The "Praying Wife" Deceit!

There is nothing as unscriptural as the belief held by many Christian circles that a "praying wife" and or a "praying mother" is essential for the success of the husband or the children.

American Pentecostalism had always sold certain individuals' experiences within the context of religion as the "new thing" that everybody must buy or key into in order to make it in life.

Capitalism's influence on true spirituality sold performative religious rites as the norm rather than the exception.

Intercessory prayer is valid and acceptable as a form of prayer that believers must engage in, but in true Christianity, an arrangement where the wife is forever on her knees while her husband barely knows the Lord is not acceptable as a form of worship.

An arrangement where the mother is praying fervently while the children are living a life of little or no regard to God is not the arrangement Jesus gave his life for.

Job made sacrifices for his children daily, but the devil still killed them like flies. He didn't train the children to make sacrifices for themselves and know God for themselves.

The responsibility for any relationship lies in the hands of the two people who are in a relationship and not on a third party.

Imagine that you introduce a young man to a young lady, but neither of them shows any interest, and you, as the third party had to beg, pray, force, cajole, manipulate, convince, throw tantrums, negotiate, cry, and plead on behalf of one party so that the other party can be patient and wait and bless or be warm to the party.

How do you think that kind of a relationship will fare?

Mothers who didn't raise their children properly end up having crooks for children. To compensate for this, they end up taking up religion to pray and plead on behalf of their children in the place of prayer.

Carmela Corleone, the wife of Don Vito Corleone in The Godfather, was a classic example of this.

A mother who raised her children properly would only bless them as they walk with God, and her children shall give her peace and become successful in all their endeavours.

Salvation is a personal thing, and having a relationship with God is a very personal thing. A father's faith cannot grant salvation to the son, a mother's salvation does not cover her children, and a wife's devotion does not count for her husband.

Again, A father, mother, or wife can intercede in the place of prayer for a loved one. Intercession could buy time, delay evil from befalling the individual, cause the person to be favoured to get a job, a contract, or a visa, but these are temporary fixes.

What God desires is to have a relationship with every one of us without any form of intermediary or proxy "standing in the Gap".

God does not want that GAP to exist at all.

All those standing in it are occupying an office that should not exist for that purpose.

For God so loved the world that he gave his only begotten son, that WHOSOEVER believe in him should not perish but have everlasting life.

Faith is a personal thing.

I have come across many men who say, "My wife is a prayer warrior; she is the one praying for me to succeed, and her prayers are effective over my destiny."

They say this when things are going well for them.

When things go sour for them in their career or business, they lash out at their wives, "Your mates are praying for their husbands, you are here pressing your phone. What is God saying? Tell me what the pastor said, pray that I get this contract, and I will buy you a car, etc."

I have seen wives who claim that it is their prayer that made their husband successful. This claim is a fallacy!

The first woman I know who made the claim was very fervent in the place of prayer. Her husband was an average person until he got an opportunity to travel to the USA.

When he got to the USA, he married another wife, and his wife in Nigeria stopped praying for him out of anger over being betrayed.

The man became richer and richer. The more the man became successful, the more this woman became bitter and resentful.

She felt God ought to stop blessing the man, but it didn't work that way, and the man was not a believer.

I see many people writing erroneously that their wives are their spiritual backbone! This is foolishness!

Nobody can be another person's spiritual backbone!

Ignorance makes people claim things that are not real as real, even though there is no scriptural backing for such.

I have seen wives who claimed that when they stopped praying for their husbands, he stopped prospering.

I have seen mothers who claimed that when they stopped praying for their children, they stopped prospering.

When I investigated the claim, it was a lie.

God did not put anybody's right to prosper in the hands of a third party. Your destiny is in your own hands!

If a wife's duty is to pray for her husband to succeed in life, then the man should marry many wives so that he can have a harem of prayer warriors lifting him up spiritually every day. Isn't that ridiculous?

Where we ought to train, we shouldn't pray! Parents must establish their children in a relationship with God (Not religion), and Spouses should establish their other halves in a relationship with God (Not religion).

Everybody must know God for themselves.

How can a man be expected to give an account of his life before God when his wife or his mother is the one who has been in charge of his spiritual well-being?

It is good to have a supportive spouse who prays with you and prays for you out of love, but this prayer is not to be taken as a substitute for the spouse having a relationship with God himself or herself.

I met a lawyer recently who was an orphan until she met this twenty-five years old man at the University of Ibadan at the age of 17.

She said she needed a mentor at the time, and he was in his final year and a member of the Christian fellowship she was attending.

He took an interest in her, and she leaned on him.

He graduated and kept in touch while she continued to study with the aid of a scholarship.

He didn't get a job after graduation and had to move back to his parents' house.

She crowdfunded for law school and became successful through her hard work, grit, and relationship with God.

She got a job, rented an apartment, and started building her career. This man, who started sleeping with her when she was nineteen, moved in with her.

She started feeding him and providing for him.

He told her she was his ministry.

God had called him to be her personal spiritual backing, and without his prayer, she wouldn't have become as successful as she was.

This lady wrote to me asking if a born-again Christian who has a relationship with God needed God to give her such a man whose sole job was to pray for her while she makes the money and splits her earnings with him.

She is very intelligent, but sometimes intelligence bows to manipulation without the right perspective.

Many Christians like her are suffering from the lies of prophets, pastors, spiritualists, marabouts, and spouses who convinced them that their relationship with God is inadequate in itself. "If not for my prayer and spiritual backing for you, you would not be this successful." This is manipulation at its best.

She was able to break free of him, and she is flying higher and higher daily in Christ today.

You have an audience of ONE.

I have an audience of ONE.

My walk with God is personal.

Your walk with God is personal.

I have a relationship with God.

You have a relationship with God.

This is what true Christianity is: a personal relationship with Jesus Christ.

-GSW-