We are faced with two Jabez's; the short two-verse vignette of a commendable believer and the modern book that puts into that passage all sorts of foreign concepts.

It is not that there isn't something valuable to be learned and imitated in Jabez's prayer as we find it in the Bible. It is just that there is a different emphasis in the book and the Book. Wilkinson makes too much of the actual prayer and the man who made it and not enough of the Lordship of the One who answers all prayers according to His will.

Commanding God?

This is found in the preface of the book. It is just not true and it is misleading and ultimately will prove to be discouraging to those who strayed from praying the Lord's "Thy will be done" prayer in order to pray Wilkinson's rote automatic "bless-me" prayer. He treats the prayer as if there is magic in the very words, as if Jabez stumbled upon an "open sesame" secret way of forcing God's hand. We know the author is teaching along these lines because later he writes (p.15) "Clearly the outcome [of his prayer] can be traced to his prayer." No, the outcome is that God chose to answer Jabez's petitions.

It is always God's prerogative to enlarge borders and honor all the other requests that Jabez had (or that we have). God answers according to His will. Or are we to suppose that if only Paul knew this Prayer of Jabez he would Not have left Trophimus sick at Miletus, or that he would have forced God to remove his thorn in the flesh. If the Book of Jabez is true, thorns in the flesh are our fault and are remediable. Closed doors are inevitably our fault. Likewise, lack of finances are our fault.

Another quote:
"The next morning, I prayed Jabez's prayer word for word. And the next. And the next. Thirty years later, I haven't stopped � I challenge you to make the Jabez prayer for blessing part of the daily fabric of your life. To do that, I encourage you to follow unwaveringly the plan outlined here for the next thirty days. "

Jesus told us not to offer up to God vain repetition. Wilkinson implies that repetition is the very key to success. Who do we believe?

A last quote:
"Jabez's last request is a brilliant but little understood strategy for sustaining a blessed life". [p. 63]

If a person has a "strategy" for the Christian life maybe he/she does not take to heart the Biblical admonition to "Trust in the Lord with all our heart, and not lean unto our own understanding. Part of a Christian's "strategy" is to say "Your will be done, not mine". This is not found in the prayer of Jabez. But that is all right because it is a short passage - but it is not well-represented in the modern book either, and that is no coincidence.

I have to agree with John Miller's closing assessment of this book:

"I'm not concerned that the book has been printed or that people actually believe the things in it. I'm concerned because we're seeing the camel's nose of heretical beliefs poking into the tents of formerly sound mainline denominations and independent churches. Dr. Dobson's endorsement has caused the book to literally fly of the shelves and I think he has given creditability to what would have previously been denounced as a prosperity gospel or "name-it and claim-it" theology."

"For me though, the real tragedy of Bruce Wilkinson's book will be in the carnage created as desperate souls follow his advice and pray Jabez's prayer for a month and see no change or things getting worse around them." Over 6 million have bought the book. Anything that has such a broad appeal has to be off-balance somewhere. Roman Catholics, Mormons, non-Christians even, speak well of the book. No work can have such broad appeal and still be faithful to the narrow way that leads to life eternal. At the very least, such popularity should cause Christians to examine more carefully the teaching here.

In these last days we can expect not only outright heresy but also misleading doctrines that are at first sight convincing but inevitably have rotten fruit.