| I John 5:13-15 "Prayer as an Act of Stewardship" |
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| Written by Rev. Donn Lee | |
| Saturday, 23 June 2007 | |
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In a series of commercials in which the creator of the Jarvik Artificial Heart, Dr. Robert Jarvik describes the benefits of a cholesterol lowering drug. When the ads air I always find myself captivated because I figure this guy really knows what he’s talking about, having made an artificial heart and all, and I really ought to listen to him because, well he really know what he’s talking about and it just might save my life. Jesus on prayer is just as intriguing to me. After all, if anyone ought to know about the importance of prayer for the spiritual life, it’s Jesus. But then I have to admit that how Jesus treats prayer in the Gospels, is not at all how I’ve conceived of prayer in the past. He prays with such intimacy, honesty, and hopefulness. He prays through storms, at tombs, and in gardens. He cries out in prayer (from the cross), and even prays for forgiveness of those who are killing him. He prays with such urgency and at the same time there is a resignation to God’s will, whatever that might be. His is less an attempt to change God’s mind then it is an adventure into a spiritual realm where good and evil lock horns; a place of sanctuary where the weary fall into safe and loving arms. It is a place where change is possible even inevitable; and nothing is hidden from the eyes of God. This is what prayer can be for us. As UM we say prayer is a form of stewardship. If stewardship is a Christian attitude toward all aspects of our lives (i.e. all that we have comes from God), then prayer, just as much as giving, serving, and worship, is an act of stewardship. Prayer is a privilege. I’ve been a Christian most of my life and prayer has always been a part of it. What I am learning is just how subversive prayer can be. Our scripture reading comes from I John 5:13-15: I invite you listen for the Good News: I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God, so that you may know that you have eternal life. And this is the boldness we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. And if we know that he hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have obtained the requests made of him. Prayer: God, we love you. We praise you. All that we have comes from you. We rejoice in your presence. Amen. Two things our scripture teaches about prayer. 1st) Prayer by its very nature is subversive. To subvert; to turn over; to reveal what is hidden; to uncover roots; to undermine false structures; to rediscover true foundations; to bring what is hidden into the light; to get to the heart of the matter; to prepare for renewal. In the words of Archbishop Desmond Tutu: "An authentic Christian spirituality is utterly subversive to any system that would treat a man or woman as anything less than a child of God. It has nothing to do with ideology or politics. Every praying Christian, every person who has an encounter with God, must have a passionate concern for his or her brother and sister, his or her neighbor. To treat anyone of these as if he were less than the child of God is to deny the validity of one's spiritual experience." Prayer, in the Christian tradition has as its ultimate goal the establishment of the Kingdom of God (on earth as it is in heaven). What could be more subversive then that? Prayer is taking of sides, God’s side, against the kingdoms of this world. Prayer challenges any claim that the kingdoms and powers of this world are somehow synonymous with God’s reign. So why don’t we pray more considering prayer is so clearly a Kingdom issue? In the movie Evan Almighty, God wonderfully played by actor Morgan Freeman, raises the question, "When we pray for courage, does God give us courage or the opportunity to be courageous? When we pray for patience, does God give us patience or the opportunity to be patient?” Be careful what you pray for, they say. Like a warning on the edge of a medieval map, “Here be dragons!” Maybe the reason we don’t pray very much is not that we doubt its efficacy. Maybe the reason we don’t pray is because it falls at the edge of what is known and comfortable to us. And if we were to be truly “in tune with God,” prayer might take us to places we do not want to go and asks us to do something we do not want to do. Like the rich young ruler in Luke 18 who is told by Jesus to do the one thing he cannot do, to divest himself of his wealth. Prayer is a decision to live on the edge of the map; it is to venture in to uncharted waters. It is to go in search of dragons. Nothing will make prayer more benign then to disassociate it from the radical nature of the coming kingdom of God proclaimed by Jesus. Think about it: If all who claim to follow Jesus (millions of professing Christians) consistently followed just one of his teachings, whether it be the Golden rule or the Beatitudes or the Lord’s Prayer, it would radically turn the world on end! We would get to know our neighbors; No one would go hungry, no one would be excluded. Generosity, acts of random kindness, and extravagance toward others would be the rule of the day. Children would not die of preventable diseases like malaria and HIV-AIDS. We would poor our resources so that wouldn’t happen! You know how some people consider yard work “cathartic?” I’m not one of “those” people! I’ve never been a fan of mowing. I’m highly susceptible to poison oak and