On Prayer

This is the sermon I gave on Sunday, July 24, 2016.

On Prayer

Rev. Dr. Tom Sorenson, Pastor

July 24, 2016

Let us pray: May the words of my mouth and the meditations of all of our hearts be acceptable in your sight O God, our strength and our redeemer. Amen.

I have a confession to make. Now, I know that some preachers believe that a pastor should never admit that he doesn’t know something, or that he struggles with something, or that he ever does anything wrong, especially not in a sermon. Well, I actually think that honesty is the better policy, so I have a confession to make. I struggle with prayer. I mean, I struggle with the common notion that the reason we should pray to God is so that God will do something we want God to do. I’ve heard of people who insist that that is true. This is second hand hearsay, but I know a woman who says she has a friend who swears that every time she’s in downtown Seattle looking for on-street parking, and she prays to God for an open parking place, she finds one. Now, I don’t go to downtown Seattle nearly as often as I used to, but I know that finding on-street parking there is essentially impossible. I don’t even bother looking for it. But this women is convinced that when she asks God to find her a parking space, she finds one. I have so many problems with that notion that I hardly know where to start to list them. Is God really concerned about something as trivial as this woman finding on-street parking so she doesn’t have to pay a parking garage? I sure don’t think so. More importantly, is that really how prayer works? Ask God for something—anything—and you’ll get it? Apparently a lot of people think so.

A lot of people think so, and it’s not hard for them to quote Scripture verses that seem to support their belief. We heard some of those verses just now. In our passage this morning from Luke Jesus says “Ask and it will be given to you.” And “everyone who asks receives.” And “seek and you will find.” Sure sounds like Jesus is saying “sure. Just ask God for it. For anything, and God will have nothing better to do than give it to you.” You need a parking place? Sure. God is the cosmic parking lot attendant. You need to pass that exam in your college course? Sure. Don’t bother learning the material, God will essentially take the test for you. Of course, sometimes our requests to God are more serious than that. You need a loved one to recover from a severe illness? “Sure,” God says, “I’m the cosmic physician who can cure all illnesses.” That’s what these verses sound like, isn’t it? Ask, and whatever you ask for will be given to you. ‘Ask and it will be given to you; seek and you will find.” Case closed, right?

Well, some of you know me well enough by now to know that I don’t think the case is closed. If it were, I probably wouldn’t be preaching on it this morning. I don’t think the case is closed for a couple of reasons. First of all, I just don’t think life works like that. I think that human experience just doesn’t support that simplistic a reading of these lines. We humans just don’t get everything we ask God for. I could ask God to deliver a Rolls Royce to my driveway by the time I get home today, and there certainly will be no Rolls Royce in my driveway when I get there. On a more serious note, I prayed that my first wife would recover from breast cancer. She didn’t. She died of it fourteen years ago next Sunday. I suspect that many of you have spoken or thought similar prayers for loved ones who passed away. Some Fundamentalist preachers might tell us that we just didn’t pray hard enough or long enough. Well, sorry. That’s not how it works. Thinking that that’s how prayer works shifts the blame for things for which we pray that don’t happen onto us when we have absolutely no control over the situation. Thinking that that’s how prayer works, that that’s how God works, destroys faith. It destroys faith because that isn’t how prayer works, and it isn’t how God works. My first big problem with believing that all we have to do to receive anything at all is to ask God for it is that life doesn’t work that way and God doesn’t work that way. God simply is not a cosmic Santa Claus.

Beyond that, I don’t think that our Gospel verses this morning actually say that prayer works that way. It sure sounds like they say that, at least upon first reading or hearing, but I don’t think they say that for a couple of reasons. First, these verses are awfully vague. “Ask and it will be given you.” What will be given me? We can read into the verse that the thing I asked for will be given me, but the verse doesn’t actually say that. In that sentence the pronoun “it” has no referent. It doesn’t refer back to anything. Then we have “Seek and you will find.” Seek what? Anything? Find what? Precisely what you’re seeking? I guess we can read that into these lines too, but they don’t actually say that. I think maybe Jesus was playing a bit of trick on us here. He wanted us to think that that’s what he’s saying when he really isn’t.

Which brings us to the second and more important reason why I don’t think these verses actually say that God will give us whatever we ask for. There are hints in them that God actually gives us something else. First, in the parable of the obnoxious neighbor who won’t stop bothering his neighbor in the middle of the night, Jesus doesn’t say that the annoyed one will give the annoying one whatever he is asking for. He says that the annoyed one will “give him as much as he needs.” As much as he needs. That certainly isn’t necessarily the same as what the persistent neighbor is asking for. Maybe he’s asking for a lot more than he needs. Maybe he’s asking for less than he needs. Maybe he’s asking for something other than what he really needs. Jesus says the neighbor who doesn’t want to get up and give him anything will in the end give him “as much as he needs.” Maybe that’s how God works. We get we need, not necessarily what we’re asking for.

Yet I think there’s a more profound truth in these lines than that. See, all of these lines lead up to a climax at the end. This passage on prayer ends with Jesus saying “how much more will your Father in heaven give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him?” Not “give whatever she’s asking for to one who asks him.” No, not that at all, but rather “give the Holy Spirit” to those who ask. In the way that these verses end lies the truth about prayer, I think. What we get what we really need. When we pray we receive the Holy Spirit. In other words, we get a strengthened awareness of the presence of God in our lives. I understand these verses to be saying seek the presence of God in your life through prayer, and you will find it. Ask for God to send the Holy Spirit into your life to comfort, guide, and challenge you, and you will receive it. Knock to have door opened so that you can enter into life in the Holy Spirit, and the door will be opened.

See, God knows what we really need in our lives. It’s not to find on-street parking in downtown Seattle, as much as we might want to find on-street parking in downtown Seattle. It’s not to receive any material thing. It’s not even to recover from illness and avoid death, for God knows that we all die and return home to God sooner or later. No, what God knows we need is God’s loving, sustaining, inspiring presence in our lives. What we need more than anything is to live in intimate connection and familiarity with God. It is really to know God present with us offering all of the gifts of the Holy Spirit as we do whatever it is we do, as we face whatever it is that we must face. That’s what prayer gives us. Prayer is the primary way in which we come to know God and God’s presence in the world and in our lives.

There are lots of kinds of prayer. They don’t all work equally well for everyone. One way may work well for one person and another way for another person. Here in our worship we usually do three different kinds of prayer. We offer our prayers for ourselves, others, and God’s world. That’s called intercessory prayer. We recite the Lord’s prayer. That’s a kind of vocal prayer that connects us with the ancient Christian tradition and with Jesus Christ. And we sit, however briefly, in silence. In silence we listen for God. In silence we wait for the stirrings of the Spirit. I personally think that silence is the most profound prayer of all, but each of us needs to find the kind of prayer that works for us. If a kind of prayer really works for you it really doesn’t matter what kind of prayer it is. However you pray, don’t expect miracles, at least not any earthly kind of miracle. Expect the miracle of God’s loving, forgiving, sustaining presence with you in everything you do and everything you say. That’s what prayer can give us. That in the end is the power of prayer, the power to connect us with our loving, forgiving, sustaining, and challenging God. Thanks be to God. Amen.