speak of in terms of self-limitation. So I’ll put a couple examples on the road on on the on the table I should say, and then I will I will give just kind of a brief illustration so that for many people this might sound like a strange idea, but you probably already have
Most of the pieces of the puzzle in mind, if we just put them on the table. So a couple of places where I think it surfaces quite clearly, especially in a cosmic conflict framework. What I mean by a cosmic conflict is that there is some kind of a cosmic struggle between the kingdom of of light and the kingdom of darkness. This is a major motif throughout scripture. It’s not a struggle between equals, God is all powerful, but somehow
Dru Johnson (33:16)
Yes.
John Peckham (33:17)
the enemy is.
Actually working against the kingdom of God. I argue this is primarily an epistemic conflict, a conflict where the enemy is his tools or lies and slander, because obviously he could not ever combat God at the level of sheer power. But for the devil, even to be allowed to to combat him in any sense, he must be allowed to work within some parameters or within some boundaries, or at least to to slander or deceive, et cetera, et cetera. So we so that’s the broad framework.
Dru Johnson (33:43)
So that’s that’s one piece that
sorry, that’s one piece of the puzzle that most people would kind of already have if you’ve if you drilled down with a bunch of why questions.
John Peckham (33:51)
Yes, I hope so. Right. And so then when it comes to like kind of specific examples where it seems like God is is binding himself or restricting restricting himself. One very striking example is in Daniel 10, where you have Daniel who is praying for understanding about a vision. He’s very concerned about the exile of his people.
Whether the prophecies will be fulfilled, or whether maybe he’s misunderstood those prophecies and the exile is gonna be a lot longer than he thought, etc. etc. He’s been praying, and this has happened more than more than once in the case of Daniel, but in Daniel ten, finally he has a vision, and then an angel comes to him, well, he’s fallen on the ground because of the vision, and and and and says, Daniel, man of high esteem or greatly beloved, I have come in response to your words, in response to your prayer. but but I was
Withstood or opposed by the Prince of Persia. Now, if we read Daniel 10, first of all, we’re told that Daniel was praying and fasting for three weeks. But when the angel comes to him, he says, From the first day, I’ve I came to respond to your prayer. But it takes him three weeks to respond. And the reason that the angel gives is because the prince of Persia withstood or opposed him. Many biblical scholars, I would dare say most biblical scholars believe that the prince of Persia there
Is not just in reference to the human king of Persia, but is referring to a celestial agent, if read in the New Testament lenses, which which which I would read it that way, fall a fallen demonic figure behind the earthly ruler. And that corresponds to later, you know, I was there until the the Michael the Prince came to help me, and Michael is clearly all not a not a human prince or a human ruler.
Dru Johnson (35:29)
Mm-hmm. Right.
John Peckham (35:32)
And so it seems evident that this is an evidence of kind of a cosmic conflict, it’s an epistemic conflict primarily.
but it is a conflict in which God sends an angel, and the angel is apparently delayed by this Prince of Persia in the conflict for three weeks. Now that could only be possible if God is not using all of his power, first of all. and and it seems like this suggests there are some parameters or rules of engagement where God is restricting even the use of his own power. another example that I think is relatively straightforward, there are many examples like these. but in Mark 9, you have the story of.
Of the man who brings his demon-afflicted son first to the disciples, and they couldn’t cast the demon out. And then he comes to Jesus and says, If you can do anything, please help my son. And Jesus responds, If you can, all things are possible to him who believes. And then I I love this part. This is not the reason I’m telling the story, but I just love this part, the response of the man, Lord, I believe, help my unbelief. And and and Jesus doesn’t say to the man, you know, come back to me when you have more faith, right?
Dru Johnson (36:37)
Right.
John Peckham (36:37)
That was enough. He casts, he cast the demon out. And that itself is there’s a whole beautiful theology of faith and prayer there. but the reason I bring this example up now is because in the aftermath of that, the disciples, their pride is hurt, and they ask Jesus, why couldn’t we cast this demon out? And Jesus says there, this kind can only come out by prayer, which suggests that there are some parameters, some what I call rules of engagement for lack of a better term.
Dru Johnson (37:06)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (37:06)
That even
affect miracle working, the demonic agency, etc. You see cases like in Mark 6, where Jesus in his hometown could do no miracle there because of the lack of faith. So it seems like God is binding himself morally to some parameters temporarily within this conflict. And this is why it can make sense for even Jesus to call the devil three times in the book of John the ruler of this world. Paul calls him the God of this world who has blinded the minds of unbelievers.
It’s primarily an epistemic conflict, but there’s some real jurisdiction, some real authority in this conflict. And I I make a case for for for the biblical grounding for this and how this might work and how it might relate to prayer. But in some way, in some sense, the devil is the temporary usurping ruler of this world. and I would argue just kind of as an aside, that he he becomes the ruler through the fall of humanity.
Humanity was God’s vice regents on the earth, and he
Dru Johnson (38:05)
Hm.
