10 Pentecost, Cp12, July 24, 2016
Gen. 18:20-33 Ps.85:7-13
Col. 2:6-15 Luke 11:1-13
What is your belief about prayer? Do the lines of the Rolling Stones express your philosophy of prayer? "You can't always get what you want. But if you try sometimes you might find You get what you need." You can't always get what you pray for, but if you keep on praying you might get what you need.
Our scripture readings today provide for us some insights about communication with God, the communication called prayer. Prayer is a discourse which is common to people around the world. I suspect that atheists do some accidental praying as well. It is amazing how non-observant religious people often use the name of God in uncommon evocative ways eveb more than believers do.
I would like to begin a presentation on prayer insight by highlighting the most important precursor to prayer. Listening. What did the psalmist write? I will listen to what the Lord God is saying, * for he is speaking peace to his faithful people and to those who turn their hearts to him.
The best way to start prayer is to listen, to be still and to hear God speaking peace to us. If we don't listen, then we don't understand prayer to be an interchange between two parties. If we rush into our petitions and requests wanting God simply to be our personal interventionist then prayer becomes not about a relationship but about me, and my needs. If you want to fail at friendship, demand the time and attention of someone all of the time and barrage them with non-stop requests and opinions. This is the way we drive potential friends away. Remember prayer is primarily about relationship with God, ourselves and each other. Relationships are about trust; good parents don't give their children snakes and scorpions when they ask for bread and an egg. Prayer is based upon simply knowing that one has the freedom to ask God about and for anything. But petitions and requests are only a small part of our overall relationship with God.
The prayer of Abraham involves a coming to acceptance about the probable and the inevitable. One of the phases of the grief process is called "bargaining." God, if I do this can I make the sad event of loss disappear? Abraham suspected the worst about Sodom where his nephew Lot lived. He knew it was a rotten city but he wanted to save his nephew. Abraham bargained for God's protection of the city of Sodom because he wanted to save Lot and his family, bute he was suspicious that even Lot's family had become corrupted and compromised by the sins of Sodom. The exchange between Abraham and God represent the bargaining dialogue of prayer. We often have to engage in bargaining language as our coming to acceptance that we are not exempt from many of the losses which can come to us. Why is bargaining valid prayer discourse? Because we are haunted by the ideal of hope and the perfect. We bargain because we believe that what is hopeful and ideal is the best option. Yet, we adjust our bargaining offers gradually and in incremental stages because we keep adjusting our desire to what the best scenario is based upon the actual condition of freedom. We bargain because we always want the best case scenario given the conditions on the ground. Isn't that what we do as the church now in the midst all of the violent acts of terror in our world? Lord, will you keep your people safe, given the probability of the conditions of freedom which allows hateful and deranged behaviors?
For St. Paul, he believed that the mystical experience of Christ gave us an access to the interior invisible and heavenly world of perceiving a more perfect way of existence. This mystical experience of spiritual rebirth is the experience of the Holy Spirit and by actualizing one's interior spiritual life, one celebrates the original heritage of one's life, as being sons and daughters of God with spiritual DNA to prove it.
St. Paul wrote his letters before the Gospel writings and the prayer prescriptions of Jesus Christ illustrate the teaching of St. Paul and the early church.
The Gospel of Luke gives us one of the version of the famous Lord's prayer for his disciples. In this prayer we are taught to know ourselves as children of God. We address God as "Our Father." As children of the heavenly Father, we have access to the inner and heavenly realm of the perfect and the ideal. And the great challenge is to make the great ideals which we know, actual in this world. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
What is basic about earthly life? Provision of life necessities. Give us this day our daily bread. Notice the plural pronoun? "Give us." We should be always asking for the general common good when we pray.
In observation of community behavior there is a great barrier. It is hatred, anger and retaliation which destroys community. The problem is that we have access to what is perfect and ideal. Sometimes we hold other people to a higher standard than we do ourselves. So what do we need to survive and live together? Forgiveness. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Forgiveness is difficult because of what is ideal and perfect, but that is why we pray over and over again for the dynamic of forgiveness to prevail in our lives and community.
What is perhaps the worst scenario for anyone of us? We do not want to be given a life situation for which we are not prepared. We do not want to have an experience which will destroy our faith, our hope and our beliefs in what is good, perfect and ideal. And so, the words of Jesus tell us to request of God: Lead us not into temptation and deliver us from the situations of freedom when conflicting systems could catch us in harm's way.
So us conclude about prayer: Prayer begins by listening to God. By listening we will most often find that the answers to our prayer have already been given to us. Next, accept our primary identity as children of God and speak often to God as our heavenly parent. Prayer is first of all about a loving relationship with God. Third, ask for the basic necessities for all of the people of this world. Fourth, Ask for forgiveness and receive it as the reciprocal grace of practice in the forgiveness of others. And finally, ask for protection for the evil that can happen because of the freedom in this world. Ask to have the conditions which will support a life of faith and hope for everyone.
