A Phenomenon of Biblical Proportions

For 2,400 years, nobody paid much attention to an obscure Bible character named Jabez. His life story--all three sentences of it--was buried in one of the dullest sections of the Old Testament.

But thanks to an Atlanta preacher, Jabez has been transformed into a religious and marketing sensation. Strange miracles are reported by people who recite his prayer. Three Jabez books have bounded to the top of national bestseller lists. The buzz has inspired Jabez coffee mugs, bath gels, neckties and--perhaps the truest measure of success--a parody book.

The Jabez fad has also attracted a swarm of critics, who say it portrays God as a cosmic slot machine “with prayer as the handle you jerk to make Him disgorge a huge pile of money,” in the words of one British writer.

At the center of the commotion is a 48-word passage from First Chronicles, the Bible’s sleep-inducing repository of genealogies. Translations differ, but the version popularized by Atlanta evangelist Bruce Wilkinson in “The Prayer of Jabez: Breaking Through to the Blessed Life” (Multnomah Publishers, 2000) says:

“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.”

It hardly sounds like fodder for a bestseller, but Wilkinson, a by-the-book Christian who graduated from Dallas Theological Seminary, calls Jabez “a daring prayer that God always answers,” and promises that his 30-day program will unlock a flood of supernatural blessings and miracles.

God “longs to give you so much more than you may have ever thought to ask for,” Wilkinson writes. Although he stresses the prayer’s spiritual benefits, others credit Jabez with helping them to find jobs, romance and more. Some of the testimonials are posted at the book’s Web site, https://www.prayerofjabez.com:

* “College tuition paid by wealthy benefactor”

* “False witness confesses after five years; wrongly imprisoned man released”

* “God coordinates Internet connection failure when man intends to visit pornographic sites”

* “God protects driver who falls asleep”

* “Pastor’s wife able to comfort child scared by mouse”

Of course, the biggest miracle of all is the book itself, which has sold 7.6 million copies and mutated into the Christian equivalent of “Chicken Soup for the Soul.” In addition to the original title, there are nine spinoffs so far, including editions for teens, kids and preschoolers.

Can a “Jabez for Dummies” be far behind?

Identifying Its Appeal

Part of Jabez’s appeal is that “it gives people a sense that they can control their own destiny,” says Lynn Garrett, religion editor at Publisher’s Weekly. “Americans like results; they like a faith that works.”

Another draw is the book’s compact size and price: a breezy 92 pages for just under $10. People are grabbing multiple copies, Garrett says. It probably doesn’t hurt that Jabez has been hyped by James Dobson, a popular Christian psychologist and radio host whose imprimatur is the religious counterpart to Oprah’s book club.

Nevertheless, nobody can fully explain the book’s runaway success. “You can analyze all the factors, but if you tried to reproduce them, you couldn’t,” Garrett says. “There’s some element of serendipity here.”

Just ask Harold Ivan Smith. In 1987, he penned a similar book, titled “The Jabez Principle.” It sold a mere 10,000 copies.

“We talked about putting a new cover on it and trying again,” says Bruce Nuffer, senior marketing manager for Smith’s publisher, Beacon Hill Press. Instead, the company is selling reprint rights to foreign publishers hoping to ride Jabez’s coattails in Asia, Latin America and South Africa. “They probably couldn’t get the rights to Wilkinson’s book [so they came to us],” Nuffer says.

In the U.S., Jabez and its progeny now gobble an ever-expanding swath of bookstore shelf space. The empire includes a leather-bound edition, an illustrated “gift edition,” a Jabez journal, a Jabez Bible study volume and two Jabez devotionals--one for children, one for adults.

Still to come: Jabez for women, authored by Wilkinson’s wife, and another Jabez sequel from Wilkinson and his editor-collaborator, David Kopp. (A more recent non-Jabez book by Wilkinson and Kopp, “The Secrets of the Vine,” based on the Gospel of John, has also cracked bestseller lists.)

