Book Review: Praying the Bible by Donald S. Whitney

 

This is a quick read. It is somewhat repetitive, so it successfully reinforces points made throughout the book well. 

I confess. I struggle with prayer and intimacy with God. It hasn’t been too great. So pray for me. 

The youth pastor at my church gave me a copy because he knew I would be blessed by this book. This is what I was looking for: a book explaining how to pray through the Scriptures. 

Do you ever notice in your prayer life, repeating the same old things with the same old words. I notice it in my life, and used to think I was so “un-Spiritual”. And maybe I was or maybe I just didn’t know how to pray very well.

Whitney points out that this method, done correctly is a fail proof method, because you are literally praying through the Bible itself. As you pray through Scripture (often Psalms is a good starting place), he guides you into an approach that is extremely simple. 

It’s easy to work through. Essentially go through a passage verse by verse and as you meditating on your reading, pray through the verses you encounter. It’s okay to move onto the next verse of Scripture if the previous one confuses you or nothing to mind. It’s okay. I have to continually remind myself that is is okay to pray through a particular Psalm and skip a couple verses if I don’t understand them or whatever. The Word will never return void. I have to believe that the Word will impact my life. 

I very much enjoy “intellectual” Christianity, by which I mean reading theology and philosophy, apologetics, learning Dutch just to read Neo-Calvinist literature, stuff like that. I enjoy that, but I have noticed it take up too much of my mind sometimes. I can sometimes be bogged down by details that I forget the simple faith. It is better to pray through Scripture than be an “intellectual” Christian. I needed this book. It’s really a must read, but it does have a couple drawbacks. 

I found myself having a bit of trouble praying through some of the psalms. Psalm 23 is relatively simple to pray through but what about Psalms of lament, or “revenge” Psalms, Psalms where the author is pleading God to destroy his enemies. How do we as Christians who are to turn the other cheek, those who are to pray for those who persecute us; how are we to pray through passages such as those? I don’t know the answer right now, but it would have been nice to get more guidance on “troubling” passages in the Psalms and various other places throughout Scripture. 

Another slight con was that the book didn’t cover praying through the rest of Scripture in too much detail. The Psalms are given ample pages, and rightly so, considering genre structure, but it would have been nice to get some guidance on how to pray through Revelation or 1st Samuel. Just some thoughts, tips and tricks for praying through other genres than “Song” would have made this book even better. 

If you struggle with your prayer life, as many Christians do, and all Christians can improve, get this book. Whitney is a pastor and understands your struggles. He’s very encouraging and suggests a praying methodology that works. Sometimes it may be awkward to pray through a Psalm, but ask God to help you pray. I often pray, “God I have no idea what to pray in this Psalm. It just doesn’t seem to match to what New Testament Christians are to say. Please guide my prayer life.” 

Summary 

• This is a must read if you feel your prayer life is in shambles but also if you desire to improve your already deep prayer life.
• Really pastoral. Whitney understands his readers
• Could use some explanation and examples of praying through Scriptures other than the Psalms.
• Praying through Scripture is simple and quite easy because it’s His words.

I strongly suggest this book.