Breaking Out of Default Mode
How to Go Beyond the Fix-it Prayer
By Kay Horner
Years ago, as our friends were engaged in family devotions, their youngest son asked, “Daddy, when are we going to do the prayer forecasts?” Even as a preschooler, he had already learned the routine of praying “fix-it” prayers.
Presenting requests for God to intervene in our lives or difficult circumstances of friends and family is not wrong. The Bible instructs us to pray for redemption, healing, and restoration, to ask the Father for our daily bread, to cast our cares on Him, and so much more. However, we must constantly be aware of the tendency to allow “fix-it” prayers to become our default mode. Jesus also taught His disciples to pray, “Your kingdom come, your will be done, on earth as it is in heaven” (Matt. 6:10).
As we mature in our faith and develop a deepening relationship with God, we begin to view life more from His perspective and expand our appreciation for the bigger picture.
In his book Flame of Love, Clark Pinnock reminds us that “our desire for God did not originate with us. We didn’t initiate the possibility of this relationship. The Trinity made it possible and kindled the desire within us. . . . It is God who invites us to join in the Trinitarian conversation already occurring.”1
How amazing to realize that the sovereign God of the universe didn’t need the world to affirm Himself since the Persons (Father, Son, and Holy Spirit) are already fulfilled in one another. Yet, through creation, He opened a way that we could join in this intimate relationship—to hear His heartbeat and pursue His desires, confirmed by His Word. One foundational concept for breaking out of our default mode is believing that prayer—or communing with our heavenly Father—is a privilege, far surpassing any checklist or obligatory devotional moment.
The depth of our inspiration must be rooted in the power of our love for Christ—not in His response to our petitions. Rather than merely wrestling with God, feeling stuck, and trying to get Him to take care of our needs or attempting to serve all His needs, we must develop a desire for experiencing His presence. Holding to the hem of His garment and esteeming the Lord Jesus Christ above all else will release God’s plan and purpose for our lives and our prayers.
Moses’ Passionate Plea
Moses provides one of the most powerful examples in Scripture of pursuing the presence of God, and doing so with a Kingdom mindset. We can be relatively sure that all the prayers of the great men and women of Scripture were not documented for posterity, but our heavenly Father obviously felt some were significant enough to echo throughout time and eternity! Moses’ impassioned prayer for God’s presence to go with His people and for a revelation of His glory is one of those prayers (Ex. 33:7–23).
Keep in mind that reading this written prayer without the Holy Spirit inspiring or breathing it into our spirits is much like reading an email or a text message. You can’t hear the voice tone or inflection. You can’t see the desperation in Moses’ eyes. You don’t hear the urgency in his voice or see the humility of his posture. So let’s first establish the context surrounding this conversation and some background behind his motivation for a face-to-face talk with Yahweh!
Less than 40 days had passed since the Israelites pledged to keep the Law God had given them from Mount Sinai (Ex. 24:3). Yet while Moses was communing with God on Mount Sinai and receiving instructions for constructing the tabernacle furnishings and establishing a pattern of worship, they had already broken the first and second commandments with their worship of the golden calf. God became so angry, He threatened to destroy all of them and start over with Moses’ offspring. In fact, Moses was angry enough to smash the tablets of stone written by God Himself.
After the people had suffered extreme punishment, Moses interceded for them for God’s forgiveness, even offering to be blotted out of God’s book (Ex. 32:32). This was going way beyond a quick, “fix-it” mentality to a Kingdom mindset.
God relented from the threat of extermination and told Moses to get moving and “lead the people to the place I spoke of” (32:34). The major problem is that He only agreed to send an angel before this bunch of “stiff-necked people” to drive out the Canaanites, Amorites, and other “ites” in the land. For us, the thought of an angel of the Lord contending with those who contend with us, and driving them back like the chaff before the wind (Ps. 35:1–6) may sound pretty awesome. For Moses and the children of Israel, who had experienced the visible evidence of the Lord’s presence in the cloud by day and pillar of fire by night, this was bad news (Ex. 33:4).
Moses’ Pattern for Prayer
Moses would not be content until God was intimately present in his own life and in the lives of the people whom God had called him to lead. Moses’ desperate plea was: “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here” (33:15). Let’s review his pattern for prayer that occurred in his usual place (tent) of meeting, alone with God outside the camp.
This wasn’t a monologue. It was a dialogue—“he said, God said” kind of conversation. Moses talked with God, and God responded. Based on the word he received from the Lord, Moses boldly made his request. This happens no less than six times in 11 verses of Exodus 33. We can never underestimate the power of praying the Word.
