{"id":25081,"date":"2020-10-31T03:02:14","date_gmt":"2020-10-31T03:02:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=25081"},"modified":"2020-10-31T03:02:14","modified_gmt":"2020-10-31T03:02:14","slug":"praying-is-not-a-magic-wand-by-michael-newman","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/?p=25081","title":{"rendered":"PRAYING IS NOT A MAGIC WAND by Michael Newman"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=19271&amp;ad_type=81&amp;rl=1800\" width=\"336\" height=\"280\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">One of the most potent ways to ingratiate yourself into the psyche of a Nigerian is to offer &#8220;prayers&#8221; a lot.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">In your speech and writing, inject &#8220;prayers,&#8221; and the illusion of spirituality is thus nourished.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It&#8217;s sad, when those who ought to know also perpetuate this delusion.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It&#8217;s time we jettison self-delusion, if we&#8217;d make progress as individuals, and collectively as a nation.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It&#8217;s time people are told the truth: PRAYING IS NOT A MAGIC WAND.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It&#8217;s time people are told the nature of effective prayer.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">I DETEST these easy (childish) prayers that&#8217;s pervasive on and offline.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">They&#8217;re often supported with a FALSE phrase: &#8220;It is well.&#8221;<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Yes, right.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It is well, even as chaos engulf the poverty capital of the world.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It is well, even as most things go downhill.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It is well, even as despair grip myriads.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It&#8217;s time these INSINCERE &#8220;prayers&#8221; are deleted. They foster false hope.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">It&#8217;s time folks know that the most potent prayers are the works of our hands.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Without a genuine and sustainable TRANSFORMATION by us all, the suffering has only just begun.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Praying is not a magic wand.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">How many 100-day prayer and fasting sessions have been held in the nation?<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">What have they yielded?<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">Praying is not a magic wand.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\">If we actually start DOING the right things, individuals and the nation will FLOURISH, and we&#8217;d no longer have any need for BEGGING some deity, we&#8217;d only have to GENUINELY give thanks.<\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<div dir=\"auto\"><\/div>\n<p><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/alternativeadvert.com\/show.php?z=30&amp;pl=19271&amp;ad_type=81&amp;rl=1800\" width=\"336\" height=\"280\" frameborder=\"0\" marginwidth=\"0\" marginheight=\"0\" scrolling=\"no\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>One of the most potent ways to ingratiate yourself into the psyche of a Nigerian is to offer &#8220;prayers&#8221; a lot. In your speech and writing, inject &#8220;prayers,&#8221; and the illusion of spirituality is thus nourished. It&#8217;s sad, when those who ought to know also perpetuate this delusion. It&#8217;s time we jettison self-delusion, if we&#8217;d [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":6,"featured_media":23106,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[8],"tags":[5883],"class_list":["post-25081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-society","tag-prayer"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/10\/thanku.jpg","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p4oswh-6wx","_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25081","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/6"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=25081"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25081\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":25082,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25081\/revisions\/25082"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/23106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=25081"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=25081"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/newsroom247.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=25081"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}