ivy. I don’t like the monotony of it or the North Texas summer heat. So imagine my unbridled enthusiasm when our Jr. High youth mission trip arrived in Seguin and I learned that I would be heading up the group assigned to mow and weed-eat three acres of overgrown grass over a two day period! Odd thing was, when it came down to it…I really didn’t mind! After all, it was for Jesus! Many of you know what I am talking about. I’ve seen members of this church spend an entire day painting a house in Dallas with the Amigos project when you would never think twice about hiring someone to paint your own house! When it involves our relationship with God, it changes how we see things. What was once laborious becomes an act of compassion and grace. I watched as our Jr. High youth sorted, scraped, painted, cleaned, and mowed…things many of our youth would never volunteer for on the “home front!” They actually argued over who was going to get to mow first! I am so proud of our youth and their ability to discern the difference between living for God and living for something else. What our youth experienced was transformational and flies directly in the face of the prevailing consumer oriented, “me driven,” I-POD, You-Tube self-focused culture. God’s Kingdom radically challenges the status quo and prayer, is the where we get our marching orders. So if prayer is powerful, adventurous, subversive stuff, why don’t we experience it that way? Verse 14, And this is the boldness we have in him, that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. Prayer is about accomplishing God’s will, not my will or your will or anyone else’s. Perhaps one of the reasons we don’t experience prayer as subversive is because we have failed to understand that prayer is a decision to align my will and your will, with God’s will. Prayer not only proclaims the coming of God’s kingdom, it identifies us as Kingdom people! We are the ones called to “proclaim Good News to the poor, release to the captive, and recovery of sight to the blind (Luke 4:18).” Prayer by its very nature is subversive. 2ndly) We must learn how to listen before we can pray according to God’s will. The question is how do we know if what we’re asking is in line with God’s will? The simple answer is that the better we know God, the more certain we can be of God’s will. We need to learn how to listen in prayer. Mother Teresa was once asked by an interviewer what she said to God when she prayed. “I don’t say much, mostly I just listen.” “And what does God say to you?” asked the interviewer. She replied, “He doesn’t say much, mostly He just listens. And if you don’t understand that, I can’t explain it to you.” According to Child Development experts, before a child ever learns to speak, they must first learn how to listen. Listening for God’s voice is fundamental to praying within God’s will. After all, how can you pray for something when you don’t know what it is? In the book Blue like Jazz, the author writes about having an epiphany of sorts. He realizes how Christians treat love as a commodity, using it like money. We withhold affirmation and love from the people who do not agree with us, but we lavishly “finance” the ones who do. He concludes, “Love is not a commodity to be bought or traded. When we barter with it, we all lose.” As many times as I’ve heard Jesus’ command to love my neighbor I didn’t really hear it because, honestly I didn’t want to. Love your neighbor, period; no ifs, buts, or exclusions. It is only when we are willing to say “yes” to God that we can begin discern just what God’s will is. We need to learn how to listen for God. 1) Prayer by its very nature is subversive. 2) We must first learn how to listen before we can pray according to God’s will. I want to close with a prayer by Regina Sara Ryan: Deliver us, O God, O Truth, O Love, from quiet prayer from polite and politically correct language, from appropriate gesture and form and whatever else we think we must put forth to invoke or praise You. Let us instead pray dangerously-wantonly, lustily, passionately. Let us demand with every ounce of our strength, let us storm the gates of heaven, let us shake ourselves and our plaster saints from the sleep of years. Let us pray dangerously. Let us throw ourselves from the top of the tower, let us risk a descent to the darkest regions of the abyss, let us put our head into the lion's mouth and direct our feet to the entrance of the dragon's cave. Let us pray dangerously. Let us not hold back a little portion, dealing out our lives-our precious minutes and our energies-like some efficient accountant. Let us rather pray dangerously-unsafe, profligate, wasteful! Let us ask for nothing less that the Infinite ravage us. Let us ask for nothing less than annihilation in the Fires of Love. Let us not pray in holy half-measures nor walk the middle path for too long, but pray madly, foolishly. Let us be too ecstatic, let us be too overwhelmed with sorrow and remorse, let us be undone and dismembered...and gladly. Left to our devices, ah what structures of deceit we have created; what battlements erected, what labyrinths woven, what traps set for ourselves, and then fallen into. Enough. Let us pray dangerously-hot prayer, wet prayer, fierce prayer, fiery prayer, improper prayer, exuberant prayer, drunken and completely unrealistic prayer. Let us say Yes, again and again and again. and Yes some more. Let us pray dangerously. The most dangerous prayer is yes. (Amen). |
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