Prayer

By Robin G. Jordan

Today’s reading, 1 Timothy 2 1-7, is the epistle appointed for this Sunday for Year C in the Revised Common Lectionary, which is used by a number of denominations. It is a short passage of Scripture, only seven verses. Despite its brevity Paul says a lot in it with a few well-chosen words.

First Paul urges his protégé, Timothy, to pray for all people and briefly instructs him how to go about it. He further urges Timothy to pray the same way for kings and all in authority and gives a rationale for praying for them. He notes that such prayer is pleasing to God whom, he tells Timothy, “wants everyone to be saved and to understand the truth.”

Paul points to Timothy’s attention that Jesus is the only Mediator who can reconcile God and humanity and Jesus gave his life to purchase freedom for everyone.

Paul further points to Timothy’s attention that God has picked their lifetime to give this message to the world.. He reiterates his conviction that God has chosen him as a preacher and apostle to teach non-Jews this message about faith and truth.

Let’s take a look at how Paul tells Timothy to go about praying for all people and for kings and all in authority. He urges Timothy to pray for them in three ways:

1. To ask God to help them.

2. To intercede on their behalf, in other words, to implore God to forgive them and not to punish them and to do good to them.

3. To give thanks for them.

In offering this guidance to Timothy, Paul is also offering guidance to us on who we should pray for and how we should pray for them.

I believe that we can safely assume that Paul, when he speaks about asking God to help them, he is not talking about helping them do bad things or harm others. Rather he is telling us to ask God to enable them to do what is good and pleasing to God, what conforms with God’s will as God has revealed through the words of the Old Testament prophets and the teaching and example of Jesus and the apostles.

When Paul speaks about interceding on their behalf, he is talking about asking God to enable them to have a change of heart, to turn from sin in repentance and to Jesus in faith and be put right with God. If they believe but have succumbed to temptation and fallen into sin, they will repent and be forgiven and will mend their ways. Having lived in disharmony with God, they will begin to live in harmony with him. Paul is also talking about praying that they will grow in their love and knowledge of God and in maturity of character, that the Holy Spirit will produce in them what Paul calls “the fruit of the Spirit.” In short, we pray for their spiritual wellbeing.

I must admit that I find giving thanks for some people a challenge. How do we give thanks for someone who is unkind to us and gives no thought to feelings, for someone who is openly hostile toward us and desires to do harm to us. What about them can we be thankful for? This may take some thought on our part but there are reasons to give thanks for them. They provide us with opportunities to follow our Lord’s teachings and to develop those qualities of character that are a necessary and important part of being one of his disciples. Our Lord instructed his disciples to love even those who have no love for them.

While it might be pleasant to be surrounded by people who love us and care about us, we would have no opportunity to love those who have a strong dislike for us and do not wish us well and to do good to them. As disagreeable and unpleasant as they may be, they are our fellow human beings and our neighbors. Paul tells Timothy that Jesus gave his life to purchase freedom for everyone, so they are also people for whom Jesus suffered and died on the cross.

Due to God’s grace, the power of the Holy Spirit, working in them, sometimes bad people do good things. The Romand built roads that enabled them to travel to the far flung corners of their empire and Roman legions to invade other nations and conquer them. Paul and the other apostles took advantage of these roads and the Pax Romana, the “Roman Peace,” that the Romans had imposed on the ancient Mediterranean world to spread the gospel. The Romans’ execution of Jesus, as cruel as it was, would serve God’s purpose. God was in Jesus, reconciling humanity to himself and on the cross he took upon himself the weight of human sin.

While I have not always been treated the way that I would wish to be treated by some fellow Christians, it has taught me the importance of treating others as I would have them treat me. I am grateful that God put them in my life because their treatment of me has enabled me to learn to forgive others and love them like Jesus does—flaws and imperfections and all.

