Jabez: The Liberating Power of Painful Events
Bruce Wilkinson, former college professor, founder of Walk Thru the Bible Ministries and Dream Africa, is one the most effective Bible teachers of the last 50 years. He has done more to help the average person understand how to interpret and apply scripture than anyone in his era. That's why I was disappointed with his still immensely popular book THE PRAYER OF JABEZ in which he promulgates a popular miss interpretation of an obscure Biblical reference:
God often respond to our prayer miraculously doing things only He can do, as he did with Jabez. Yet He just as surely works through life's routine. He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. The record of God's work is not to impress us with the spectacular, but to use the spectacular to change the way we respond to Him. Biblical interpretation finds the timeless life principles that transforms us whether God works through the mundane or the miraculous. The problem with Wilkinson's JABEZ is that it makes God's actions contingent on how we pray. Even the oft quote verses about praying in Jesus name are references to His authority in our lives, rather than a formula used to get the results we want. Wilkinson's book THE PRAYER OF JABEZ sounds more like the theology of Janis Joplin than it does the Bible.
Since every word of scripture has a specific teaching principle for the transformation of our lives (2 Timothy 3:16 &17; 2 Peter 1:3 &4) even the genealogies of scripture are important. The books of Chronicles are a religious history of Israel. Probably written by the Priest Ezra for the people after they returned from exile to remind them how God repeatedly redeemed the people from the consequences of their sin. It is above all else the record of how God used the chosen people to prepare for the Messianic coming, and to be an historic picture of redemption for all time. In the midst of this long list of who beget whom the list is interrupted by the record of Jabez. His life reveals that God redeems, liberates and transforms us through the painful events of our lives.
The name Jabez comes from the Hebrew yabets. It probably means "grief or sorrow." The passage emphasized that his mother named him "sorrow" as a description of how he was born. She uses a different word otseb to describe her labor. Otseb can also mean sorrow, but is more often translated as some form of the word idol or wickedness. Jabez's prayer asks God's hand to be with him through atsob "hurt, pain or grief" and that God would keep him from me ah ra, and adjectival form of the word ra, meaning adversity. It is probably best translated as evil or harm. The Hebrew hearing this passage read in the synagogue would have heard a repeated call from Jabez to be liberated from a the damage done through painful sometimes evil things that had happened to him.
The Hebrew hearing this passage read in the synagogue would have heard a repeated call from Jabez to be liberated from a the damage done through painful sometimes evil things that had happened to him.
His prayer to "expand his territory" must be understood it this context. Jabez seems to be a man who rose above the circumstance of a painful and sorrowful family life to become a man who was greatly honored.
Out of a 34 word Hebrew verse there are five words that can be translated sorrow or pain. Why such an emphasis on pain? What does it have to do with Jabez's prayer? Jabez is listed as a descendant of Perez (1 Chronicles 4:1). Perez was the product of Judah's incestuous relationship with his daughter-in-law Tamar (Genesis 38:12- 30; 1 Chronicles 2:4 & 5; 4:1). The name Perez is a noun form of the word perets, meaning a breech or broken. Perez was born into a family system that was broken. Many of Perez's descendant were violent people, warrior. Is it possible that Jabez's mother description of his birth is more of a reference to the family environment into which he was born than to her labor? The verse implies that Jabez was born into a social system that had little opportunity or may even have been oppressive. Far from anticipating a wonderful future for her precious beautiful baby boy the mother sees his future as sorrowful, yet his mother's worries were unfounded
Instead of living a life broken and breeched because of painful events the text says he "was more honorable than his brothers." The word "honorable" is from nikbad, often translated "respected." This is no aspersion on his brothers it simply contrast the concern his mother had for how his life would turn out with the way it actually did. 1 Chronicles 2:55 records a town named Jabez "where scribes lived." If this town was named after this Jabez, then it means he was a very important person in Israel. (In the ancient world and today cities are often named after highly respected accomplished people -- Washington, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Seattle.) Since scribes lived there it is possible that the namesake of the city was a great scribe or scholar. Although the text does not say this Jabez was a scholar. The context in which town of Jabez is mentioned tends to favor the view that it was named after him. Out of a family system that was broken and dysfunctional Jabez became an important man, perhaps even a great scholar for whom an academic center was named.
