Sermon for January 16, 2022 - The Joy of Prayer - Prayer as a Spiritual Discipline
Last week Pastor Arleen introduced our current series on spiritual disciplines. If you missed that message, it was an excellent overview of what spiritual disciplines are and why they matter. You can watch that on our Youtube channel on demand.
At the Thursday morning Bible study, we discussed the Scriptures that Pastor Arleen used in her message, and I asked people, to begin with, how they feel about the word “spiritual“.
The general response was that the word “Spiritual” generates positive feelings and, for those in the Bible study anyway, the word brought up thoughts and feelings about the inner life, about our relationship with God, and about all those things about us that are true and the most important.
Who we really are on the inside. That much is, I think, a good overview of how people generally feel about the word spiritual.
Then I asked how people feel about the word “discipline”. And there were a variety of responses. One said that discipline was generally a positive word when they thought of their own life and how they were able to make positive forward progress by applying discipline to their lives.
But when it came to thoughts of being disciplined as a child, perhaps on the job, the feelings expressed by the group about that word were more negative.
Another person present at the Bible Study suggested that the word discipline was so strongly connected to parental discipline, and being forced to do things that they didn’t want, the word just had a very negative meaning overall.
Another added that when you attach the word “spiritual“ to the word “discipline“, it created a completely different feeling and meaning. That person‘s experience was that spiritual growth generally would happen when they were engaged in spiritual disciplines.
And I think the sense there was that when we’re not actively doing things that we might call spiritual disciplines, we can find ourselves in some way drifting in our walk with God. So adding the word “spiritual“ before the word on “discipline“, kind of reduces the negative associations, and in fact turns it around completely to being a positive thing.
And in fact spiritual disciplines are an extremely positive thing. Pastor Arleen ended her message with a caveat or a warning, as I heard it, that I think is wise. For me it is summed up in these meme:
So the caution here, and there are always cautions which hopefully keep us from extremes, the caution here is that spiritual disciplines, spiritual growth in general weirdly - can produce pride in us if we’re not careful.
When we make positive movement forward, and experience the blessing and the life-change that really applying ourselves to the spiritual disciplines brings, it’s in the human heart to look down on those that, from our limited perspective, are not growing as much.
That tendency to pride is something we have to be very honest about and careful about. What’s the big general statement that Scripture makes about this type of pride?
Pride goes before destruction, a haughty spirit before a fall. Proverbs 16:18. So yes, spiritual pride is something to be avoided at all costs. May we grow the self-awareness to maintain humility in the midst of growth. Amen?
The reason that spiritual disciplines are so positive, and the reason that we encourage all of us to grow in the spiritual disciplines can perhaps be understood with a few simple metaphors. Think about when you have been super thirsty, even if you may not have been fully aware of it. Maybe you’ve been focussing on a task, distracted. What happens if you have a small cup of water?
Speaking first person, what happens is that my body just instantly absorbs it. And then the question is, is that enough? Well, when you’re really super thirsty, you can drink much more than a small cup of water.
I’m a large fellow, and it has happened numerous times when I’ve been super thirsty, perhaps the result of doing a whole lot of distracting work where I was focussed on what I was doing and not on how I was feeling, that when I have started to drink water, I’ve been able to drink 16, 20, 24 ounces in a single gulp.
It is utterly refreshing, even when you didn’t know how thirsty, how deprived your body was. More than likely you have your own experience of thirst.
Not enough prayer, and communion with God can be like that. Maybe it’s the reason sometimes that many of us inconsistently and just periodically cry out to God in prayer. It might be that the reason for that is that we have not been taking “small sips“ as it were on the regular. And our spirits then may have developed a thirst, a tremendous longing for God, a tremendous sense of being far away from God and needing to draw near.
The spiritual disciplines can help us to keep near to God, so that we are always, so to speak, sipping on that living water the Jesus offers us. We can find ourselves less often in crisis-prayer mode, when we are accustomed to regularly and intentionally communing with God on the daily.
During this current plague, we’ve all been wearing our masks, among other cautionary practices. When you’ve been out shopping, or out and about working in some capacity, your body adapts to the slight but over time significant reduction in oxygen intake, what happens when, after a while or after a few hours, you remove your mask?
