My Sister Said Jehoshaphat's Prayer Sounds Like Giving Up

My sister Hannah has been a nurse for more than twenty years and she doesn't soften much, so when I told her on Sunday night what this week's post was going to be about, she let me finish and then said, "Wait. We have no might and we don't know what to do is the whole prayer? That sounds like giving up with nicer manners."

I was standing at the sink with the phone on my shoulder and my hands in lukewarm dishwater, and what I said was "Huh." That's what I say when I have nothing, and then I rinsed the same pot twice. I had a decent answer by Monday, after reading the chapter again with Ben banging a pot lid on the floor beside me. This week's Come, Follow Me reading covers 2 Chronicles 14-20, 26 and 30. The piece everyone seems to land on is chapter 20, where a king with an enemy army coming prays out loud in front of everybody and says he's out of ideas. Hannah's reaction is a fair one. I think the chapter answers it.

Is "we have no might" actually a prayer?

Start with where it falls in the story, because verse 3 says "Jehoshaphat feared" and the writer doesn't dress that up. The king is afraid first, and what he does next is set himself to seek the Lord and call a fast. Then the people come in from every city of Judah, and he stands up in front of them at the temple.

The prayer itself takes six verses to get anywhere near the hard part. He reminds God who He is (verse 6), what He did for their fathers (7), what the people built and what they promised to do if trouble came (8 and 9), and then he lays out who is coming against them and what he thinks of it (10 and 11). By the time he gets to the army, he has spent most of a minute reminding himself and everyone listening whose land this is and who gave it to them.

Then verse 12, which is short by comparison and has all of the weight in it.

O our God, wilt thou not judge them? for we have no might against this great company that cometh against us; neither know we what to do: but our eyes are upon thee.

2 Chronicles 20:12

There's a request in it ("wilt thou not judge them?") and an assessment of the situation that happens to be accurate. Then comes an admission that the people in charge have no plan, and then a direction to look.

Hannah would call that a rapid response. A nurse who watches a patient go downhill and calls for the doctor hasn't quit on the patient. She knows exactly where her own skills end, and she picks up the phone.

The last clause is the one I'd underline for a child. Nothing in "but our eyes are upon thee" says how the trouble gets fixed or when. It only says where Judah is looking in the meantime.

The verse about the little ones

Verse 13 is easy to read right past.

And all Judah stood before the Lord, with their little ones, their wives, and their children.

2 Chronicles 20:13

So the children were there, standing in the courtyard while their king told the whole country he didn't know what to do. The text doesn't tell us what any of them thought, and I'd give a lot to know whether some small person tugged on a sleeve and asked what happens now.

What it does tell us is that nobody ran. A man named Jahaziel spoke, the king bowed with his face to the ground, and then the people fell down and worshipped (verses 14 through 18), which is a lot of calm for a crowd with an army on the way. A seven-year-old in that courtyard spent the afternoon watching grown-ups say they were out of their depth and stay put.

Verse 12 gets pulled out as a nice thing to say, and I think that loses the courtyard. Children mostly learn this kind of prayer by hearing it prayed, and what they're listening for is whether a parent can say "I don't know what to do about this" to God out loud, in the kitchen or the car.

How do you teach a scared kid to pray it?

I taught third grade for five years, and "I can't" from an eight-year-old can mean ten different things. It might mean I'm scared, or I didn't hear the directions, or someone laughed at me on Tuesday, or I'd just rather not. The first job was always to find out which one, because you can't help with "I can't." You can help with "I don't know where to start on the long division and everybody else already is."

Jehoshaphat's prayer does that sorting for a child, and I'd break it into three pieces. They're small enough to say at a bedside.

First, say how big the thing is, and use the real words. "Help me have a good day" gives a child nothing to hold, but "the hand dryer in the new school bathroom is so loud I hold my breath and I don't know where to sit at lunch" is a real sentence about a real morning. The king names the people at the door, Ammon and Moab and Mount Seir (verse 10), when he could have just said he was in trouble.

Second, say you don't know what to do. This is the one adults skip most, and I think kids skip it because we do. It feels like the wrong thing to confess to God, who already knows.

Third, say where you're looking. A child can do this one in four words, which is about what the verse takes. "I'm looking at you."

A seven-year-old with a loud hand dryer might put the whole thing as "Heavenly Father, that bathroom is too loud and I don't know what to do and I'm looking at you."

If a child can't get words out loud at all, there are smaller steps before that, and I wrote about one of them in Lily couldn't say the closing prayer, so we started smaller.

You go first.

Say it in front of them about your own too-big thing, a diagnosis in the family or a bill or a decision you can't see the end of, and say it plainly, at the table or in the car with the radio off.

What the prayer doesn't do

It isn't a method for making the team or passing the test, and the chapter says as much. The answer Jahaziel gave starts with the battle not being theirs (verse 15), and then comes verse 17.

Ye shall not need to fight in this battle: set yourselves, stand ye still, and see the salvation of the Lord with you, O Judah and Jerusalem: fear not, nor be dismayed; to morrow go out against them: for the Lord will be with you.

2 Chronicles 20:17

The last part says "to morrow go out against them," so they still had to walk out. Verse 20 has them up early the next morning and heading into the wilderness, and verse 21 puts the singers at the front of the army.

Nobody stayed home. A child who prays this before a tryout or a spelling test still has to walk in, and still might not make the cut, so the extra lesson with the coach and the tutor and the older cousin who knows the material all still count. Say the prayer along with them.

A few verses on, Jehoshaphat goes right back to making a bad call. Verses 35 through 37 have him joining himself with a king who "did very wickedly," and the ships they built together are broken.

Frequently Asked Questions

Is it okay for a little kid to say "I don't know what to do" to God?

Yes. Little kids are usually more honest about this than we are, and they'd say it to God the way they say it to you if nobody corrected them into politeness.

What if my child prays it and the tryout goes badly anyway?

Sit in the car a minute before you start the engine. I wouldn't tell them God must have had a reason, since they won't believe it and you can't know it. Tell them you watched them walk in scared, and let that be the thing you talk about on the way home.

Is being afraid a sign of weak faith?

No, and verse 3 is my proof. The king "feared," and in that same sentence he sets himself to seek the Lord. Show it to any child who has been told that scared means faithless.

Do I have to use the King James words?

No. "We have no might against this great company" is hard to say with a straight face over cereal, so keep the three pieces and let the child say them however they talk. I'd read the real verse aloud once so they know where it came from, and after that it's theirs.

One question for you

I'd really like to know what the sentence is in your house. What do you actually say to your child before something that scares them, and is there one you wish you'd had ready?

with love, Melissa