It Takes A Church...

Prayer that Changes Things: Part 4

After taking a couple of posts to honor Rev. Joe Stephens' passing, I return today for the final installment of a series on prayer. 

Praying Naked

With this title, you’ll be relieved to know that I will not be using any specific visual images today.    Here's what we have covered so far...

•    Prayer that changes things begins in the Care-filled stillness of God that calls us to live out the life of God faithfully in the world. 
•    Both God’s care and God’s call, are always together in every circumstance. 
•    That confidence allows us to seek out the voice of God who is always speaking to us in every circumstance. 
•    Through the prayer of examen, we learn that as we regularly reflect upon our lives we can see where our consolations lead us and what our desolations teach us, and
•    And then through the practice of discernment we apply the grid of obedience to the scriptures and the building up of God’s Community in every circumstance, and begin to develop wisdom to make life-changing decisions responding to God’s leading and teaching.

This morning we add in the final, but oh-so-important element: vulnerability.  Openness, genuiness, authenticity: faith that allows the walls to be torn down, our souls exposed and our heart and actions left naked before God and evident to others.  And like a house that is being remodeled so that the walls have come down and we can see the mess inside, we too feel the vulnerability of becoming more and more exposed as we open ourselves to the searching eye of God and recognize that our lives are always lived in public.

Meanwhile, the crowds grew until thousands were milling about and stepping on each other. Jesus turned first to his disciples and warned them,

“Beware of the yeast of the Pharisees—their hypocrisy.

The time is coming when everything that is covered up will be revealed, and all that is secret will be made known to all.

Whatever you have said in the dark will be heard in the light, and what you have whispered behind closed doors will be shouted from the housetops for all to hear!

In this passage from Luke 12:1-3 there is a kind of double-entendre in the warning that Jesus gives his disciples about the Pharisees.  In the first place, Jesus warns his disciples to be careful of the Pharisees.  While they claim to be devoted to God, they are actually hypocrites who are just looking for ways to oppose the work of God that is happening in Jesus.  He warns his disciples that whatever they say will be used against them. That whatever they whisper will be shouted aloud and that there will always be those who want to stop Jesus’ Kingdom work in the world and they are just looking for an opportunity to discredit Jesus by making known the faults and foibles of his followers.

And there is a good warning here for us, isn’t there?  We need to know that the more we become serious about living out our faith, the more there will be people out there who are just waiting for an excuse to discredit Jesus by pointing out our faults of faith. By trying to tear us down, or waiting for us to fall down so that they can have an excuse for their own rejection of the way of Jesus.

But the second meaning also present here is that Jesus also warns his disciples not to become like the Pharisees.  Jesus warns them of the hypocrisy that often follows when we try to get serious about living a God-pleasing life (sspecially when others are watching--v.1). We can feel so vulnerable, so messy, so incomplete and so much like a work-in-progress.  It is so tempting to just start faking it.  To playing religion, to talk about things that we are not experiencing or even attempting.  To take on the appearance of having it so spiritually together that we start to put on layers and layers of religious garb, of spiritual masks, that hide the naked truth that we ourselves are still vso very far from what we are meant to be.

This is a good warning to us.  A French writer of the 17th century said, "Hypocrisy is the tribute vice pays to virtue."   Hypocrisy often occurs because we who know better can’t live better.  When our actual impact falls short of our intentions.  And Jesus warns us that whatever we say or do in secret that only he knows will eventually find us out.  The big problem with faking it till you make it, is that you never really make it.

The Greek word, hypocrisy, here is the word for the mask that was worn in a Greek play. Jesus warns his disciples to beware of the “leaven of the Pharisees”, the hypocrisy that they have mastered of appearing more spiritual and devoted than they really are. Because not only does it keep them from admitting to themselves their need for Jesus, but they also influence and intimidate others. Like “leaven” where a little bit influences the whole loaf of bread, a little hypocrisy can ruin a whole community of people.

I live in a community where people often seem so put together that it can feel very vulnerable when life gets messy.  When the circumstances of life, our own faults and folly, our mistakes and miscues become apparent it is tempting to want to cover them up behind a mask, to make sure that no one sees the mess of renovation, the warts and wrinkles of our humanness. 

And this is only all the more so when we know that others are looking at us because we have declared that we are followers of Jesus.  It is so tempting to hide ourselves from others and to attempt to hide ourselves from God.

So many people in our community are actually struggling right now.  Home values are plummeting, jobs are being lost, the stresses of a fast-paced life are taking their toll.  And when marriages are strained and families are in crisis, and kids are making harmful choices, we often tell ourselves that the only way to go on is to cover up, put on a mask, where an extra layer of religious garb, make sure that no one sees the mess inside our hearts and our homes. And then we live in fear and isolation that we are all alone in our messiness and that eventually someone will find us out and make it worse.