On top of that, Oregon-based Multnomah Publishers has authorized a cavalcade of official merchandise, including Jabez backpacks, Christmas ornaments, vanilla-scented candles, mouse pads, even a framed artist’s conception of Jabez himself. Jewelry is also in the works, but a proposal for Jabez candy bars was rejected. “We want to be careful about not over-commercializing this,” says Leslie Nunn Reed, the licensing agent. The goal is to only allow products that help people remember and use the prayer, she says, noting that royalties from the merchandise will be donated to a Bible teaching ministry founded by Wilkinson.

Although most people had never heard of Jabez (pronounced JAY-bez) before the book’s meteoric rise, word of the prayer’s power has actually been circulating for decades.

Christian musician Ken Tamplin, who credits the prayer with saving his life, learned it from his mother 28 years ago. She, in turn, heard about it at a Long Beach seminar led by evangelist Bill Gothard.

Gothard, who was recently asked to write a book on why the Jabez prayer works (“Because it’s a cry, not a prayer, and crying is more powerful”) doesn’t recall mentioning Jabez back then, except perhaps in passing.

Wilkinson traces his inspiration to 1974, when he listened to a sermon by Richard Seume, then-chaplain at Dallas Theological Seminary. Seume has since died, but his widow, Mary, says he developed his Jabez message in the mid-1960s while leading a church in Virginia and then preached it regularly at conferences and retreats until his death.

From there, the Jabez trail runs cold. But use of the prayer seems to be a modern phenomenon. It’s hard to imagine Wilkinson’s book catching on in past centuries. The message and tenor stand in stark contrast to, say, Thomas a Kempis’ “The Imitation of Christ,” which debuted in the 15th century and ranks as perhaps the most widely read devotional in Christian history.

“The tone of [Jabez] has a certain optimism and aggressiveness and lack of humility that is very different [from past spiritual classics],” says Robert K. Johnston, a professor of theology and culture at Fuller Theological Seminary in Pasadena. “In that sense, it’s very American.... It fits in with our cultural optimism. Movies without happy endings don’t sell here.”

Author’s Life Not Without Trials

Wilkinson, a 53-year-old father of three, practices what he preaches. Silver-haired and square-jawed, he has used the prayer daily for nearly three decades. But it hasn’t rendered his life problem-free.

Although the author is now turning down interview requests, publicists and news accounts fill in some of the details.

In 1993, for instance, his home was invaded by a toxic mold that thrashed his immune system and left him seriously ill for about two years, he told Cox News Service. Wilkinson has also struggled with shaky finances, professional burnout and a sputtering writing career. None of his previous books, which also dealt with spiritual breakthroughs, ever sold more than 20,000 copies. And when he drafted a 280-page Jabez manuscript in the 1980s and showed it around, nobody liked it, says Joel Kneedler of Multnomah, which published the current version last year.

Dobson, the Colorado-based radio host, changed all that. In late 1999, he and his wife heard a tape of Wilkinson’s Jabez sermon and invited him to speak at a National Day of Prayer luncheon in May 2000.

Wilkinson’s publisher urged him to put together a Jabez book in time for the event. But the author balked. “I’m done writing books,” Wilkinson told Multnomah officials. But with sufficient arm-twisting, and a promise of help from editor Kopp, the manuscript took shape. According to an article in the Washington Times, Kopp did the heavy lifting, distilling Wilkinson’s sermons and papers into a conversational instruction manual laced with personal anecdotes. The book opens with Wilkinson and his wife, Darlene, studying their Bible in a Dallas kitchen “with yellow counters and Texas-sized raindrops pelting the window.”

The final draft barely rolled off the presses in time for the prayer luncheon. “Wilkinson was probably walking to the podium as they slipped a copy into his hand,” Kneedler says.

Nobody dreamed it would be a blockbuster. The initial print run was 26,000. Over the summer, the publisher cranked out another 46,000 copies. Then the book took off. Panic set in at Multnomah, a small Christian publishing house in Sisters, Ore. “We had meetings trying to figure out what to do,” recalls Kneedler. Some favored a million-copy pressing; others worried that Jabez was a passing fad. In November, the company spit out 384,000 copies, then rolled the dice with 1.1 million in February and 2 million in March.

By May, the book was making national news and riding high on bestseller lists.

Controversy--and spoofs--were inevitable.