John Peckham (38:06)
becomes the usurping ruler in their place. And this is one reason why Christ, one of the things that Christ accomplishes by becoming human, succeeding where humanity failed and takes back the world on behalf of humanity, not by force, but through this plan of redemption that involves a demonstration of God’s righteousness and God’s love that ultimately culminates with the cross and beyond. So those are some of the textual examples of what I call for lack.
Of a better term, rules of engagement in this cosmic conflict that even God seems to consistently abide by. And I would say if someone’s not familiar with this framework and they might think, how’s that possible? Number one, it doesn’t remove God’s sovereignty, it doesn’t diminish his power at all, but it relates more to God’s commitment and promise keeping. So I often ask my students, does the God of the Bible make promises? And the answer is easy, it’s not a trick question.
The God of the Bible is nothing, if not a God who makes promises, right? He is God who makes covenant and he always keeps his covenants. Right? So if God and and the second question I ask them is, does God always keep his promises?
Dru Johnson (39:08)
Mm.
John Peckham (39:09)
And of course the answer is yes. Any promise or commitment he has made, he has therefore morally bound his future action. Hebrews 6 says his prom his promises are unbreakable. you have in First Timothy and in Titus, he cannot deny his own nature. It’s impossible for God to lie.
And so if God makes a commitment or a promise, he has thereby morally bound his future action. And I and I make a a minimal case that scripture depicts God as actually committing himself to abide temporarily within certain parameters in order for this conflict to be settled once and for all. And because it’s an epistemic conflict about lies and deceit and slander, it’s really about trust and and trusting in God and who you will trust, who you’ll give your allegiance to.
That kind of conflict cannot be settled by sheer power. Because
Dru Johnson (39:59)
Hm.
John Peckham (40:00)
if someone raises allegations against your character or my character, or against the character of of someone in power, and they then use that power to silence the accusations, that only makes the problem worse, right? It can o and I would argue don’t it can only be settled by
Dru Johnson (40:12)
Well, some people have not figured that out yet.
I’ll leave it right there.
John Peckham (40:18)
I will I will leave I’ll leave that
one alone. But generally speaking, it
Dru Johnson (40:23)
Yes.
John Peckham (40:23)
only makes the problem worse, right? It it only actually f w should f feed into the allegations of corruption. And so those kinds of allegations or that kind of distrust, which is the enemy’s modus operandi throughout the entire scripture, can only be settled by a demonstration. And that’s what God is doing in this plan of salvation. And prayer takes place within this this framework of
of a cosmic conflict. And we’re living in the way C. S. Lewis put it, we live in enemy occupied territory. And we’re part of I think he says we’re part of the resistance or something like this.
Dru Johnson (40:55)
So I I wanna just point out for those people paying attention, what you’re doing here, which I think is important. I’m I’m very interested in method. And so what again, one of the things I really appreciate about your method is you keep y in in some ways like the early church councils, they keep going back to scripture and trying to figure out if all these things are true, there’s gotta be something that holds it together.
And I think that’s the beauty of the way scripture puts things out there is it makes us work, which means that our epistemic abilities, our abilities to understand things are important to God, as I’ve argued in a couple places. And that, you know, your method is really just going back to scripture and looking at the sweep of it and saying, What is true what must be true, given that all of these things are the case? now
John Peckham (41:40)
That’s right. That’s right.
Dru Johnson (41:41)
at the risk of offending our audience, and insulting their intelligences,
If everything you’re saying is correct, I’m just gonna buy it out of the gates. Everything you said and all the implications that follow from it, it seems like there are some very direct implications for the church, about our prayer life. I wonder what you think the most obvious of those are. And then I also could imagine somebody going somebody taking this the wrong way and saying, that we should just pray, we should pray twenty-four hours a day, and that’s what
makes things happen and walk away from the actual actions of life.
John Peckham (42:20)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah, that’s a that’s a great question. So first on the one hand, I think if we actually believed the framework that prayer can open up avenues for God to do things he already wants to do, that we would pray more fervently, we would pray more seriously. Our prayer life might model more the one who we claim to follow, that is that is Christ, right? Who seemed to prioritize prayer almo over just about everything in in in
Dru Johnson (42:44)
Mm.
John Peckham (42:45)
in his ministry, right? but I think the the the other extreme
is also also problematic. if we think we are only supposed to pray, but then we neglect doing things that are within our sphere of action, we’ve we’ve also made a huge mistake, right? Because we’re called as Christians in many ways, I I wouldn’t take this to its maximal sense either, but we’re called in many ways to be the hands and feet of Christ, right? We’re supposed to reflect his love. And if there’s something within my sphere of influence, yes, pray about it, but if you can actually do something to make it better, you’re right.
Do that and and put that in action. And I actually think a framework, and I and I and I haven’t sufficiently put on the table the full framework. So it’s just a skeleton that I’ve that I’ve presented here, obviously, of what is what is what I try to put forward in the book. But if you actually have this kind of framework in which humans have real agency, that even God is not going to transgress within certain limits, then there’s going to be many things that are going to be temporarily left up to us that God wants to do through us, but if we don’t cooperate with him, they might not be.