So what do we do?  How can we avoid this?  If the answer is not to cover up, how do we really pray in such a way that things change for the better?

By trusting God with our mess.  By believing that the one who saw us come into the world naked and vulnerable, and who will take us from this world naked and vulnerable knows and will be with us in every naked and vulnerable, messy and incomplete moment in our lives. And by learning to pray and live more honestly and authentically. Which leads me to this key thought:

Prayer that changes things comes from a heart that is honest before God and leads to a life that is authentic before people. 

Prayer that Changes Things: Part 3

Jesus WON'T take the Wheel...

And this is my prayer, that your love may overflow more and more with knowledge and full insight 10 to help you to determine what is best…(Philippians 1:9-10, NRSV)

If you have read the last couple of posts, then you know that we are in the middle of a series called “Prayer that Changes Things”.  And as we have learned together “prayer that changes things is prayer that changes us.”

Together we have been trying to develop a prayer life that is built on creating still spaces to listen to the Lord, and to respond to God’s Spirit that is at work in every circumstance leading us to live more filled with gratitude, joy and consolation, and with less despair, sin and desolation.

But here is the question I want to begin with today.  Once we have found some moments of stillness and once we have begun to pay attention to those moments that seemed to be more faithful with God’s will for our lives, how do we in fact, know that it is God’s will for our lives?  How do we “discern the will of God” as so many people talk about it?

The Will of God is always a popular topic because all of us want to make good decisions that God will bless.  As Christians, we believe that in order to be happy and successful, to live blessed, we have to live according to God’s will.  And that is true. 

But when most of us talk about God’s will, we couldn’t be further from the truth.  Most of us think of God’s will as a clear, step by step blueprint or map for living.  That God has every detail of our lives completely and utterly mapped out and that our job is to find out what that will is and live accordingly. 

We think of life like an Amtrak training heading from “this world to heaven” And that God is the conductor of the train and our job is make sure that whenever we have to change trains or make a decision that we are on the right train so that we never get off track.  Getting on the wrong train or making a decision outside of God’s perfectly mapped out will is a tragedy, leading to missing what God wants for us. 

So then, we spend a lot of time fussing over the perfect decision.  If God has every part of my life mapped out like a cross-country train track then there must be one perfect will of God for which school I attend, which person I marry, which job I take, how many children I have, when I retire and so forth, right?  I mean if we miss the will of God in these decisions we are doomed, right?  We might eventually make it to have eternal life with God, but we won’t experience the blessing of living God’s will here and now, right?

Wrong.  There is absolutely no place in the Bible where we are told that God’s will is about figuring out every single detail in your life according to some master plan.  Indeed, there isn’t one master plan.  Not one place in the Bible are we told to discern the will of God as we make decisions in our lives. 

In fact, the Bible says that God’s will for us is really just one thing and is the same for all of us:  To make us more like God.  To change our lives so that we are in every way like Christ.  This is what it says in 1 Thessalonians 4:3: For this is the will of God, your sanctification… or as it says in another translation, “God’s will is for you to be holy…”

You see God’s will is that we would be changed, transformed, become more like him. And when we make decisions in life, when we pray for God to be at work in our lives, God’s concern is that we would be transformed people, sanctified people, holy people.  God’s will is not in the details of the journey but in the end point, the goal. 

Some of you are going to be troubled by this.  What?  Some of us say. You mean there ISN’T God’s perfect will about which school I attend, which church I join, which career I enter?  There isn’t one perfect person to marry, one perfect will to live as a Christian following Jesus?  Doesn’t God love me and have a wonderful plan for my life?   Yes.  That plan is that you would become like Jesus in every way. That your life would reveal God's saving work to the world in every aspect.  That you would become sanctified. (Romans 8:29, 1 Thes 4:3)

That’s right.  I know for some of us this is a shock.  Some of you would say to me, you mean, that you don’t believe that marrying Beth and coming to your church was God’s perfect will for your life?  No.  Don’t misunderstand me.  I love Beth so much that I can’t imagine a better wife for me.  And I love being pastor of this mychurch so much that seems like God picked it out especially for me.  But neither marrying Beth nor coming to SCPC was the only choice I could have made.  Indeed, I didn’t make them alone, both Beth and my congregation chose me also. 

You see, the will of God for our lives is not like an Amtrak train with one way to the destination, it is more like a cross-country ride in an old VW Bus.  God’s will is for us to make it to the final goal—to become like him.  But frankly there are many ways we can get there.  God invites us join him on a journey, while we steer the bus. 

