Introduction
I heard a story a few weeks ago about a best man who was
late for the wedding and couldn’t find anywhere to park. In desperation he
prayed, “God, if there is a God, I’ll go to church every week for the rest of
my life if you’ll just find me a parking space.” Suddenly, amazingly, miraculously,
there was a space right in front of him. “Never mind, God,” he said, “I just
found one!”
Over this summer we are thinking about what some call
‘Christian disciplines’ but I prefer the term ‘spiritual fitness’. What makes
up a healthy spiritual work-out?
Prayer
Is Work
One of the things is prayer. Have you ever prayed for
a preacher to shut up and sit down? Somebody did some research a while back and
found that the average length for a sermon in the UK has now fallen to under 10
minutes. Asked to comment on the research, one joker said, “It is a testimony
to the remarkable power of intercessory prayer!”
But in reality, many of us find prayer hard work. The
Bishop who ordained me, Geoffrey Rowell, once said, “In the contest between
prayer and work, work always wins because it’s easier.”
I was reading the other week about the Mission that
Mother Teresa founded in Calcutta. Apparently, there was a time when the
sisters were becoming overrun by the demands placed on them. There were more people
at their door than they could keep pace with. They had to turn some away.
So one day one of the novices approached Mother Teresa
and said, “What are we going to do? We are overwhelmed. The sisters are
discouraged and exhausted.” Do you know how Mother Teresa replied? She said,
“Then we shall have to get up in the morning one hour earlier. And we shall
spend that extra hour in prayer.”
I would have said, “Then we shall have to open the
doors one hour earlier to fit more people in.” But it’s a good job they had
Mother Theresa running that place and not me. Because Bishop Geoffrey was
right, in the contest between prayer and work, work wins, because it’s easier.
But prayer is more effective than we know. God provided an international wave
of interns and volunteers, and the mission was able to cope again.
How
to…
When Jesus talks about praying, he gives some straight
talk about how to go about it. “Don’t show off,” he says in v5, “it’s not a performance.”
“Don’t crowd it out,” he says in v6. “You really need
to find a private space where you can be alone with God.”
“And it doesn’t have to be long. Don’t waffle on and
on,” he says in v7, “God knows what
you want to say.”
The prayer Jesus taught, we call it the Lord’s Prayer,
but actually it’s our prayer. “This then is how you should pray”, he said (v9). And Jesus’ approach is simple.
The Lord’s Prayer begins with the three things that
God is looking for from us: reverence – ‘hallowed be your name’; allegiance –
‘your kingdom come’; and obedience – ‘your will be done’.
And it goes on to ask for the three things we need
from God: food – ‘Give us today our daily bread’; forgiveness – ‘forgive us our
sins’; and freedom – ‘deliver us from the evil one’.
The evangelist J. John and his wife Killy heard about
a woman who was in a coma, completely unresponsive. They went to the hospital
and asked the staff if they could pray, and their request was granted. They
stood either side of the patient, each held one of her hands, and said, “What
shall we pray?” They were pretty low on ideas.
So Killy said, “Maybe the Lord’s Prayer.” J. John
said, “Sounds good.” So they started to pray, saying each line slowly and
deliberately. Our Father in heaven…. Hallowed by your name… And as they said, “Your
kingdom come” the patient suddenly sat up, bolt upright. She was discharged a
day later.
The Christian author John Ortberg once talked about
his Uncle Otis who regularly prayed for the sick. One Sunday in church, he was
asked to pray for a poor soul who was suffering from quite severe constipation.
Uncle Otis started praying, “Lord, heal this man
immediately!” Sometimes an immediate answer to prayer is not quite what you
need and mercifully this particular prayer was not answered instantly!
In Luke’s gospel, Jesus’ teaching this prayer comes as
a reply to a question from one of the twelve. They saw Jesus praying and asked
him to teach them to pray.
It’s a good question to ask. If somebody came up to
you and said, “You’re a Christian aren’t you? Oh good. I was wondering, tell
me, I have wanted to learn to pray for ages; where should I start?” What would
you say in reply? Would you offer a technique? Do you think you’d mention this
prayer?
Some people like to take time out in quiet monasteries
or chapels. Others pray best in the car after listening to the Bible on CD. (A
word of advice: if this is you, learn to pray with your eyes open)!
Some, like me, prefer to spend the first moments of
each day in prayer, before or just after getting up. For others, the best
moment is at the end of the day on the sofa with a cup of cocoa. Do whatever
works best for you.
Once, because I was slipping into the habit of saying
the Lord’s Prayer mechanically, I tried to put it in my own words, using as few
words from the original as I could, but without changing the meaning. Here’s
what I came up with:
Father God, high above
us and far beyond us,
may everyone on earth give you honour,
accept your authority and obey your word
as the angels do in your presence.
Give us just what we need for the day ahead.
Forgive us when we go against you
just as we make peace with those who hurt us.
Don’t test us beyond what we can bear
but drive the devil away from us.
The just rule, the invincible power, and the unfading
glory
belong to you alone and always will.
That's right!
In today’s Gospel reading it is clear that prayer is
something we rightly do alone in private and together with others. As I said, Jesus
teaches us to find a space where we won’t be disturbed, where we can be alone
with God.
But he doesn’t mean we should only pray
privately. If he did expect us to only pray alone, the prayer he taught us
would begin with the words ‘My Father’ not ‘Our Father.’
Jesus expects Christians to pray together in groups as
well. When he said to go in a room and shut the door, he meant that our praying
should not be a display for onlookers.
Public prayer is not a show. “Do not be like the
hypocrites, for they love to pray standing… on the street corners…” Why? “To
be seen.”
Corrie Ten Boom was a Dutch watchmaker’s daughter who
survived Ravensbruck concentration camp after being sent there for hiding Jews
in her house. She knew quite a bit about trouble and perils.
And she knew that some people only pray when the chips
are down. As soon as life gets better prayer gets forgotten. So she once asked
this question, “Is prayer your steering wheel or your spare tyre?”
In other words, does prayer direct your life, is it at
the heart of your decision making, or does it only really happen in dire
emergency when all else fails?
But some people will worry and lose hours of sleep before
they pray and leave things with the Lord.
Can I encourage you, if you are carrying heavy burdens
today, and you haven’t really prayed, to come to God and lay your anxieties
down at his feet? Maybe pray with someone else if that helps. But don’t suffer
alone. The Lord is near.
There’s a lovely verse in Philippians 4 about worry
and prayer. “Do not be anxious about anything, but in every situation, by
prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, present your requests to God. And the
peace of God, which transcends all understanding, will guard your hearts and
your minds in Christ Jesus.”
In other words, peace comes when we leave our burdens
with God in prayer.
Ending
To finish, let’s thank God for answered prayer. If
each of us shared, one by one, all the prayers God had answered in our lives I’m
sure it would take days to hear the end of it.
And, at the same time, let’s trust his wisdom and timing
for those prayers that are yet unanswered.
Some of the things I asked God for years ago, I know now
would have taken my life in a completely different direction, and not for the
better. As someone wisely noted, “We shall need eternity to thank God for all
the prayers he didn’t answer.”
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