Jesus in his teaching laid particular emphasis upon two commandments:

“‘You must love the Lord your God with all your heart, all your soul, and all your mind.’ This is the first and greatest commandment. A second is equally important: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’ The entire law and all the demands of the prophets are based on these two commandments” (Matthew 22: 37-40 NLT).

When we pray for others, we give tangible expression to our love for them, and in giving tangible expression to our love for them, we give tangible expression to our love for God and for Jesus whom he sent.

As the apostle John writes in his first epistle—

“If someone says, ‘I love God,’ but hates a fellow believer, that person is a liar; for if we don’t love people we can see, how can we love God, whom we cannot see?” (1 John 4:20 NLT)

Our love of God is inseparably tied to our love of others. We can tangibly express our love others in various ways. Praying for them is one of these ways.

When we love someone, we desire what is good for them. When we pray for them, we ask God to make that possible.

Praying for someone can also be thought of as an indirect way of wishing someone well, of expressing goodwill toward them. We may not always be able to do that directly, but we can do it as prayer.

Percy Dearmer, Anglican priest, author, hymn translator and writer, and editor of The English Hymnal (1906) in his book The Church at Prayer and the World Outside (1923) theorizes that prayer sometimes works like divinely assisted telepathy. It conveys our feelings of goodwill toward someone and our thoughts for their wellbeing to them and these thoughts and feelings have a positive effect upon them. While I do not subscribe to this theory, it is an interesting way to look at prayer.

I do believe that God knows our hearts, our deepest thoughts and feelings, and may be moved by these thoughts and feelings and may choose to respond to them. Our prayers are never wasted although we may not receive the answer that we hope for. As well as giving tangible expression to our love for others, our prayers bring us into alignment with God’s will.

As the first Anglican bishop of Liverpool, James Charles Ryle, observed, we cannot claim to have a relationship with someone with whom we never have a conversation. Likewise, we cannot claim to have a relationship with God if we do not pray.

Prayer is our way of conversing with God. It is a two-way conversation, not a monologue. God does speak to us if we are attuned to hearing him. He may not always speak to us directly, but he does speak to us—through other people, through a passage or verse of Scripture, through the words of a hymn, through a dream, through an impression in our mind, through the events in our life.

Jesus taught his disciples to go into an inner room and pray (Matthew 6: 6). He was not telling them that they should not pray in public. Rather they should not emulate the practices of the Pharisees who too obviously prayed in public in an attempt to make other people notice and admire them. They even went as far as be deliberately late for the prayers in the synagogue so that they would be forced to pray in the street where they would be seen and had someone announce that they were about to pray with a trumpet blast. What Jesus was telling his disciples was that they should avoid such ostentatious displays of piety, which were done not to honor God but to gain attention.

Jesus himself prayed in front of other people as well as withdrew to a deserted place to pray, setting an example for us. He sometimes chose to pray aloud when others were present so they would hear the words of his prayer.

In his first letter to the Corinthians Paul urges the members of the church at Corinth to pray in words that other people can understand when they are praying, and other people are present. In this way those present will not only be edified but will also be able to add their “Amen” to the prayer and make it their own. If a stranger walks into their gathering from off the street, the stranger may hear the words of their prayers and be convicted, convinced of sin or error and a personal need for a savior.

Jesus also taught his disciples to persevere in prayer like someone who had an unexpected guest arrive at their home late at night and who did not have enough bread to provide the visitor with a meal, so they went to a neighbor’s house and banged on the neighbor’s door and begged the neighbor to provide them with bread until the neighbor got out of bed, unbarred the door, and gave them what they needed. Jesus also illustrated the importance of persistence in prayer with the story of a widow who pestered an unjust judge until he settled her case in her favor.