Get done. Many, many goods in the world might not be brought about. So those are two twin potential problems. But I think on the on the positive side, that prayer can make a difference should call us to pray more fervently, to be drawing
Dru Johnson (44:05)
Mm.
John Peckham (44:05)
to God in a deeper way. But I I would add we should also avoid the idea. And this is one of the things that I really hope people who read the book or even just hear the discussion here won’t miss.
There is a tendency among some people who do believe in the power of prayer to then think that everything hinges on their prayer.
Dru Johnson (44:24)
Mm.
John Peckham (44:25)
And if they are praying for something, let’s say they’re praying for somebody with an illness, somebody they love, and then their prayer is not answered in the way they wish that it would, they say, I must not have prayed hard enough, or my prayer
Dru Johnson (44:37)
Mm.
John Peckham (44:37)
must not have been faithful enough, or I might have done done something wrong, et cetera, et cetera, as if everything hinges on them.
And so on one side in the book, I make a case that prayer can and does make a difference in many cases because of this free will framework and and rules of engagement framework. But on the other side, there are also many other factors involved with respect to God’s will. There are factors, some of them relate to the way that we relate to God in prayer. But even all of those factors that are within our control, all of them could be in place, and it still might be the case that God does not grant or request.
Even if that request is for one good thing, right? So so just quickly here, one might think, my prayer’s not answered because I’m I’m not in a right relationship with God. It’s true that not being repentant, not being in right relationship with God can affect one’s prayer. Or I’m not praying with the right motivations, as James says, or I’m not praying according to God’s will, or I’m not praying persistently or fervently enough, or on and on. And I have a whole chapter on these elements or factors that that of prayer that scripture mentions make a difference. And yet, all of those factors could be in place and
God still might not grant the prayer as we pray it. And
Dru Johnson (45:45)
Mm.
John Peckham (45:46)
the supreme classical example of that, for which we shouldn’t run to the default of blaming ourselves, is Jesus in Gethsemane. Jesus
Dru Johnson (45:53)
Hm.
John Peckham (45:54)
prays to the Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass. What cup? The cup of his suffering, the cup of his cross. If it is possible, let this cup pass. Then he says, But not my will, but your will be done. And yet the cup did not pass, right? What he prayed for was not
granted.
Was it because he didn’t have enough faith? Of course not. Was it because he wasn’t in a right relationship with God? No. Did he not pray persistently enough? Did he not pray with the right motivate motivations? No, no, no, no. He was he was sinless. He was perfect. He prayed in all the right ways. And that their prayer quest still wasn’t granted for what he asked, even though what he was asking for in isolation was a good thing, right?
Dru Johnson (46:30)
Mm.
John Peckham (46:30)
To avoid suffering and dying on a cross. That’s a good
Dru Johnson (46:32)
Right.
John Peckham (46:33)
thing in and of itself. And I take that prayer there when Christ says, if it is possible, I take that to mean.
Because elsewhere in in Gethsemane, at least in in other in in other parts of the gospel accounts, he says, with you all things are possible. So on one hand he says, if it’s possible, with you all things are possible. I don’t think that to be any kind of a a lack of faith in in God’s power, but I think it should be taken consistently to mean if it’s possible, in keeping with your overarching purposes, given everything you know. And of course, in a vacuum, it was possible for Christ to avoid the cross. He himself, it seems, had the power.
To just,
Dru Johnson (47:10)
Mm-hmm.
John Peckham (47:10)
say, I’m done with this. I’m not gonna die for these people. They’re they’re mocking me, they’re torturing me, I’m just gonna come down from the cross. Now he presumably as divine, he had that power. but if Christ were to avoid the cross, there was no way then for him to save the world. So it was possible in and of itself, but it wasn’t possible in keeping with God’s overarching intentions. And we need to keep that in mind when we’re praying, that just because our prayers are not answered, it doesn’t mean that prayer doesn’t make a difference at all or that prayer doesn’t work, so to speak.
But it means we should always remember there are many other factors involved, many of which we do not see. And this is why prayer can never be thought of as working like magic or working like an algorithm. And I’m very concerned, even though I make a kind of a case for spiritual warfare and a cosmic confidence view of prayer, I’m very concerned about views, spiritual warfare views of prayer that go so far beyond the text that they that they seem more like occultism than they do a a biblical
Dru Johnson (48:00)
Mm.
John Peckham (48:01)
kind of faith, right? We can’t manipulate God. We don’t, we don’t.
In my view, we I don’t see any place where we gain control over the demonic realm or that we’re called to do that, right? And so even though I’m making a strong case that we should take these things seriously, which are generally neglected in the Western world, you could go far to the other extreme, which a with a kind of fixation and
Dru Johnson (48:19)
Mm.
John Peckham (48:20)
a running beyond the text to a kind of something that borders on on occultism. So those are some of the things that I would say about practical implications among others.
Dru Johnson (48:30)
excellent stuff. Doctor John Peckham, thank you so much for your wisdom, your scholarship and your time.
John Peckham (48:38)
Thank you. Thanks for having me, Drew. It was really a pleasure to sp to speak with you and and always good to see you.
