Prayers

from my sermon on 9/06/09 from Matthew 6:5-15

We were made to pray. I have a pastor friend who bought a new notebook computer. She was afraid that it would be hard to connect to the internet. She thought she might have to buy an external antennae or purchase software or punch a bunch of buttons. But no, the moment she opened it and turned it on, it instantly found the nearest hot spot and she was connected to WiFi. She said, "It was wired to be connected." So are we! We were made to pray, to be connected to God.
Prayer is not commanded, it is commended. It is normal, natural human behavior. The passage says twice, "whenever you pray." It is expected that we pray.
As I am going through what we United Methodists believe in this sermon series, I remind you that the vows we make are "get-to's" not "have-to's". We get to pray. We were made to pray.
Jesus' teaching on prayer is found in our passage today. He says we don't pray for public show. If we do, our prayers are insincere and go no further than the applause we get. As read the commentaries, this type of public scene was not very common.
He also says that it is not necessary to pile up a bunch of words or fancy words. This feels like we are trying to manipulate God or use magic words to get what we want. He says the Father knows what we need before we ask.
So we go into our closet, maybe literally. I once had a church member, Mary Ann, who had a spare closet off of the master bed room. She put a kneeler in there, some candles, devotional books, etc. She knew that when she went in there, she had but one agenda, and that was to pray. To be alone with God is not being alone.
I had a man in another church who had a prayer chair. He had his devotional materials around that chair. He would get up early in the morning and sit in that chair to pray.
How about you? How, when, where, what do you pray?
Here's a good take-home line that I stole from a great author, "Pray as you can, not as you can't." Not worry about the way you pray, comparing yourself to others. Pray in your own unique way. There are as many right ways to pray as there are people.
Some of you will pray quietly as comtemplatives. Some will need movement. I walk as I pray in the mornings. Some of you will run, or swim, or do yoga, or tai chi. Some of you will pray with music. St. Augustine said, "The one who sings, prays twice." Some of you will pray best with a hammer in your hands as you build wall sections for Habitat for Humanity like yesterday. Some of you will pray as you study and come to new intellectual insights. Some of you will pray with your feelings. I am even not afraid of those who pray in special prayer language, like speaking in tongues.
I have heard a lot of stories about prayer over the years. I once had a woman in my church who said that she prayed while driving to work in the mornings. I said, "That's fine, just don't close your eyes."
Pray simply. Simply pray.
To this end we have a model prayer. It comes right in the center of the Sermon on the Mount, chapters 5-7, in the theological and structural center, in the middle of chapter 6. We call it the Lord's Prayer, but really it is the Disciple's Prayer, a gift Jesus gave us. When we don't have the words, there are words waiting for us. It is amazing how adaptable this prayer is: we say it at weddings and funerals, when we are young and with our last dying breath, in private and in public.
Let's say it now: My father, who art in heaven. Hallowed be my name. My kingdom come. My will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give me today my daily bread. And forgive me my trespasses, as I forgive those who trespass against me. And lead me not into temptation, but deliver me from evil. For mine is the kingdom, and the power, and the glory forever. Amen.
OOps. Did you hear some dissonance? What pronouns did I use? (singular) What ones did you use? (plural) The model prayer always invites us into community, even if we are praying alone. The model prayer always invites us to seek God's purposes and not our own.
So we pray Our Father...God sets the agenda. John Wesley who started the Methodist refrom movement that became the UM denomination today said that we could pray in confidence to Our Father, that God is always more ready to give than we are to ask.
May God's reign come, God's will be done....this sounds a lot like Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane...not my will, but thy will be done. Today, I am remembering Jill Baggerman, who has been a youth intern at our church. She is in Uganda today. She is foregoing her senior year at Texas, because she is putting her will aside. I read her email this past week as she was leaving. She said, God, get me out of the way, empty me, use me. We will be praying for Jill this year as she asks for God's will to be done in her.
Daily bread....what happened those 40 years in the wilderness? God provided manna daily. In Jesus' time the common laborer got paid at the end of every day's work. That was to provide bread for the morrow. It was a day to day existence. This line puts us in touch with the most vulnerable in our midst. I remind you today of the communion rail offering that goes for Mobile Loaves and Fishes which feeds the homeless.
Debts is really the best translation...for what can we pay to take sin away? All of us are indebted to God. God's essential nature is forgiveness.
The prayer ends with a doxology...for thine is the kingdom, power and glory...but not in the text. If you notice, it is a footnote. The doxology is not in the best and oldest Greek manuscripts. However, there are at least 10 different doxologies found. It shows the wide and persistent use of this model prayer in the early church.
Oh, you nearly let me forget the line about lead us not into temptation and deliver us frm evil....God doesn't tempt us....the best translation is "save us in the time of trial."
And so I end with a story of confronting evil. In Chile, there was a time of the "disappeared." Under Pinochet's government, people who disagreed with him simply disappeared. Some were killed. Some were tortured. A man who was being beaten, in the depths of despair, began to pray....Our Father, who art in heaven...the beating stopped....he heard his torturer say the words with him. The torturer said, "I am a Christian too."
We were made to pray. We keep praying this model prayer until we become what it says. We get to pray. That's the good news I have to share with you today.