Jabez's life is an example of how God will work to redeem Israel. Both books of Chronicles record the history of a broken dysfunctional nation. Some of the national leaders attempted to overcome the national problems through hard work, political alliances, or even false religion. Those who successfully overcame obstacles, trusted God's the same way Jabez did. They renewed the covenant with God and prayed humbly for his blessing. The record of Jabez's life provides the structure and theme for all 1st Chronicles and is repeated in the famous theme verse of the 2 Chronicles.
The one thing all human beings have in common with Jabez, that makes this section of scripture so practical, is that we all experience pain and suffering, all of our families are broken, all of our relationships have been breeched. Jabez teaches us how God can use our history to shape His heritage. Jabez remembered his difficult and painful past and as part of God's work in his life. The memory of Judah's incest had been preserved in the family history. As the books of Chronicles would progress they would record that all but eight kings were evil. They worshiped idols, tried to defeat the nations enemies, overcome its struggle or assuage its past pain through attempting to control the national destiny. Jabez sets the stage for the eight Kings who allowed God to shape the national heritage.
When Jabez remembered his family history he went back beyond Judah to remember Judah's father Jacob, later named Israel. Jacob had schemed and manipulated to make himself great until he learned that his success came because of a covenant entered into by his grandfather, Abraham with God. Abraham also tried to manipulate and control events on his own, out of his scheming came an opposing nation through his son, Ishmael. Despite Abraham's lies and Jacob schemes, God remained faithful. God worked to create the nation of Israel and bring the Messiah into human history despite human frailties. Many of Perez descendants tried to suppress memories, and overcome the stigma of their past. They tried reveling in pleasure to overcome pain. None of it worked. Jabez acknowledged the reality of his painful past, but at the same time called upon God, to redeem it.
People who experience great trauma will sometimes attempt to suppress the memory of events, hide them, turn to things that will make them forget, and often in an attempt to control the pain it becomes the force that control their lives. Some are even unable to cope with the memories and take rash or irrational actions to stop the painful memories or feelings. Scholars have found that intensity of pain has no bearing on disability. Some people are unable to function with just a small amount of pain or with an inconvenience, while other pain and suffering puts no limits on their functionality (Melamed, S.Z. Grosswasser, and M. Sterm, Acceptance of Disability Work Involvement and Subjective Rehabilitation Status of Traumatic Brain Injured Patients, Brain Injury 6: 233- 243 reference in Hayes, Stephen, C. Get Out of Your Mind into Your Life: The New Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, New Harbinger Publications, Copyright 2005 by Stephen C. Hayes and Spencer Smith). Jabez understood that traumatic events could be remembered as happening in the past without controlling either our thought or feeling.
Rather than attempting to suppress his thoughts, relieve his pain or solve problems he could no longer control, he called upon the God of Israel who shapes those events for a godly heritage. Jabez called upon God to shape his heritage despite his history. He asked God to expand his border of his influence. The covenant made with Israel was a covenant of land. God gave them a land to possess. He did this so that their influence might be extended to the nations, that all people might understand the message of grace foundational to Israel's history (Exodus 19:5 & 6). Jabez's prayer is for the Spirit to use his life in a way that increases his influence on others to enter into relationship with the God of Israel. Those of us who live under the new covenant understand that Christ's sacrifice has given Him authority over the world (Galatians 6: 13- 16) and that we who follow Christ are to be influential for the cause of Christ throughout the world (1 Peter 2: 4-6).
When we realize that God's hand shapes every event in our lives to expand his kingdom we need not be controlled by past events, no matter how traumatic. We can recognize that our memories no matter how painful are a record of God's redeeming work in our lives. We can trust God for blessing even in our pain. Jabez asked God to bless him and to keep the painful memories of his past from "harm." The word harm is the meahrah, it is almost always translated evil. Jabez is praying that God would keep his past from overcoming him and leading him to some evil, selfish attempt to overcome his pain.