All of the sudden you are intensely aware of oxygen. If you’re like me, you are incredibly thankful for pure, and unfiltered oxygen. That’s really the only time I think about oxygen. Any other time I just take it for granted.
I think of the prayer practice of confessing my sins, as kind of like removing my mask. Overtime, and it can be over a few minutes or hours or days, my communion with God can become rote, kind of flat, or simply very little conscious contact. And that even with regular Bible reading. I think that sin, sins of commission or omission, can put a block, a mask, or perhaps a veil of sorts between us and God.
Confessing our sins, and doing so with the confidence that scripture gives us, that when we confess our faults he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness; confession is kind of like removing the veil, removing the mask that is hindering our communion with God.
And during this extended plague, this ongoing pandemic of COVID-19, we all need to become connected or stay connected to the lifeline that is our relationship with God, we need to stay profoundly connected to God who is our source of spiritual oxygen, so to speak. Like normal oxygen, we can neglect or even forget the presence of the living, life-giving God in our daily lives.
In Matthew chapter 4 Jesus described himself as one who would give water that would satisfy forever. The challenge for us, is that we need to drink that water that satisfies. That is communion with God. That is prayer. In a sense that is the fruit of all of the spiritual disciplines.
Another way to think of what we’re talking about today is that these are the spiritual privileges that we have because we belong to Jesus, because we are saved, because the Holy Spirit lives in us and is transforming us to be more like Jesus.
Prayer is the lifeline that ushers us into the presence of God on a continuing basis.
Let’s talk about confession
First let’s look briefly at what confession is not: Confession isn’t about convincing God to forgive me.
Sometimes we may feel that God will only forgive if we demonstrate enough remorse and sorrow for sinning. If we don’t feel bad enough, for long enough, there is no forgiveness.
We may think that confession without enough penance is inadequate and rejected by God. In essence, we might believe God grants forgiveness in equal measure to the quality of our confession. This was heresy, of course.
God forgives because it is God’s nature to forgive, not because we enter a rare forgivable state after an impressive confession session. God forgives us because God is good, compassionate, merciful and gracious, not because we are sorry, scared or sorrowful. God doesn’t need us to grovel for forgiveness. God’s forgiveness is freely and fully given. Always. Troy Watson said that.
Confession isn’t about convincing God to forgive me. It’s letting God shine a light on everything that hinders me from becoming the person God created me to be.
The practice of confession has three primary purposes:
1. To take responsibility for our actions, attitudes and words.
2. To be set free from the shame, unworthiness and indebtedness that accumulate whenever we make foolish, selfish and harmful choices,
3. To open our lives to the healing presence of God and invite God’s transformative power into our acknowledged areas of imperfection, struggle and weakness.
Let’s talk about Giving Thanks
The story is told of two old friends who bumped into one another on the street one day. One of them looked very sad, almost on the verge of tears. His friend asked, "What has the world done to you, my old friend?"
The sad fellow said, "Let me tell you. Three weeks ago, an uncle died and left me forty thousand dollars." "That’s a lot of money."
"But, two weeks ago, a cousin I never even knew died, and left me eighty-five thousand free and clear." "Sounds like you’ve been blessed...." "You don’t understand!" he interrupted.
"Last week my great-aunt passed away. I inherited almost a quarter of a million." Now he was really confused. "Then, why do you look so glum?" "This week... nothing!"
Thankfulness to God is an incredibly important practice in our prayers. In order to be thankful, we have to pause and think. We have to stop and consider our lives. People can have a natural tendency to complain, to focus on the negative? Can anyone relate to that?
We can live in a state of being busy and doing stuff, sometimes experiencing joy, sometimes just struggling through the day. Or we can live day to day, as many of us are doing now due to the limitations forced on us by Covid, just frustrated at what we can’t do that we used to do.
All that is normal, but none of that feeds our spirits, none of that builds our faith. Pausing and reflecting on the things that are blessings in our lives - that builds us up. This morning you woke up. Lots of folks didn’t. Are you grateful for being alive today? Did you eat today or do you plan to later? That’s something to be thankful for. Do you have a friend?