My fellow Christians, if you don't believe that you are ordained to ministry, you are wrong. Each and everyone of us is ordained to the ministry of prayer. And I hope that you will continue to pray and to expand the time which you give to the completely portable ministry of prayer. Today each of us have been given the cabinet position in God's kingdom: Minister of the Interior. Amen.
I would like to begin a presentation on prayer insight by highlighting the most important precursor to prayer. Listening. What did the psalmist write? I will listen to what the Lord God is saying, * for he is speaking peace to his faithful people and to those who turn their hearts to him.
The best way to start prayer is to listen, to be still and to hear God speaking peace to us. If we don't listen, then we don't understand prayer to be an interchange between two parties. If we rush into our petitions and requests wanting God simply to be our personal interventionist then prayer becomes not about a relationship but about me, and my needs. If you want to fail at friendship, demand the time and attention of someone all of the time and barrage them with non-stop requests and opinions. This is the way we drive potential friends away. Remember prayer is primarily about relationship with God, ourselves and each other. Relationships are about trust; good parents don't give their children snakes and scorpions when they ask for bread and an egg. Prayer is based upon simply knowing that one has the freedom to ask God about and for anything. But petitions and requests are only a small part of our overall relationship with God.
The prayer of Abraham involves a coming to acceptance about the probable and the inevitable. One of the phases of the grief process is called "bargaining." God, if I do this can I make the sad event of loss disappear? Abraham suspected the worst about Sodom where his nephew Lot lived. He knew it was a rotten city but he wanted to save his nephew. Abraham bargained for God's protection of the city of Sodom because he wanted to save Lot and his family, bute he was suspicious that even Lot's family had become corrupted and compromised by the sins of Sodom. The exchange between Abraham and God represent the bargaining dialogue of prayer. We often have to engage in bargaining language as our coming to acceptance that we are not exempt from many of the losses which can come to us. Why is bargaining valid prayer discourse? Because we are haunted by the ideal of hope and the perfect. We bargain because we believe that what is hopeful and ideal is the best option. Yet, we adjust our bargaining offers gradually and in incremental stages because we keep adjusting our desire to what the best scenario is based upon the actual condition of freedom. We bargain because we always want the best case scenario given the conditions on the ground. Isn't that what we do as the church now in the midst all of the violent acts of terror in our world? Lord, will you keep your people safe, given the probability of the conditions of freedom which allows hateful and deranged behaviors?
For St. Paul, he believed that the mystical experience of Christ gave us an access to the interior invisible and heavenly world of perceiving a more perfect way of existence. This mystical experience of spiritual rebirth is the experience of the Holy Spirit and by actualizing one's interior spiritual life, one celebrates the original heritage of one's life, as being sons and daughters of God with spiritual DNA to prove it.
St. Paul wrote his letters before the Gospel writings and the prayer prescriptions of Jesus Christ illustrate the teaching of St. Paul and the early church.
The Gospel of Luke gives us one of the version of the famous Lord's prayer for his disciples. In this prayer we are taught to know ourselves as children of God. We address God as "Our Father." As children of the heavenly Father, we have access to the inner and heavenly realm of the perfect and the ideal. And the great challenge is to make the great ideals which we know, actual in this world. Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.
What is basic about earthly life? Provision of life necessities. Give us this day our daily bread. Notice the plural pronoun? "Give us." We should be always asking for the general common good when we pray.
In observation of community behavior there is a great barrier. It is hatred, anger and retaliation which destroys community. The problem is that we have access to what is perfect and ideal. Sometimes we hold other people to a higher standard than we do ourselves. So what do we need to survive and live together? Forgiveness. Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us. Forgiveness is difficult because of what is ideal and perfect, but that is why we pray over and over again for the dynamic of forgiveness to prevail in our lives and community.
What is perhaps the worst scenario for anyone of us? We do not want to be given a life situation for which we are not prepared. We do not want to have an experience which will destroy our faith, our hope and our beliefs in what is good, perfect and ideal. And so, the words of Jesus tell us to request of God: Lead us not into temptation and deliver us from the situations of freedom when conflicting systems could catch us in harm's way.
So us conclude about prayer: Prayer begins by listening to God. By listening we will most often find that the answers to our prayer have already been given to us. Next, accept our primary identity as children of God and speak often to God as our heavenly parent. Prayer is first of all about a loving relationship with God. Third, ask for the basic necessities for all of the people of this world. Fourth, Ask for forgiveness and receive it as the reciprocal grace of practice in the forgiveness of others. And finally, ask for protection for the evil that can happen because of the freedom in this world. Ask to have the conditions which will support a life of faith and hope for everyone.
My fellow Christians, if you don't believe that you are ordained to ministry, you are wrong. Each and everyone of us is ordained to the ministry of prayer. And I hope that you will continue to pray and to expand the time which you give to the completely portable ministry of prayer. Today each of us have been given the cabinet position in God's kingdom: Minister of the Interior. Amen.
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