This genealogical reference points backward to the God of Israel who shaped events in the life of Judah and Perez so that even through the suffering caused by incest God would bring about the birth of Jesus and the redemption of all people. It points forward to the record that would be written of the results of Kings who walked with God and those who did not.
I've often wondered why the author used such an obscure person to make his point. Jabez is not remembered for any accomplishment. We do not know where he was born or where he was buried. We only know that he had a life effected by traumatic effects of pain and suffering. His actions and contributions will be long forgotten but we can all learn an eternal lesson about redemption from him. An obscure person like Jabez is very much like those of us reading this post today. Most of us will never be remembered beyond a couple of generations.
Pain and suffering is a reality of life that we all will experience. We are unable to change our history. We can only accept the reality we face and either allow God to use it to shape our heritage or allow it to destroy us. Everyone reading this is suffering through something, or you will be soon. Techniques to feel better will only defeat you. Attempts to suppress memories will only make them come flooding back, but if you call upon the God of Abraham, give your life to him, God will use the painful events of your life to shape your heritage, to bring you into relationship with him. Pain is the most liberating experience God gives us. Jabez does not call us to fatalism, or to destructive behavior, rather he calls us to recognize that painful action and events even of our own making need not shape our present or destroy our future. That all these things God is using to perfect us, to liberate us and to redeem us.
Jabez was more honorable than his brothers; and his mother called his name Jabez, saying, “Because I bore him in pain.” Jabez called upon the God of Israel, saying, “Oh that you would bless me and enlarge my border, and that your hand might be with me, and that you would keep me from harm so that it might not bring me pain!” And God granted what he asked. (1 Chronicles 4:9-10 ESV)Wilkinson makes a common exegetical mistake expecting historical events to repeat themselves if we act the right way. The Bible records (Acts 19:11) that towels and aprons that touched Paul's skin were used to heal the sick. Even though God used towels and clothes to heal in the past the record of these event in no way establishes the use of prayer towels for healing. The scripture records God's activity in history and human lives. There is no guarantee that God's action will be repeated. Jabez's prayer is no formula for effective prayer. For Wilkinson Jabez was a guy with a lot of problems who lived an honorable life. When he prayed to God for more land God gave him more than he requested. If we live like Jabez' and follow his prayer formula God will give us more than we ask. Using two ancedotes he illustrates how understanding Jabez's prayer to expand his territory can enlarge the results of our prayers: A female student of his at Multnomah School of the Bible was discouraged, because no one was dating her. She had no marriage prospects. He prayed with her the way Jabez prayed and she was soon married. Second a group of pastor's were struggling to find transportation from Portland Oregon to a national pastor's conference in Atlanta. Wilkinson lead them in Jabez's prayer and a 747 was donated for the trip.
God often respond to our prayer miraculously doing things only He can do, as he did with Jabez. Yet He just as surely works through life's routine. He is the same yesterday, today and tomorrow. The record of God's work is not to impress us with the spectacular, but to use the spectacular to change the way we respond to Him. Biblical interpretation finds the timeless life principles that transforms us whether God works through the mundane or the miraculous. The problem with Wilkinson's JABEZ is that it makes God's actions contingent on how we pray. Even the oft quote verses about praying in Jesus name are references to His authority in our lives, rather than a formula used to get the results we want. Wilkinson's book THE PRAYER OF JABEZ sounds more like the theology of Janis Joplin than it does the Bible.
Since every word of scripture has a specific teaching principle for the transformation of our lives (2 Timothy 3:16 &17; 2 Peter 1:3 &4) even the genealogies of scripture are important. The books of Chronicles are a religious history of Israel. Probably written by the Priest Ezra for the people after they returned from exile to remind them how God repeatedly redeemed the people from the consequences of their sin. It is above all else the record of how God used the chosen people to prepare for the Messianic coming, and to be an historic picture of redemption for all time. In the midst of this long list of who beget whom the list is interrupted by the record of Jabez. His life reveals that God redeems, liberates and transforms us through the painful events of our lives.
