Part 4; The Path of Prayer – Aug 26, 2018
This morning we continue our series on Prayer by acknowledging that there are many ways to pray, many ways of coming into the intentional presence of God.
The word intentional is important here. As people of faith, we know that God is always with us, already present in our lives.
The good news is that God doesn’t wait for us to invite God to show up, God doesn’t wait for us to ask God to do something, instead, God is already present and already active in our lives, in our families, in our world, in the church.
So why should we pray?
We pray because God longs to be in a relationship with us. We pray because God gives us the gift of prayer and invites us to make prayer a way of living out our faith.
Being in a relationship with another takes intentional attention and action. It doesn’t matter if the other is a family member, friend, co-worker, or God. Being in a relationship means making time for each other.
Prayer is the relational arm of our faith. It’s one way that we intentionally make time for God.
There are different ways to pray, different paths, into the intentional presence of God.
One way is through the spoken word. Speaking our prayers to God. Whether that be out loud or within the silence of our thoughts, using printed prayers that we read or spontaneous prayers that we offer at the moment.
Jesus gave the disciples, and us, a spoken prayer, that provides a pattern, a shape for our prayers.
You might have noticed that the prayer we heard this morning from Matthew is not quite the same as the one traditionally known as the Lord’s Prayer, nor is it the same as the one recorded in the 11thchapter of Luke.
I’m not going to spend time unpacking the differences, that’s best done in bible study.
Instead, today, we look at the Lord’s Prayer as a pattern for prayer. This pattern includes provokingGod to listen, giving praise to God, making a plea for God’s intervention, and seeking God’s provision, pardon, and protection.
I admit, it might be odd to think of us provoking God, yet Scripture is full of examples of our faithful ancestors provoking God to action – Moses provoked God to respond to the needs of the Israelites by saying things like: “Why did you bring us out of Egypt, to kill us and our children and livestock with thirst?”
The psalmist provoked God to compassion by praying “Turn, O LORD! How long? Have compassion on your servants!
Jesus tells us to provoke God by praying Our Father. In this way, we claim God’s relationship with us, a relationship grounded in community and love.
Nehemiah provoked God by praying, O Lord God of heaven 6let your ear be attentive and your eyes open to hear the prayer of your servant that I now pray before you day and night.
How do you provoke God to listen to you? Is it simply saying God, Jesus, Holy Spirit? Or do you like to use as an adjective to describe God like almighty, loving, gracious? Or is it some other salutation like dear God, or hey God.
My friends, there’s no right or wrong way to provoke God, no set formula. In fact, there may actually be times when you provoke God by just launching right into your prayer and that’s okay too!
In the pattern of the Lord’s Prayer, we provoke God to listen and then we give our praise to God.
When we pray “hallowed be your name” we are offering ourselves in worship, giving praise to God, and praying that God’s name, God’s presence, which is holy already because of who God is, will continue to be made holy in and among us, right now. We’re praying that everything we think, do, and say will bring glory and honor to God’s name.
The next part of this pattern is a plea for God’s intervention in the world and in our lives right now, not some distant time in the future, but right now.
We plea “your kingdom come, your will be done.” Be careful here, this is a plea for change, for transformation – transformation in us, our church, the world. To pray, your kingdom come, your will be done is a plea to transform us from being me-centered to kingdom-centered, God-centered.
In a me-centered world – I am more important than anything or anybody else. I want what I want without regard to how that affects others. I want to be first, to be the greatest, to be at the front of the line. That’s not how God’s kingdom works.
In God’s kingdom, Jesus says that the first is last, that the greatest among us is to become the servant, and that washing the feet of another is how to show love. Each day we are to be busy doing kingdom business: welcoming the stranger, feeding the poor, clothing the naked, visiting those in any kind of trouble, working for justice
And if that’s not difficult enough, we then plea for God’s will to be done – this requires humility, right. When we plea for God’s will to be done, we admit that our wills, my will, is not the most important thing, that life is not all about me!
To plea for God’s kingdom to come, God’s will to be done is to plea for God to intervene in our lives and in the world, in ways that will fulfill Gods purpose, fulfill God’s mission.
So far, we’ve seen that The Lord’s Prayer is a pattern of prayer that involves: provoking God to listen, giving praise to God, and making a plea for God’s intervention in our lives and in the world.
The next parts in this pattern of the Lord’s Prayer include seeking God’s provision, pardon, and protection.
We pray:
11Give us this day our daily bread.12And forgive us our debts,
as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13And do not bring us to the time of trial
but rescue us from the evil one.
The ability to ask God for these things: for provision, pardon, and protection is such a gift, a gift we shouldn’t take lightly. By including these aspects in what we call The Lord’s Prayer, Jesus is assuring us that they are important to God.
God longs to provide for us, to meet our daily needs.
God longs to pardon, forgive, us of those things that we fail to, things we ignore when we should be paying attention; those things that we do or say which cause us harm or harm others, those things which separate us from God.
God longs to protect us from the struggles of this world so that we can live fully in the life God wants for us, gives to us.
Things happen in our lives that challenge us. We won’t always have what we need. We won’t always feel forgiven and we won’t always forgive others. Hardships and pain will come our way. That’s the reality of living on this side of God’s kingdom. Where God’s will is challenged by the brokenness of sin.
And still, God gives us this gift of prayer and this shape, this pattern, of prayer so that when we are facing the tough times of life, we can lean into this prayer, when we don’t know what to pray for or pray about, we can lean into this prayer.
And when we pray, “your kingdom come, your will be done” we can trust that God is already at work bringing in the God’s kingdom, restoring God’s will, providing for us, pardoning us, and protecting us.
As a pattern of prayer, The Lord’s Prayer, gives us a shape that we can use for all of our spoken prayers, prayers that we speak out loud or in the silence of our thoughts.
This pattern, this shape, includes: provoking God to listen, giving praise to God, making a plea for God’s intervention, and seeking God’s provision, pardon, and protection. This is beautiful, isn’t it? What a gift!
I mentioned earlier that there are different ways to pray, different paths, into the intentional presence of God and that one of those ways is through the spoken word.
Another way is through listening, through contemplative prayer, sometimes known as centering prayer or meditation. While there are subtle differences between these different ways of listening prayer, the bottom line is that they all involve being still, quieting your mind, resting in God’s presence without rushing to fill the space or the time with words.
So, we’ll end the sermon today by being still. I’m going to use Psalm 46:10 to shape our listening. I’ll read this verse a couple of times, omitting words as I go. There will be a moments of silence in between, creating space to listen.
So, get comfortable, close your eyes, if you’d like. And hear God say:
Be still and know that I am God.
Be still, and know that I am.
Be still, and know that I
Be still and know that
Be still and know
Be still and
Be still
Be
Amen.