“And shall I pray Thee change Thy will, my Father,
Until it be according unto mine?
But, no, Lord, no, that never shall be, rather
I pray Thee blend my human will with Thine.

I pray Thee hush the hurrying, eager longing,
I pray Thee soothe the pangs of keen desire—
See in my quiet places, wishes thronging—
Forbid them, Lord, purge, though it be with fire” (Amy Carmichael).

I’m revisiting Shadow of the Almighty, the story of Jim Elliot. This time it’s the audiobook read by Elisabeth. My first impression is that sometimes I think Christianity in the early part of the 20th century seems quite a bit different than today’s version of it. For one thing, people talked a whole lot more about taking up crosses and laying doen lives for the sake of the gospel.

I wonder if all the prosperity and freedom of our present culture hasn’t made for a soft Church. You can go back and read that the Church grew the most when it was persecuted the most. A famous early Christian leader said that the blood of the martyrs watered the seed of the Church, and that’s why it grew the way it did.

But also, there’s something to be said for surrender. It’s one thing to pray “Thy will be done” glibly as part of the Lord’s prayer and not really mean it or think through what you’re praying. But as Elisabeth Elliot famously said, when you pray God’s will be done, you’re also praying that your own will be undone if necessary.

If you want to go beyond comfortable cultural Christianity, you’d do well to read the biographies of the faithful of old, especially missionaries like Jim Elliot, Amy Carmichael, Hudson Taylor, and Darlene Deibler Rose. They did more than talk of sacrifice. They did it. They gave up everything that was comfortable and familiar and took the gospel into places it had not been before.

The scary part of praying God’s will is that you don’t know where God will lead you, but the best part is that God will go with you, whether it’s to the other end of the world or across the street. It’s the prayer that never ever fails.