The name Jabez comes from the Hebrew yabets. It probably means "grief or sorrow." The passage emphasized that his mother named him "sorrow" as a description of how he was born. She uses a different word otseb to describe her labor. Otseb can also mean sorrow, but is more often translated as some form of the word idol or wickedness. Jabez's prayer asks God's hand to be with him through atsob "hurt, pain or grief" and that God would keep him from me ah ra, and adjectival form of the word ra, meaning adversity. It is probably best translated as evil or harm. The Hebrew hearing this passage read in the synagogue would have heard a repeated call from Jabez to be liberated from a the damage done through painful sometimes evil things that had happened to him.
The Hebrew hearing this passage read in the synagogue would have heard a repeated call from Jabez to be liberated from a the damage done through painful sometimes evil things that had happened to him.
His prayer to "expand his territory" must be understood it this context. Jabez seems to be a man who rose above the circumstance of a painful and sorrowful family life to become a man who was greatly honored.
Out of a 34 word Hebrew verse there are five words that can be translated sorrow or pain. Why such an emphasis on pain? What does it have to do with Jabez's prayer? Jabez is listed as a descendant of Perez (1 Chronicles 4:1). Perez was the product of Judah's incestuous relationship with his daughter-in-law Tamar (Genesis 38:12- 30; 1 Chronicles 2:4 & 5; 4:1). The name Perez is a noun form of the word perets, meaning a breech or broken. Perez was born into a family system that was broken. Many of Perez's descendant were violent people, warrior. Is it possible that Jabez's mother description of his birth is more of a reference to the family environment into which he was born than to her labor? The verse implies that Jabez was born into a social system that had little opportunity or may even have been oppressive. Far from anticipating a wonderful future for her precious beautiful baby boy the mother sees his future as sorrowful, yet his mother's worries were unfounded
Instead of living a life broken and breeched because of painful events the text says he "was more honorable than his brothers." The word "honorable" is from nikbad, often translated "respected." This is no aspersion on his brothers it simply contrast the concern his mother had for how his life would turn out with the way it actually did. 1 Chronicles 2:55 records a town named Jabez "where scribes lived." If this town was named after this Jabez, then it means he was a very important person in Israel. (In the ancient world and today cities are often named after highly respected accomplished people -- Washington, Cleveland, Pittsburgh, Seattle.) Since scribes lived there it is possible that the namesake of the city was a great scribe or scholar. Although the text does not say this Jabez was a scholar. The context in which town of Jabez is mentioned tends to favor the view that it was named after him. Out of a family system that was broken and dysfunctional Jabez became an important man, perhaps even a great scholar for whom an academic center was named.
Jabez's life is an example of how God will work to redeem Israel. Both books of Chronicles record the history of a broken dysfunctional nation. Some of the national leaders attempted to overcome the national problems through hard work, political alliances, or even false religion. Those who successfully overcame obstacles, trusted God's the same way Jabez did. They renewed the covenant with God and prayed humbly for his blessing. The record of Jabez's life provides the structure and theme for all 1st Chronicles and is repeated in the famous theme verse of the 2 Chronicles.
"if my people who are called by my name humble themselves, and pray and seek my face and turn from their wicked ways, then I will hear from heaven and will forgive their sin and heal their land. "(2 Chronicles 7:14 ESV)Jabez understood that God was using every difficulty in his life to shape his character and establish a plan for his life. When we live the way Jabez did God can extend His influence in our lives. Jabez was not the only good example that came from Perez. King David was a descendant of Perez as was the Lord himself (Matthew 1:3). The passage reveals how our painful events in life can be liberating
The one thing all human beings have in common with Jabez, that makes this section of scripture so practical, is that we all experience pain and suffering, all of our families are broken, all of our relationships have been breeched. Jabez teaches us how God can use our history to shape His heritage. Jabez remembered his difficult and painful past and as part of God's work in his life. The memory of Judah's incest had been preserved in the family history. As the books of Chronicles would progress they would record that all but eight kings were evil. They worshiped idols, tried to defeat the nations enemies, overcome its struggle or assuage its past pain through attempting to control the national destiny. Jabez sets the stage for the eight Kings who allowed God to shape the national heritage.
