Prayer Shapes Life
Meg and I are very blessed with our kids. We have spoken to each of them in the last week and several of them multiple times. A couple of them call Meg almost every day. Sometimes we call them. Lately we get to FaceTime with Mabel and I’m on a constant quest to find ways to make her smile. Motorboat sounds work well lately. Meg talks to her dad every day. My parents feel like they talk to me almost every day because they watch this service and Compline, but I do try to talk to them every week.
With our kids and our parents, we might talk about anything from the weather to a movie or whatever the latest challenges or news may be in our lives. All of that conversation is life-giving because we love each other. We never stop being parents or children, in a sense, but it’s nice when that takes on friendship as well. Whether it’s family or a friend, we treasure such intimacy and trust.
When Jesus’ disciples ask him to teach them how to pray, his description feels like family. It was common for rabbis to teach about God in terms of Father in Jesus’ time, and several of the prophets refer to God as Father in the Old Testament, but this emphasis is new and very personal.
Our own early fathers may fail or abandon their children, but we know what fatherhood is meant to be. Jesus wants us to approach God as Father in that intimate, loving way, in the hallowed or holiness of his name.
(We are following, of course, the structure of the Lord’s Prayer. You may be wondering about all the pieces that are missing. We draw The Lord’s Prayer from Matthew Chapter 6:9-13. Luke’s version is a little different, which we can ascribe to the likelihood of Jesus teaching the same thing but not the precisely same language but making the same point.)
“Your kingdom come” reminds us that God invites us to participate in the coming of his kingdom. This hearkens back to Israel’s history. Their receipt of the Promised Land was not merely the granting of a divine deed. It was a call to action. The “land of milk and honey” meant work. The people had to shepherd and tend to their livestock, which I gather is pretty tough work, to produce the milk. That’s a good thing. A life of complete leisure is boring, insipid and self-destructive.
They had to tend to the crops which the bees would pollinate to get the produce of the land and the sweet byproduct of honey. The vast majority of Israel’s acreage requires irrigation. Water is their most precious resource. Left to nature, Israel isn’t a particularly green landscape. But with the faithful nurture of its people, you can literally see where Israel ends and Lebanon or Syria begin. Israel is green, they are dry. The exception is the lower Jordan valley, where Israel has been working with Lebanon, sharing methods and so on so that both sides of the river are lush with date palms, oranges, mangos and other crops.
When we pray “Thy kingdom come” we must not overlook the work that implies for us who are following God’s Word. Faith is not a passive exercise for us to accept then store in our hearts. It isn’t just about getting people to behave morally, it’s about producing an abundance that illustrates and demonstrates God’s love for his people.
Faith works into all that we are and all that we do, family, work, education, and our community.
Note that the disciples’ question and each part of Jesus’ instructions are communal, not personal. We don’t pray, “My Father who art in heaven” or “Forgive me my sins” or “Give me today my daily bread” or “Deliver me from evil.” The kingdom of God is communal. We are in this together. That’s why despite all the difficulties and challenges we encounter, we form these communities and talk about them as family.
Once he has given these instructions on what to say, Jesus teaches us about the heart of prayer. These three charges: Ask, Seek and Knock are all encouraging us to lay our hearts at God’s feet and trust him with all of it. Don’t put yourself off with, “God won’t” or “I’ve tried” or I can’t.” God’s faithfulness is absolute, it’s ours that slips and fades. The key to prayer is persistence. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve found something immediately after praying (Seek and ye shall find.) Persistence in prayer keeps us in persistent connection with Our Father. That is the key to life, eternal life that includes right now.
You want an example of persistence? Take a guy like Fred Allen. You know Fred. Big smile, hearty laugh, firm handshake. Did you know that Fred planks?
I think I have this right, the planking that Fred does involves holding your body straight on a level plane while propped up on you elbows; nothing but your toes and elbows on the floor. And there you stay as long as you can. Here’s the thing. Fred is, shall we say, seasoned. Over 80, which puts him in the top 10% by age of people in this room right now. And I bet Fred can out-plank almost everyone here. At most there may be a handful. Fred can plank for 4½ minutes or more.
By comparison, and you know I’m a runner and work out several times a week, I can plank for about a minute, maybe a minute and a half. What is the difference? Fred works at it. He does it all the time.
Why does Fred plank? It really works your core muscle, the abs and lower back and so on. That helps with a lot of issues, and it keeps Fred moving really well. Everything else works around that core.
At its heart, our faith is not primarily about a set of rules or morals, or even intellectual assent to a set of beliefs, though of course all of those come into play. Prayer is central to nurturing our relationship with our Father, with Christ and the Holy Spirit through prayer.
The very fact that we seek God at all, each in our own way, is evidence that he is with us and calling us closer. Take heart, he is with us. Talk to him. And remember it takes time, God’s time.
AMEN