Near the end of January 2015, I was involved in the National Prayer Committee meetings in Phoenix, AZ—when most of the nation was focused on the Super Bowl in that city. As prayer leaders from around the nation, we had come for a different reason. But the Lord soon turned our attention to a critical prayer need. For weeks prior to our arrival, law enforcement, travel, and hospitality personnel had been trained and equipped to address the significant problem of sex trafficking. Unfortunately, this had emerged as a prominent issue associated with the Super Bowl and Pro Bowl—both held in Phoenix within one week of each other.
We joined local prayer efforts, driving throughout the city, prayerwalking, and praying on the actual site of the game. My prayer team was drawn to decree and declare God’s Word: “Yes, captives will be taken from warriors, and plunder retrieved from the fierce; I will contend with those who contend with you, and your children I will save” (Isa. 49:25).
The Lord’s plan to release captives was confirmed the day following Super Bowl 49 when major media sources reported, “Hundreds . . . Arrested in Sex-trafficking Sting that Culminated on Super Bowl Sunday.” The sheriff’s office said 54 women and 14 juveniles nationwide were “rescued.” We were thankful to have been invited to join God in His agenda.
Reminding God
Moses was also emboldened by God’s Word and calling. He essentially reminded Yahweh: “You are the One who has been telling me to bring up this people. You are the One who has acknowledged me by name as Your own chosen and called vessel, and given me the necessary favor to execute Your will. I’m in this situation because of Your invitation and initiative.”
When we sense God calling us to a deeper level of praying Kingdom prayers, we can be encouraged by the fact that He didn’t send an army with tanks to deliver two-plus million people from bondage in Egypt. As someone once said, “He sent one little old man with a stick, a stutter, and a criminal record for murder, then called him to confront the impossible.”
Obviously, Moses needed to know not only the person of God, but the plan of God. So he confidently asked not only for the right thing, but with the right motivation. “If you are pleased with me, teach me your ways so I may know you and continue to find favor with you. Remember that this nation is your people” (Ex. 33:13).
Whether we witness one person delivered from the strongholds of Satan, or intercede for an entire nation to repent and turn from their wickedness, we will need to progressively become more deeply and intimately acquainted with the Deliverer. Our confidence increases in the presence of the God of impossibilities!
God’s Promise of His Presence
God promised His Presence would go with Moses and give him rest (33:14). This was a wonderful revelation, but the determined, unselfish leader wanted more. He prayed God’s answer back to him and changed the pronoun from second person singular to third person plural: “If your Presence does not go with us, do not send us up from here. How will anyone know that you are pleased with me and with your people unless you go with us? What else will distinguish me and your people from all the other people on the face of the earth?” (33:15–16, emphasis added).
What was the Lord’s answer? “I will do the very thing you have asked, because I am pleased with you and I know you by name.” (33:17). In other words, you’ve spent time in My presence, developing a relationship with Me!
The point of the entire chapter is that by His grace, the Lord will renew His covenant promises with His people, distinguishing them as unique because of His presence. The word “presence” is a plural noun always used as a singular, referring to the face or faces, the part that turns, in front or before.2 It is used eight times in this one chapter as evidence that the “faces” of the triune God would turn from His anger to go before His people. We would do well to remember and be encouraged that this ever-present God’s name is Immanuel, God with us!
Mediating the Presence of God
We might like to stay in that place by the Lord, hidden by His hand in the cleft of the Rock. But He calls us to take up the mantle of ministry He has given us and face a hurting, broken world. Moses emerged a changed man following his encounter with the Lord God, who is “compassionate and gracious, slow to anger, and abounding in love and faithfulness” (34:6). He understood that to do God’s work—yet miss His presence—is the wrong way to go. To experience God’s presence and not fulfill His plan for your life is the wrong place to stop.
Moses moved beyond the default mode to exploring God’s nature and character by spending time in His presence. The solitude and personal worship of this man of prayer led to an ability to mediate the very nature and presence of God to the people.
Later in Numbers 14, Moses remembers what God previously said, recorded in Exodus 34:6–7, as he prays for Him to pardon the sin of this people according to His great love (14:17–19). Why did he have to mediate with God for the people so many times? The Word tells us, “He made known his ways to Moses, his deeds to the people of Israel” (Ps. 103:7).
Will we settle for being, as the children of Israel were, people who saw God’s acts, deeds, and miracles—or will we move to a depth of prayer and relationship to be like Moses, who knew God’s ways, character, and nature?
The people knew what God did, but Moses knew God!
1Clark H. Pinnock, Flame of Love: A Theology of the Holy Spirit (Downers Grove, IL: 1996), 46.
2Strong’s Hebrew and Greek Dictionaries, quoted in E-Sword, Digital Software Version 10.0.5, Copyrighted by Rick Myers, Franklin, TN: 2002–2012.
KAY HORNER is the executive director of Awakening America Alliance and national coordinator for Cry Out America. She is a member of the National Prayer Committee.