Sunday
10/23/16 Freeville/Homer Avenue UMC’s
Sermon Title: “Humble before God”
Old Testament
Scripture: Psalm 65
New Testament
Scripture: 2 Timothy 4:6-8, 16-18
Gospel Lesson:
Luke 18:9-14
My friends, my brothers and sisters, welcome again on this
the Twenty-Third Sunday after Pentecost. Twenty-Three Sundays after the Holy
Spirit moved on the day of Pentecost, and the Christian Church was born.
Since
the day of Pentecost, one of the strongest spiritual disciplines of the
Christian Church has been prayer. How many of us here this morning pray once a
day, or maybe many times a day? How many of us pray for our church, for our
families, for our communities, and for our world? Due to the significant
importance that prayer plays in the Christian faith and the Jewish faith, this
morning I want to talk about prayer.
So
as I just asked, do we pray every day? When we pray, what do we pray for? Who
do we pray for? Why do we pray the way that we do? Further, how do we pray to
God? What is our attitude towards God when we pray? Do we pray with a spirit of
humility, or do we pray to God with a different attitude? To sum this up, when
we pray to God, how, for whom, and in what ways do we pray?
One
of the things that I get asked a lot as a pastor, and maybe you get asked often
to, is to pray someone. How many of us have been asked to keep someone in our
prayers? How many of us are part of prayer chains? Meaning, if there is a
problem with someone, or something else, we are called to pray to our God that
will listen and hear our prayers. This is why in some Christian Churches after
telling God our prayers, we then respond by saying, “Lord in your mercy, hear
our prayers”.
For
me, when I am asked to keep someone in my prayers, I do my best to actually take
time to pray for them, instead of just telling someone I will pray for them. I
also don’t pray just out of a pastoral obligation, as I prayed long before I
became a pastor. When I pray, I pray first and foremost, because I believe that
God hears me and hears you. I believe that our God is personal and can do all
things. I pray because I believe in what God can do through Jesus Christ.
For
many of us, our prayers can be reflective of what is going in our lives, or how
we are feeling right then when we pray. The broad spectrum of our human
experience can often mean that we communicate to God in different ways at
different times. Our worship and our singing on Sunday mornings, or at other
times for example, can be different based upon where we are at on a given day.
If we are angry for example, perhaps we pray to God angry. If we are joyous for
example, perhaps we pray to God in a joyous way. What is the right way to pray?
Again then, when we pray to God, how, for whom, and in what ways do we pray?
This
morning we have a reading from Psalm 65. As you may have heard me say before,
the Book of Psalms in the Bible is a massive book that contains many beautiful
writings, and the mood of the Psalms are different dependent on the situation
that the writer was facing when the actual Psalm was written. Some Psalms therefore,
sound like a person who is crying out to God in brokenness and desperation, and
some Psalms are Psalms of great praise.
Many
of the Psalms are songs, or prayers, or other writings. The Psalms are not
written to be historical accounts with facts and figures, but are instead
written to communicate the personal relationships and praise of God through the
ups and downs of the lives of the Jewish people. Perhaps our prayers lives are
like the Psalms then? So when, how, for whom, and in what ways do we pray to
God?
In
our Psalm reading from Psalm 65 for this morning, the Psalmist writes, “Praise
is due to you, O God, in Zion; and to you shall vows be performed, O you who
answer prayer!” (Ps. 65:1-2a, NRSV). Would you say in this instance that the
Psalmist in Psalm 65 has a positive and a joyous view towards God, or a broken
and hurting view towards God?
This
Psalm to me, is very clearly a song or a writing of praise to God. The Psalmist
doesn’t feel abandoned, forgotten, or desperate in this Psalm, but rather full
of hope and joy.
I
can imagine that we all would hope to pray like this every single time that we
pray to God. The reality of life though, like the Book of Psalms, is that in our
prayer lives our prayers can vary depending on how are feeling and what we are
experiencing.
I
have talked to many people who depending on their life circumstances told me
that they prayed to God angrily in some instances, or with joy in other instances.
When
we look at our reading from this morning from the Apostle Paul’s second Epistle
or letter to Timothy, we find Paul speaking a little different than normal. In
this portion of Second Timothy, Paul is telling Timothy he believes that he is to
die his earthly death soon. According to church tradition, the Apostle Paul was
beheaded in Rome for preaching and propagating the Gospel of Jesus Christ.
