fantasy of Jabez, The

Human Quest, Jan/Feb 2002 by Novosad, Nancy

Comes now the hottest cultural phenomena of the New Millennium and the best-selling nonfiction book in

America: a slight 92-page three-byfive-inch milky-beige hardcover about an obscure one-sentence prayer, the favorite petition of an equally obscure Old Testament character "more honorable than his brothers."1

The Prayer of Jabez: Breaking Through to the Blessed Life is a creation of Atlanta-based evangelist Bruce H. Wilkinson, prominent Promise Keepers speaker and founder of Walk Thru the Bible Ministries. Wilkinson, who wants to "teach"2 "ordinary Christians"3 how to pray Jabez's "daring prayer,"4 invites common folk along on his "personal exploration"5 of I Chronicles 4:9-10: "And Jabez called on the God of Israel saying, 'Oh that you would bless me indeed, and enlarge my territory, that Your hand would be with me, and that You would keep me from evil, that I may not cause pain!' So God granted him what he requested."

Wilkinson first heard the prayer of Jabez some thirty years ago from a Dallas Theological Seminary chaplain who challenged students "to be a gimper for God... someone who always does a little more than what's required or expected of him."6 Although uncertain of its meaning or effect, Wilkinson prayed the prayer and eventually conjured a powerful personal fantasy about the nature and effect of the prayer and the life of the man who prayed it.

Premised on the fantasy that "God does have favorites... simply put, God favors those who ask,"7 the volume promises a "cycle of abundant living"8 "extravagantly blessed"9 with "supernatural favor"10 and "marked by miracles."11

"Absolutely!" Ask God to increase the value of your investment portfolio or business, Wilkinson says. "If you're doing your business God's way, it's not only right to ask for more, but He is waiting for you to ask."12

However, the request must be openended and non-specific, because it is "entirely up to God to decide what the blessing would be and when, where, and how" the individual will receive it.13

Published in April 2000 by Multnomah, a small Christian house, Jabez notably advances the offensive by evangelical Christian titles onto the major trade best-seller lists that began in 1998 with the apocalyptic novels of the Left Behind series.14

Moving to extend market share and build the brand, identity merchandise such as mugs, backpacks, Christmas ornaments, mouse pads, - even an artist's rendition of Jabez -- have been brought on line quickly. Sequels include The Prayer of Jabez for Teens; The Prayer of Jabez for Women; The Prayer of Jabez for Kids; The Prayer of Jabez for Little Ones; The Prayer of Jabez for Y Hearts; The Prayer of Jabez Devotion for Kids: Living Big for God; a praise music CD; and a video series.

Scores of followers not only pray Jabez everyday but purchase multiple copies of the book and press it onto relatives, friends, and business associates. Converts to the Jabez lifestyle scout for opportunities to impose their newly found godly influence on total strangers as modeled and scripted in the text Fanatics meet in small study groups and on line to discuss the phenomenon and its impact on their lives. No stranger to the corridors of power, Jabez has been ushered in to the Oval Office, executive board rooms, and congressional hearings.

The official Jabez web site is full of solicited testimonies of divine intervention and immediate gratification: A mayoral candidate who featured the prayer in campaign advertisements and on the campaign trail says it not only prompted her to run in the first place but turned the electoral tide in her favor; a public relations consultant says that after praying Jabez for a week her Fortune 500 company told her that her hourly rate was too low; business entrepreneurs and professionals say it increases business; desperate parents of ill children say it puts them in the path of people with the financial wherewithal to improve their children's lives, once distraught spouses say it saves marriages; others say it creates opportunities to identify and target converts.

Wilkinson is a shrewd and gifted rhetorical innovator on intimate terms with the shared symbolic terrain of the evangelical subculture - powerful dramatic narratives, linked fantasies, and symbolic cues that converge to form a collective consciousness for those who participate in the subculture.15 While outsiders may have difficulty accepting the subculture's basic assumptions and contradictions, participants have integrated them into their own personal drama.

Studies have found that evangelicals sustain a distinct collective Christian identity that serves as the primary source of individual identity. According to sociologist Christian Smith, author of American Evangelicalism: Embattled and Thriving, "American evangelicals believe not only that an unchanging and universal Truth exists, but - more audaciously perhaps - that they are the ones who know it because God has revealed it to them."16

"Do we really understand how far the American Dream is from God's dream for us?"17 Wilkinson asks, as if to underscore that the Christian Right's culture war is far from over. He inveighs against "what feels right to us but is wrong" and presumptuously challenges "ordinary