When Jabez remembered his family history he went back beyond Judah to remember Judah's father Jacob, later named Israel. Jacob had schemed and manipulated to make himself great until he learned that his success came because of a covenant entered into by his grandfather, Abraham with God. Abraham also tried to manipulate and control events on his own, out of his scheming came an opposing nation through his son, Ishmael. Despite Abraham's lies and Jacob schemes, God remained faithful. God worked to create the nation of Israel and bring the Messiah into human history despite human frailties. Many of Perez descendants tried to suppress memories, and overcome the stigma of their past. They tried reveling in pleasure to overcome pain. None of it worked. Jabez acknowledged the reality of his painful past, but at the same time called upon God, to redeem it.
People who experience great trauma will sometimes attempt to suppress the memory of events, hide them, turn to things that will make them forget, and often in an attempt to control the pain it becomes the force that control their lives. Some are even unable to cope with the memories and take rash or irrational actions to stop the painful memories or feelings. Scholars have found that intensity of pain has no bearing on disability. Some people are unable to function with just a small amount of pain or with an inconvenience, while other pain and suffering puts no limits on their functionality (Melamed, S.Z. Grosswasser, and M. Sterm, Acceptance of Disability Work Involvement and Subjective Rehabilitation Status of Traumatic Brain Injured Patients, Brain Injury 6: 233- 243 reference in Hayes, Stephen, C. Get Out of Your Mind into Your Life: The New Acceptance and Commitment Therapy, New Harbinger Publications, Copyright 2005 by Stephen C. Hayes and Spencer Smith). Jabez understood that traumatic events could be remembered as happening in the past without controlling either our thought or feeling.
Rather than attempting to suppress his thoughts, relieve his pain or solve problems he could no longer control, he called upon the God of Israel who shapes those events for a godly heritage. Jabez called upon God to shape his heritage despite his history. He asked God to expand his border of his influence. The covenant made with Israel was a covenant of land. God gave them a land to possess. He did this so that their influence might be extended to the nations, that all people might understand the message of grace foundational to Israel's history (Exodus 19:5 & 6). Jabez's prayer is for the Spirit to use his life in a way that increases his influence on others to enter into relationship with the God of Israel. Those of us who live under the new covenant understand that Christ's sacrifice has given Him authority over the world (Galatians 6: 13- 16) and that we who follow Christ are to be influential for the cause of Christ throughout the world (1 Peter 2: 4-6).
When we realize that God's hand shapes every event in our lives to expand his kingdom we need not be controlled by past events, no matter how traumatic. We can recognize that our memories no matter how painful are a record of God's redeeming work in our lives. We can trust God for blessing even in our pain. Jabez asked God to bless him and to keep the painful memories of his past from "harm." The word harm is the meahrah, it is almost always translated evil. Jabez is praying that God would keep his past from overcoming him and leading him to some evil, selfish attempt to overcome his pain.
This genealogical reference points backward to the God of Israel who shaped events in the life of Judah and Perez so that even through the suffering caused by incest God would bring about the birth of Jesus and the redemption of all people. It points forward to the record that would be written of the results of Kings who walked with God and those who did not.
I've often wondered why the author used such an obscure person to make his point. Jabez is not remembered for any accomplishment. We do not know where he was born or where he was buried. We only know that he had a life effected by traumatic effects of pain and suffering. His actions and contributions will be long forgotten but we can all learn an eternal lesson about redemption from him. An obscure person like Jabez is very much like those of us reading this post today. Most of us will never be remembered beyond a couple of generations.
Pain and suffering is a reality of life that we all will experience. We are unable to change our history. We can only accept the reality we face and either allow God to use it to shape our heritage or allow it to destroy us. Everyone reading this is suffering through something, or you will be soon. Techniques to feel better will only defeat you. Attempts to suppress memories will only make them come flooding back, but if you call upon the God of Abraham, give your life to him, God will use the painful events of your life to shape your heritage, to bring you into relationship with him. Pain is the most liberating experience God gives us. Jabez does not call us to fatalism, or to destructive behavior, rather he calls us to recognize that painful action and events even of our own making need not shape our present or destroy our future. That all these things God is using to perfect us, to liberate us and to redeem us.
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