It
would seem that the Apostle Paul knew something here that we didn’t, in that he
seemed somehow to know that he was going to be killed soon. It is believed that
the Apostle Paul was in the prison in Rome at this point, and some experts
believe that the Apostle Paul wrote his Epistle or letter to the Romans while
in prison in Rome to.
The
Apostle Paul tells young Timothy here in this morning’s reading his experiences
with his faith, which includes prayer. The Apostle Paul tells Timothy, “I have
fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith. From
now on there is reserved for me the crown of righteousness, which the Lord, the
righteous judge, will give me on the last day…” (2 Tim. 4:7-8a, NRSV). It would
seem clear that the Apostle Paul, while in prison in Rome, while being
persecuted, is praying, and is closer than ever to God.
In
fact, the Apostle Paul then tells Timothy of this persecution. He says, “At my
defense no one came to my support, but all deserted me. May it not be counted
against them! But the Lord stood by me and gave me strength, so that through me
the message might be fully proclaimed and all the Gentiles might hear it” (2
Tim. 4:16-17a, NRSV). The Apostle Paul then finishes by saying that he trusts
God, and that God is with him. It would seem clear that the Apostle Paul has
strong faith, and is likely praying fervently to God.
In
our gospel reading for this morning from the Gospel of Luke, Jesus tells us a
parable or a story about how to pray to God. This is what the parable says: “Two
men went up to the temple to pray, one a Pharisee and the other a tax
collector. The Pharisee, standing by himself, was praying thus, ‘God, I thank
you that I am not like other people: thieves, rogues, adulterers, or even like
this tax collector” (Lk. 18:10-11, NRSV). Near the Pharisee who was praying,
was a man who was a tax collector that was also praying.
The
Pharisee then continues his prayer by saying to God, “I fast twice a week; I
give a tenth of all my income” (Lk. 18:12, NRSV).
The
tax collector praying near the Pharisee pray differently though. The gospel
says, “But the tax collector, standing far off, would not even look up to
heaven, but was beating his breast and say, ‘God, be merciful to me, a sinner!”
(Lk. 18:13, NRSV).
Jesus
then says of the tax collector not the Pharisee that, “I tell you, this man
went down to his home justified rather than the other; for all who exalt
themselves will be humbled, but all who humble themselves will be exalt” (Lk.
18:14, NRSV).
So
my sisters and brothers, when we pray to God, do we pray like the Pharisee
prayed, or do we pray like the tax collector prayed? Are we more like the
Pharisee, or more like the tax collector?
I
wonder if at some points in our lives we have all in some ways been more like
the Pharisee when we pray, or more like the tax collector when we pray. Our
goal in our faith is to pray to God with humility, but depending on our mood or
the day, do we sometimes not go to God with as much humility as we could?
This
is a hard thing, as Jesus this morning gives us a parable or a story on what
attitude we should have towards God when we pray. So when you pray to God, how,
for whom, and in what ways do we pray? What is your attitude when you pray?
I
want to share a short story with you called, “Prayer Changes Me”. This is a
story about the famous Christian author and scholar CS Lewis, and is taken from
a “Film quote found at Internet Movie Database”. Here is the story: “CS
Lewis was the author of the widely read children’s books, The Narnia
Chronicles, as well as many novels for grown-ups and books on issues
surrounding the Christian faith. The movie Shadowlands (directed by
Richard Attenborough and produced in 1993) tells Lewis’ story, focusing in
particular on his relationship with his wife, Joy Gresham. Gresham and Lewis
meet while Lewis is a don at Oxford University.”
“After
Joy is diagnosed with cancer the couple marry. The movie invites us to witness
their love, their pain, their grief, their struggles with faith and God.
Eventually Joy dies”.
“At
one point in the story a friend says to Lewis, “Christopher can scoff, Jack,
but I know how hard you’ve been praying; and now God is answering your
prayers.”
“Lewis
replies “That’s not why I pray, Harry. I pray because I can’t help myself. I
pray because I’m helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the
time, waking and sleeping. It doesn’t change God, it changes me.”
So
friends when you pray, how, for whom, and in what ways do we pray? What is your
attitude when you pray? When we pray, are we more like the Pharisee in this
morning’s gospel reading? Or when we pray, are we more like the tax collector
in this morning’s gospel reading? Perhaps sometimes we are like both.
What
is true though, is that when we pray, God hears us, and therefore may we do as
it says in 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18, “Rejoice
always, pray
without ceasing, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is the will
of God in Christ Jesus for you” (1 Thess. 5:16-18, NRSV). So my sisters and
brothers may we continue praying this day, and always. Amen.
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