DERYL DAVIS: Few people had ever heard of the obscure, sentence-long prayer lodged deep in the book of 1 Chronicles. But Atlanta evangelist Bruce Wilkinson changed all that when he and a co-author, David Kopp, wrote a book about the prayer, published last year.

The book's tremendous success is based, in part, on Wilkinson's interpretation of the ancient prayer as a plea for personal blessing and for more opportunities to do God's work. The book has struck a chord with many evangelical Christians, who say Wilkinson has shown them it's okay to pray for themselves.

MAN IN AUDIENCE: It's "How do I pray? How do I pray?" The Jabez Prayer teaches you in about three verses, two verses, this is how God wants you to pray, every day.

DAVIS: Wilkinson calls Jabez "a daring prayer that God always answers." He encourages readers to pray it for at least 30 days in order to see results.

DR. BRUCE WILKINSON: What happens is, if you keep praying that prayer, you do get answers, and thus far, we've not met anyone who's prayed the prayer for a month who doesn't have a number of stories to tell you.

DAVIS: But Jabez has drawn critics, who say Wilkinson's book makes unfair promises and encourages American obsessions with money and success.

REV. JAMES MULHOLLAND (author, PRAYING LIKE JESUS): The Prayer of Jabez in some sense anoints avarice and makes greed and selfishness a virtue, and that's a deeply troubling thing.

DAVIS: The words in question were first spoken by a man named Jabez, who appears only once in the entire Bible. The account reads, "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!'"

A prayer for blessing can sound odd to Christians more familiar with sermons about sacrifice and humility. But Wilkinson says it's all right to ask for blessings. In fact, God likes it.

DR. WILKINSON: All through the Old Testament and the New Testament, asking God to bless you is practiced widely. And today, we misunderstand that asking God to bless you isn't something that displeases God. It is a pleasure to God to hear you ask, "I would like you to bless me."

DAVIS: Apparently, that's a message people want to hear. The Prayer of Jabez book has sold nearly 8 million copies and spawned a whole realm of merchandising ... Jabez for teens, Jabez for kids, even Jabez for little ones.

There are songs about the prayer ... a new Jabez CD ... and a Web site where readers post testimonies. Many record miraculous experiences. Susan Heim started using the Prayer of Jabez last year.

SUSAN HEIM: I just really cried out to God, as Jabez did, for blessings, and God gave us the blessing of another child, which we were not able to do on our own.

DAVIS: Audrey Massey believes the Prayer of Jabez has helped her fight serious illness.