“We figured this book was so popular that it had to be bad, so we went out and read it and we were right,” says Douglas Jones, author of “The Mantra of Jabez: Break on Through to the Other Side” (Canon Press). Jones, who teaches philosophy at a Christian college in Idaho, adds: “It’s not that we consider the book evil. It just captures everything that’s silly about contemporary evangelical Christianity.”

Practice the Jabez mantra, says the book’s dust jacket, and “soon you too will feel an adrenaline rush that you can call the Holy Spirit and use it to justify any fool thing you want to say.”

Other critics brand Wilkinson’s book as a rehash of the “prosperity gospel,” a Pentecostal movement that said fervent prayer brings wealth and health. They zero in on two passages from the book:

In one, Wilkinson discusses Jabez’s request that God enlarge his territory: “If Jabez had worked on Wall Street, he might have prayed, ‘Lord, increase the value of my investment portfolios.’ ... When Christian [businessmen] ask me, ‘Is it right for me to ask God for more business?’ my response is, ‘Absolutely!’ 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.”

In another chapter, Wilkinson is stuck in traffic on the way to an airport and prays for his flight to be late. He doesn’t discuss whether having things go his way negatively affected others on the flight--rather, he says it gave him the chance to minister to another waiting passenger.

Wilkinson insists his book has been misinterpreted by some readers. It’s not about shaking down God for personal favors and riches, he has told reporters. It’s about surrendering to God’s purpose for your life and praying for the resources needed to act on his behalf.

Still, some remain wary.

“Where was this book 2,000 years ago?” says Mike Gunn, a Seattle pastor who has posted an Internet broadside against the Jabez fad. “With all the theologians in the past two millennia, you’d figure someone would have discovered this gem, but no one has.” If you’re looking for a model prayer, he says, try the one Jesus taught--the Lord’s Prayer.

The point about undue emphasis on Jabez might be exemplified by a new bumper sticker: Inside the Christian fish emblem, Jesus’ name has been replaced by “Jabez.”

Johnston, the Fuller Seminary professor, says Wilkinson’s book displays “a defective understanding of prayer,” especially in its claim that God “always answers” the Jabez petition. “God’s ways are mysterious. Sometimes God answers by silence. Sometimes God answers by ‘No,”’ he says. “The book sets up people to fail. If they pray and bad things happen, they will think that they lack faith.”

However, Johnston says some of the attacks are undeserved. “The book is meant to help people overcome evil and accomplish good. If someone prays it daily, they’re going to be a better person and they will mature in their faith.”

Not everyone is as optimistic. Jabez symbolizes much of what is wrong with modern Christianity, says Mike Yaconelli, former editor of the Door, a magazine that lampoons Christian foibles.

“Americans have perfected the art of reducing complicated truths into formulas and products,” says Yaconelli, who also leads a tiny church in Yreka and owns Youth Specialties, an El Cajon-based company that trains youth ministers. “We’re desperate for instant, visible, measurable ways of knowing God, instead of trusting that it’s complicated and a mystery.”

Unlike some critics, Yaconelli doesn’t think Wilkinson is promoting greed. But he sees a larger problem. “He’s not promising Cadillacs and a million dollars, but he is promising that great big, incredible things are going to happen if you pray this prayer. It almost minimizes the power of the small and the little and the tiny, even though that’s what Jesus was all about. I think he’s distorting what ‘bless’ means. Go to the Beatitudes [in the New Testament]. ‘Blessed are the poor, blessed are the hungry.’ That’s what ‘blessed’ means. But these are not the kind of blessings Wilkinson is talking about.”

At Multnomah, spokesman Kneedler shrugs off the brickbats. “Bruce Wilkinson has been preaching on Jabez for 30 years and never had one complaint until it sold a million copies,” he says. “Obviously, you’re not going to be able to please everyone with a 92-page book. But it wasn’t meant to be some big exegetical treatise on prayer. It was meant as an encouragement to people who believe or are on the outskirts [of faith].”

By that standard, it’s a success, Kneedler says: “We believe God has a purpose for this book. So we’ll take the controversy and the hits, knowing that God is using it to accomplish his will.”