 |
||||||||
| ||||||||
 |
||||||||
|
|
|
|
|
|||
 |
|||
Teach Us to PrayJuly 29, 2007 Ninth Sunday after Pentecost For most spiritual seekers, especially those who attempt to respond to the message of Jesus, there inevitably comes the day when they question the content and validity of their prayer. I know this to be true for two reasons: my own experience, and the experience of countless others who have shared their confusion with me. In fact, this is one of my most frequent topics of pastoral conversation – addressing peoples’ uncertainty about what to pray for, or how to pray, or on a more basic level, perplexity about just what prayer is supposed to be, anyway. It pops up in all sorts of odd, unsuspecting moments as people tell their stories over lunch or breakfast, or even a chance encounter on a sidewalk. That happened just this last week. On my way to an appointment, I ran into an acquaintance walking to lunch on Park Avenue. We paused for a moment, exchanged pleasantries. Responding to the social habit of asking how she was, she surprised me with the truth. She was very flustered and upset by a report from an oncologist. She blurted out, “You’re a minister. What am I supposed to pray for? I’ve never known how to pray.” Unprepared, I sort of mumbled something and then she said she was sorry, but she was running late and had to keep walking. “Please pray for me,” I heard her say over her shoulder. That’s what I call a sort of hit and run pastoral encounter. In June, I officiated at the wedding of a young man who had attended Christ Church for a few months some years back. In the course of our planning and counseling sessions, he mentioned in a sort of off-hand manner to his fiancé that he was grateful to me for teaching him how to pray. This surprised me because I could not remember ever having had a conversation with him about prayer, and he had never attended any class in which the topic might have come up. I asked him about this. He said that the learning came from Sunday services on the days I did the pastoral prayer extemporaneously. He had never really understood how to do it, or even what prayer really was, who he was really addressing, and so on. I had modeled for him how he might go about it. He thanked me again. The interesting thing is that I had never really thought about my praying here as a kind of instruction, per se, but then I realized I should have known better. It’s the wisdom every thoughtful parent discovers sooner or later (and, of course, its much better if discovered sooner) – children learn mostly from context and behavior and how words attach to those things. They imbibe what is modeled for them. When this really dawns on parents it can come as quite a shock, because kids have the tendency to give back what they get. In church we pray. We could say that it’s part of church culture. It happens in a variety of forms. There are written prayers publicly shared. There is time for silent prayer. There are times clergy pray. And, I suppose any other moment in the course of worship could prompt prayer of one sort or another. Still, for all of this praying, on any given Sunday, questions and uncertainties abound. Clearly, the culture of the band of friends that tramped in and around Jerusalem in the first century included a whole lot of prayer. Luke reports Jesus was often praying for extended periods of time. Sometimes all night. Given the potent impact of his life and teaching, it stands to reason the disciples are interested in learning about this standout behavior. What exactly is he doing when he’s spending all that time by himself? “Lord, teach us to pray.” Jesus responds with a few sentences we have come to call “The Lord’s Prayer.” There’s a bit longer, more developed, version in Matthew. Here we have the stripped down model with its simple, unadorned statements and petitions. Following this comes important instruction concerning perseverance and the necessity to ask, to search and to knock on the door of God’s estate. But even with this primer on prayer, many are still left scratching their heads. We can certainly say the words Jesus taught; in fact we will be doing that very thing in just a few minutes. Still, you’re not alone if you find that these words don’t seem to connect with the business of your life right at the moment. But then it might be useful and stop here to ask what would connect with the business of your life? Do you even know? Really? I suppose you might be able to come up with a sort of laundry list of needs, but underneath it all, do you have a sense of what you’re really after when you walk into a sanctuary like this? Here’s the thing: the words Jesus gives his friends to use are not complicated or long-winded. They’re efficient and to-the-point, accessible and humble, intimate and honest. And they are instructive to us precisely because they’re Jesus’ words. They reflect his own piety. All serious scholars believe this. And while we could usefully spend a month’s worth of sermons unpacking the meaning of each petition he offers, for today I want to stay with just one observation, one essential quality that sets the context for all of Jesus’ prayer. And it’s summed up in the very first word, “Father.” In the original Aramaic the word is “Abba,” or better for us, “Daddy.” This is a salutation of familial intimacy as a beloved child to a parent. This is an intimacy Jesus invites us to share. Someone might say, “Ah, yes, Steve, but I had a terrible relationship with my father and I can’t get around that. Besides, it’s only male. Surely God is not some man up in the sky.” Of course, substituting Mother is no better in this sense, for surely there are those who can report a deadly relationship with Mom. What has to be accessed here is the healthiest sort of relationship of a child to a parent, one of deepest intimacy and empathy. Whether or not we’ve ever experienced such a thing, we can imagine it. We have an instinct for it. Jesus instructs that we can approach God directly, simply, confidently, and affectionately. All of that is held in that one word. We are to speak knowing that whatever it is we say will be heard and we will be held. Whatever else we might say about prayer, this relationship is the heart of the matter. Our deepest longing concerns the reunion we experience in this mystical, intimate relationship. For some, this level of intimacy, as compelling as it is, might be a little terrifying, a little too close for comfort. After all, a relationship like that really does matter. The parties really do take one another seriously. Very little remains hidden in such a relationship. Mostly, we can’t hide from ourselves. Sometimes people will tell me how distant God seems, how hollow their prayer feels. But a question often hovers in the background, a question about whether or not they actually want the sort of relationship they say they’re after. They’re clear about wanting certain things, certain specific, tangible outcomes. But do they want the relationship? Or are they more satisfied by thinking of God as the vending dispenser? Say the right words and out pops the desired product. “Teach me to say the right words,” might summarize our more honest position then. In this we’re like little Timmy who decided to write God a letter the week before Christmas. He knew exactly what he wanted and so he took out a pencil and began: “Dear God, I have been very, very good…” He set his pencil down, balled up the paper and threw it on the floor. He began again, “Dear God, I’ve done everything I’m supposed to do…” Once more he stopped, balled up the paper and threw it to the floor. After a few moments of hard thinking he got up and went to the mantle where the nativity set had been placed. He pulled a chair over to stand on, took the figurine of Mary, went into the kitchen to fetch some paper towels and returned to his room where he rummaged underneath his bed to find an empty shoe box. box. Carefully wrapping Mary and placing her securely in the box he pushed it back under the bed. He returned to his writing: “Dear God, if you ever want to see your mother again….” Sometimes we think we know what we want. Which, of course, is regularly different from what we might need. A good parent gives good gifts. That’s the simple logic Jesus states here. Simple, but elusive for those of us who have been steeped in a culture that teaches all about having and owning and controlling. Jesus says, “How much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!” That’s the clincher. But then, that’s not what we said we wanted. Jesus responds, that’s what God wants most of all to give to us – God’s own self. The author of creation, the one who knit you together in your mother’s womb, that one is pleased to be as close to you as your very next breath. That one has created you for relationship. God set it up that way and invites us to share in it. Sometime after Jesus is gone, Paul writes this: “The Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for us according to the will of God.” (Rom. 8:26-27) That’s how it is for me much of the time. Like Paul, I find that often I do not know how to pray and what I might pray for. But also like Paul, sighs too deep for words intercede and God is pleased to give me God’s own self which is far, far more than I could possibly have asked or imagined on my own.
Previous sermon: Learner and Doer • Next sermon: Then What? All past sermons |
| ||
|
|