Someone who reaches out to you and who you can call? That is a gift to be thankful for. Let alone if we have shelter, if we have food that we like to eat, if we have a community that we’re connected to, if we have the internet on our phones or wifi at home that enables us to partake in a gathering like this online during a plague.
There are literally endless things to be grateful for, and thankfulness, practiced regularly, is a great antidote to depression, to self-pity, to envy of others and to a host of other things that can spoil life for us.
Thankfulness can also impact and even shape our prayers for others. I hope you are praying for others, your friends, your enemies, your family, your community, our leaders, your pastors. We all need your prayers.
When you pray one time for a person - be it for their immediate needs, for their salvation and anything in between - you are hopefully praying in faith. If you didn’t have faith you wouldn't be praying. When you pray, you are trusting, rightly, that God is hearing you.
1 John 5:14 This is the confidence we have in approaching God: that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us. 15 And if we know that he hears us—whatever we ask—we know that we have what we asked of him.
So then the second time we pray, and the third and so on, we can pray in gratitude for how God is answering our prayers according to His will. That is very different that over and over again bringing the same anxious longings to God, using the same words and being in the same state of stress as we might have been the first time we prayed for the person.
So prayer with an attitude of thankfulness can make a huge difference all round.
Let’s talk about the Jesus prayer
This will be very brief. There is a beautiful and ancient practice, one that I have done for a lot of years, and one that can and still a tremendous sense of God‘s peace and be a tremendous reminder of God‘s presence.
That practice is called the Jesus prayer. What is a Jesus prayer? It is simply this: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner”.
This prayer came out of and interaction that’s a blind man, Bartemeus, had with Jesus in ?
I have use this prayer when I have been lost for words, in confession, in places of anxiety and worry. I have prayed this in order to fall asleep.
It is a prayer that can help to quiet our spirits. It is a prayer of the heart. Couldn’t be simpler, or easier to memorize. I really encourage you to practice this.
Let’s talk about ACTS
This is a helpful way to give some structure to your private time with God. Just one word to remember. Acts
Adodation
This is where we simply worship God, we adore him, we love him and praise him for who he is. We take time to express our love to God, take time to adore the Lord and give him your hearts affection. This is not the time to ask for anything yet.
But we can concentrate on who God is, his character, his loving kindness, his holiness and perfection. If you’re wondering about words to use to express your adoration of God, just look through the Psalms. There you will find a great deal of inspiring thoughts and words.
Confession
Confess your mistakes and your faults and your failures to God. Ask for his forgiveness, trusting that forgiveness comes through Jesus Christ who died for us. Here you can reflect on how to change your attitude and behaviours going forward, how you could do better next time, asking for God‘s grace to improve.
Thanksgiving
Here we take time to do as we’ve already discussed, thank God for everything he has done in your life. This is a good place to reflect on the ways in which God has met you in your need in the past, the way that he has answered your prayers before, and all the good things he has done for you.
Supplication
This is where you ask God to supply your needs. Here’s where you pray for your daily situation, your needs, your health, your friends, your family. Here you can pray for the church, you can pray for church leaders, and pray for those people that you love. And you can pray that God will enable you to be present at the right time in other people's lives to be a source of blessing.
So that’s a little bit about the spiritual discipline of prayer. Of course there are many more resources that can be available to you online, but I really would suggest starting with some of the things that we’ve been looking at today.
The end goal is that we want to continue to grow to become like Jesus. We want to live in direct and constant relationship with the one who loves us more than any other, and the one whose love for us runs deeper than any other love.
So I hope that as we continue to look at different ways of practicing spiritual disciplines, that each message will be an encouragement and a blessing to you. I always think that the best kind of message is one that leaves us wanting to apply what we are learning, wanting to learn more and more.
So may we each continue to grow during this very difficult extended period of time of the pandemic, which will hopefully be the only such time like this in our lifetimes, May we continue to grow and may you each flourish in your relationship with God.
I think we should see this time of lockdown, and a varying degrees of freedom to move around, as not wasted time, not just an experience to be regretted, but let it be an experience in which we truly seek to pursue the heart of God in prayer, and prepare ourselves for the future blessing that God intends us to be in the lives of others, in the lives of those who are struggling, in the lives of our family and friends.
May the Lord richly bless you and keep you and fill you with his presence, in Jesus name. Amen.
