NOTES for Ch1 4:10
In the middle of the very long list of names of Judah's descendants, we unexpectedly meet a short story, only two verses, about a certain Jabez, about whom practically nothing is known except his name, "son of pains." Who are his father and mother? Did he have children? What place does he occupy in the genealogical chain? There are no answers.
Jabez turns to God with a prayer of petition. So what? In every age people have done this, and we do it too. But does God always give what people ask of Him? No prayer can force God to do what He considers wrong.
Far from all our prayers of petition "hit the mark"; we do not always ask for what He also wants to give us. But Jabez succeeded in this. At the same time, what matters is not only what he asks, but how he asks. Let us begin with the address: "Oh that You would..." This modality is remarkable, leaving God complete freedom: to hear or not to hear, to answer or not to answer, to give or not to give.
Let us remember: "not as I will, but as You will" (Matt. 26:39). "Bless me with Your blessing": Jabez invites God Himself to choose what this blessing will be. "Enlarge my borders": usually we understand this as Jabez asking for an increase in landholdings and property in general. But how often exactly such requests remain without God's answer. It is possible that in this case God had the possibility of interpreting this petition differently.
Jabez asks for the enlargement of his borders. But the earth and everything on it is not his property; all of it belongs to God (Ex. 19:5). "My borders" are my limitation, my closedness, my inability to do good, my lack of freedom. But the very increase in the degree of freedom of a person who is in slavery to sin is the work of salvation accomplished by God throughout all history. "Your hand was with me": by this Jabez asks for God's active presence in his life.
There is a very great risk in this, but also a correspondence to the desire of God Himself (Josh. 1:9, Matt. 28:20). "Keeping me from evil": does there not sound here an echo of the prayer that the Lord taught us? "So that I may not grieve": "that My joy may remain in you and your joy may be full" (John 15:11). The correspondence of Jabez's prayer to what God wants to hear from us is astonishing. "And God granted him what he asked": we do not know what exactly God gave Jabez, but we know what example of prayer this passage from the Bible gives us.