Prayer That Changes Things: Part 2

I have posted on this before, but this simple, ancient spiritual discipline is truly one of the most life-changing I have practiced and I gladly pass it on...again. -- Tod

Holy High-Low

In Poker, there is one particular type of game that allows two different people to win the pot at the same time.  It is called High-Low.  In High-Low Poker, both the highest hand and the lowest hand split the pot. 

For a while now, my family has been playing a kind of communication game that we call “high-low” at dinner time.  Every one of us has to check in and tell his or her “high” of the day and “low” of the day while we eat together.  The Highs and lows are different for each person.  A high may be, “getting a good grade on my math test” or “my friend and I made up after our fight” or “I had a really good staff meeting.”  Or “The hours I spent in the garden.”   And equally so, the low is something different for each of us—and frankly, most of the time we would rather not even talk about it.  But around the table we do, both highs and lows and through it we are learning to sense God’s leading in our lives as individuals and as a family.

Now, technically, this “spiritual poker game” is called the Prayer of “examen”, and it is mostly an end-of-the-day spiritual discipline developed by St. Ignatius in the 16th century. 

Prayer That Changes Things: Part 1

With the new year, many of us are eager to make changes.  We may even seek to enlist some divine help in making those changes.  A few months back I gave a series of messages called "Prayer That Changes Things" that I would like to reproduce here over the next few days.  Consider them my attempt to help you with your desire to make changes in your life.      -- Tod

 

Let me begin by telling you a story that comes out of Greek Mythology. (The first time I heard it, was not in a high school English class but from singer Jim Cole. And it inspired his wonderful song, Master of My Heart, which I recommend you find immediately.)

The Sirens are cannibalistic demons that sing beautiful music to sailors that pass by their island.  The song was so beautiful that it would drive out any other thoughts except for a longing to hear more.  The sailors would hear the songs, would fall in love with the Sirens and turn their boats to the shore.  The boats would crash on the rocks and the Sirens would devour the foolish and fooled sailors. 

When Odysseus sailed around the island, he put molten wax in the sailors’ ears so that they couldn't hear the Siren's song.  He told the men to lash him to a pole so tight that he couldn't get loose and no matter what he said to not let him go and left the wax out of his ears, because he just wanted to hear the song. As they sailed around the cape, the sailors couldn't hear the song because of the wax.  But Odysseus cried out to them he was so moved by the Sirens song.  If he could have gotten free, he too would have sailed the ship to certain death, but strapped to the mast, tormented but safe, he sailed past the Siren Island. 

I think that many of us are like Odysseus, dear friends.  Sometimes, I am.  We want to sail past the islands of destruction, but we still want to hear their song. 

We want to be captain of our own fates, willing ourselves through the trials of life, but at the same time we feel tormented by the realization that we are seduced by the very things that could destroy the life we have worked so hard to create.  We shudder at the thought of so many people who have ended up wrecked on the shore, and consumed by the very things they thought would bring them happiness.  We are like Odysseus, strapping ourselves to the mast and binding ourselves to our busy schedules, our full lives, our attempts to immunize ourselves and especially our children against the seductions of this world.  We wish that we could just pour wax in our kids’ ears and be held against our wills to keep from being devoured by that which we secretly desire.  We fear that if we ever hear the song of the sirens, the lure of the world, the temptations of the flesh, that we will wreck everything that is good in our lives.  And so we live tormented, trapped, strapped, and exhausted.

Oh we may have made it so far, but is this anyway to live? 

I have already told you one story from mythology; let me tell you another one, a true story from the Scriptures.  It is a classic story of a confrontation between good and evil, between faith and false gods.  And let’s see if something about sounds familiar to us.  I will narrate it, but if you want to follow along in the Bible, you’ll find it in 1 Kings 18-19. 

Some two hundred years after David ruled Israel in its heyday, the kingdom had split in two and Israel was ruled by King Ahab.  The Bible makes it clear that Ahab, though a Jew was not faithful to God. He was lured away into worshipping false gods by his wife Jezebel, who wielded her power and influence to corrupt Israel and to lead them to worship the false gods of the Baals, even to the pointing of seeing that the true prophets of God were put to death so that they would not speak against her.

And because of Ahab’s weakness and Jezebel’s faithlessness, the people of God began to worship both the One True God Israel and as well as the false gods of the Baals.

But in Israel at the time was one genuine prophet of God named Elijah.  In 1 Kings 18, Elijah challenges the prophets of Baal to a kind of Spiritual Heavyweight Ultimate Fighting Match.  They would each make an altar of wood and on it lay a butchered bull.  But instead of lighting the offering, Elijah all by himself challenges the 450 false prophets of Baal to call out to their gods to light the altar and consume the offering. 

