A young mother feeds her baby, wakes up every two hours at night, sleeps less than four hours intermittently and expects the father to help in the morning while she catches up on her rest.

“Don’t worry,” her husband placates. “I will be praying for you.” After all, he has a ministry to run whereas his wife has … secular concerns. He, on the other hand, is hosting an important morning prayer for the pastors of the nation.

In the eyes of the pastors that morning, he sure looks like a spiritual man who sets the example. He is a young father with a newborn, and yet here he is, sacrificing his time to pray for the nation’s families. Plus he just made a lengthy prayer to God concerning his wife and newborn. 

But has he missed the point?

Likewise, it is so when concerns regarding social issues are brought up to us. Our Christian response may be: We will pray!

But root issues need to be resolved – God has given us the roles of salt (Mark 9:50) and light (Matthew 5:14) of the world, not to mention ability plus authority to resolve issues of injustice with our hands, legs and mind.

So have we missed a point?

Don’t get me wrong. It’s not that God doesn’t answer prayers. But God never meant to separate the physical from the spiritual. The physical and spiritual are created intertwined.

God called His physical creation “very good” (Genesis 1:31). Our spiritual acts redeem a defiled physical world through, for instance, cleansing prayers and prophetic acts. But it is only through physical acts that we execute justice and display the righteousness of God to the world.

James 5:16 says the prayers of a righteous person are effective. Isaiah 58 warns that prayer and fasting without justice is not of Him. (Isaiah 59 goes on to warn of God’s judgement on His people because of their indifference to truth and justice, which went on to result in evil.)

This is why God does not excuse us when we see a wounded person and we walk on to attend church. (Read the Parable of the Good Samaritan, Luke 10:25-37) Something is missing there.

This is why Jesus could not look upon the 5,000 who were hungry and not command His disciples: “You, give them something to eat!” 

This is why Mordecai and Esther (Esther 4:1-17) could not stay silent when the king commanded the slaughter of the Jews.

This is why James said true religion is to visit the orphans and the widows (James 1:27).

In all these examples (and there are more throughout the Bible), God thoroughly expected His people to act with justice and righteousness, out of the motivation of love for Him and for people.

Spirituality, or unique spiritual “offices” of prophetic works or intercession, did not exempt the prophets Moses, Elijah, John the Baptist, Jonah, Ezra, Nehemiah, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Micah, Amos or Malachi from the need to speak His truth with love on issues of justice and to act correspondingly – even sacrificially.

Therein lies the challenge – and surrender – required of Christ, and us.

Likewise, on a personal level, we wouldn’t just pray if our child or loved one has a road accident, serious gaming addiction, or is involved with drugs, gangs or gambling. Or would we?

So at a societal level, let’s not just say “let’s pray” and stop there. Yes, let’s pray as we depend utterly on God for our deliverance, but God also expects of us to play our role, for He has given us authority to rule and steward creation! (Genesis 1:28)

Let’s pray and then let us also speak and act with the love of Christ! For true spirituality is rooted in love which compels real sacrifice, not one-dimensional religiosity that is safe but carries the sacred-secular divide deception.

Let’s pray and repent of this root deception and start to apply true spirituality on the root issues of lives! Then we will pray with all our heart, and our prayers shall be powerful and effective!