In his first letter to the Thessalonians Paul gave these instructions to the church at Thessalonica—

“Always be joyful. Never stop praying. Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.” (1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 NLT)

One of the ways that we can pray continuously is to adopt a practice which the seventeenth century French Carmelite monk, Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection commended to those who sough spiritual guidance from him. It is to live our lives with the awareness that God is present with us always and commune with him throughout the day, sharing with God our thoughts and feelings as we go about our daily activities. The wisdom Brother Lawrence shared with them, in conversations and in letters, would later form the basis for the book, The Practice of the Presence of God. The Abbé Joseph de Beaufort compiled this work after Brother Lawrence died. It may be found online, and I recommend reading it.

As for “being thankful in all circumstances,” what Paul has in mind is maintaining an attitude of gratitude and thankfulness toward God whatever the circumstances in which we find ourselves.

Prayer is one of the means of grace which those who wished to join one of the early Methodist societies were expected to employ. The means of grace, John Wesley taught, are “outward signs, words, or actions ordained of God, and appointed for this end – to be the ordinary channels whereby he might convey to men preventing, justifying, or sanctifying grace.”

As used in this Wesley quote, “men” means everyone, not individuals of a particular gender. “Grace,” whatever other label we may attach to it, refers to the power of the Holy Spirit working in us to achieve what God purposes.

According to John Wesley, the first of the means of grace is prayer.

“The chief of these means are prayer, whether in secret or with the great congregation; searching the Scriptures (which implies reading, hearing, and meditating thereon) and receiving the Lord’s Supper, eating bread and drinking wine in remembrance of him; and these we believe to be ordained of God as the ordinary channels of conveying his grace to the souls of men.”

In his sermon, “The Means of Grace,” Wesley cites two passages from the Gospel according to Matthew in support of this belief—

“Keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you. For everyone who asks, receives. Everyone who seeks, finds. And to everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.” (Matthew 7: 7-8 NLT)

“ When he discovered a pearl of great value, he sold everything he owned and bought it!” (Mathhew 13: 46 NLT)

Citing Matthew 7:9-11 and Luke 11:11-13 Wesley draws to our attention that God tells us to use prayer and promises that it will be successful and effective in producing the intended results.

“You parents—if your children ask for a loaf of bread, do you give them a stone instead? Or if they ask for a fish, do you give them a snake? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give good gifts to those who ask him.” (Matthew 7: 9-11 NLT)

“You fathers—if your children ask for a fish, do you give them a snake instead? Or if they ask for an egg, do you give them a scorpion? Of course not! So if you sinful people know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him.” (Luke 11: 11-13 NLT)

Wesley further points to our attention that we receive from God by repeatedly and forcefully asking God in an annoying way for what, if we did not ask in this way, we should not receive at all! Wesley cites the Parable of the Inopportune Neighbor, Luke 11:5-9, which I mentioned earlier.

“Then, teaching them more about prayer, he used this story: ‘Suppose you went to a friend’s house at midnight, wanting to borrow three loaves of bread. You say to him ‘A friend of mine has just arrived for a visit, and I have nothing for him to eat.’ And suppose he calls out from his bedroom, ‘Don’t bother me. The door is locked for the night, and my family and I are all in bed. I can’t help you.’ But I tell you this—though he won’t do it for friendship’s sake, if you keep knocking long enough, he will get up and give you whatever you need because of your shameless persistence.”

“And so I tell you, keep on asking, and you will receive what you ask for. Keep on seeking, and you will find. Keep on knocking, and the door will be opened to you.”

Wesley’s sermon, “The Means of Grace” can be found online in its entirety.

One of the things that we learn from prayer is our need of God and how dependent we are upon him. Without God enabling us, we cannot repent, believe, or grow in godliness and holiness. But as Jesus told the disciples what is impossible for human beings is not impossible for God.

If you take one thing away from today’s homily, may it be that prayer is an important part of the life of disciple of Jesus, and while we may at times struggle with prayer, we should not cease from praying for others and ourselves. While God may know our deepest thoughts and feelings, God nonetheless wants to hear from us. Like the loving parent that God is, God wants us to share our most intimate thoughts and feelings with him. God wants to hear from his children.