The prophets of Baal make their altar with the bull offering on it and all day long from morning until midday, 450 false prophets call out to Baal, “O Baal, answer us!”  About noon, Elijah starts talking smack to them. “What’s the problem boys?  Is your god meditating somewhere?  Has he wandered away?  Is he on a trip?  Is your god sleeping?  You better try harder if you are going to wake him up!” And they did, even cutting themselves and pouring out their own blood.  But still the altar lay quiet. No fire, no big powerful god showing up, no matter how much they sacrificed their own flesh.

Then the story really gets interesting… Elijah takes an old altar to Yahweh that Jezebel had thrown down.  He picks up twelve stones to represent the tribes of Israel.  Out of the stones he makes an altar and around it digs a huge pit.  He places the bull on the altar and then he tells the people to fill up four huge jars of water and pour them on the altar, then they do it again, and a third time.  He literally drenches the altar, the wood, the stones, and the offering. 

And then he prays…just prays.  No shouting, no wailing, no self-mutilation. Just prays.  Answer me, O Lord, answer me, so that this people may know that you, O Lord, are God, and that you have turned their hearts back.”

And a fire bolt comes from heaven.  The flames consume the offering, consume the wood, consume the stones, the fire licks up the water overflowing out of the trench.  And in 1 Kings 18:39 we read, When all the people saw it, they fell on their faces and said, “The Lord indeed is God; the Lord indeed is God.”

Now I had to tell you that story to tell you this.  AFTER this huge victory, do you know what happened to Elijah?  Did he go on to confront Ahab and Jezebel?  Did he start a revival in Israel?  NO. 

And this is the most surprising part.  The disappointing part.  The disturbing part. The part that somewhere within us, we all understand, but we wish we didn’t.

Elijah gets word that Jezebel now wants him dead, and what does he do?  Does he say, “Hey lady, bring it on.  Have you seen what my God can do?”  Does he stand in the middle of the challenge and finish the job by confronting the Heretic Queen? No.  He hears that Jezebel is coming after him—and he flees.  Something about Jezebel making their spiritual confrontation personal, takes the fight right out of Elijah. 

He leaves town, he leaves the country, he leaves the ministry and he sit down under a tree and prays to die.

In  1Kings 19:4-8  we read,
But he himself went a day’s journey into the wilderness, and came and sat down under a solitary broom tree. He asked that he might die: “It is enough; now, O Lord, take away my life, for I am no better than my ancestors.” 5 Then he lay down under the broom tree and fell asleep. Suddenly an angel touched him and said to him, “Get up and eat.” 6 He looked, and there at his head was a cake baked on hot stones, and a jar of water. He ate and drank, and lay down again. 7 The angel of the Lord came a second time, touched him, and said, “Get up and eat, otherwise the journey will be too much for you.” 8 He got up, and ate and drank; then he went in the strength of that food forty days and forty nights to Horeb the mount of God. 9 At that place he came to a cave, and spent the night there.

Notice, that Elijah is discouraged, wants to die and cries out to God and what does God do?  First he cares for Elijah. He gives him food and lets him sleep.  Now here we are.  A man of God is alone with the Lord and God comes to him and hears the prayer of his heart.  God listens not only to the words of his lips and the discouragement of his soul, but to the deeper longing that has probably been building in Elijah for years.  And in the encounter with God face to face, everything changes. 

But what exactly is that?  What does change?

But notice what he doesn’t change.  Notice what he doesn’t do?  Does God solve Elijah’s problem?  You know, take out Jezebel?  NO. He doesn’t.  And this is different than we expect, isn’t it?

We think that if God is going to change anything, he is going to change our circumstances don’t we?  Many of us think that that is the primary purpose of prayer: Getting God to change stuff.  God, this is your world, so please change it.  Please, change my husband, change my kids, change my circumstances.  Take care of my boss, give me an extra two hours every day and two days of every week so that I can fit everything in.  Multiply my pay check, change the economy, fix the housing market, let me win the lottery.  Give me my first college choice, be popular at school, get kids to like me, let me get the perfect job or find the perfect spouse, or have perfect kids.  Eliminate all temptations, all trials, all turmoil. Inoculate my family from ever experiencing pain or having problems, God, just change—everything.

My friends, this series is about learning to pray in such a way that things get changed.  It could be in the middle of hard, personal circumstances where it seems like some enemy wants to destroy our life as we know it.  It could be in the middle of great blessings, of tremendous opportunities, of life in all its complexity, it makes us wonder “where is the life that we have lost in the living.”

Over the next few posts we will look at a myriad of circumstances that are as different as all of our lives, but the one thing they will have in common is that we know that something needs to change.  And indeed, sometimes, graciously, almost miraculously God does change our circumstances, but what we will see is that over and over again, we will keep coming back to this reality:

The prayer that changes things is the prayer that changes us.