Some people are always full of confidence.
Winston Churchill was the Prime Minister of England during World War II, and while he may have privately harbored doubts and fears, publicly he radiated an air of confidence.
In one of his first speeches after becoming Prime Minister, he addressed a nation that was losing the war. Many believed that the Nazis would defeat England and rule all
of Europe. Speaking to the nation, he told them, "...we shall not flag or fail. We shall go on to the end, we shall fight in France, we shall fight on the seas and oceans, we shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall defend our Island, whatever the cost may be, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall fight in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight in the hills; we shall never surrender."
It was that kind of confidence that made Churchill and effective politician, leader and speaker.
Occasionally I meet people who seem to have that kind of confidence.
Perhaps you have as well.
A teacher, a boss, or a parent.
Some people just radiate a confidence.
St. Paul from the Bible was such a man.
Paul always seemed so assured of what he was doing. He was so knowledgeable of Scripture. So confident.
Many of the books of the New Testament are actually letters that were written by Paul. Some of these letters were written while Paul was in prison, such as his letter to his coworker Timothy.
When he wrote Timothy, Paul wrote what may have been his most despairing words.
There he is in prison.
He is there because he was doing God’s work -- proclaiming the Gospel of Christ in Rome.
You can hear how tired he is.
"Alexander, the metalworker, did me great harm. The Lord will reward him according to what he has done. Be on your guard against him yourself because he was violently opposed to our message... No one stood by me the first time I defended myself (in court), all deserted me."
He stands as a man locked in chains. He is in a prison cell. He is tired.
Overworked. Without much support. Only his doctor and close companion, Luke, is with him.
And yet, even through the darkness of that despair a light shines. Paul is still certain of the Gospel. He is still confident. He is still able to say "The Lord stayed with me. I was able to proclaim the message."
Such commitment.
Such dedication to a task.
Such confidence.
Paul is always confident. Even in this, his darkest hour. He always uses words
and phrases like, "I am confident..."
"I am persuaded..."
"I know..."
"I am convinced..."
In Romans (2:19), Paul is CONFIDENT that God is a guide to the blind and a light to those in darkness.
In Philippians (1:6), Paul is CONFIDENT that the work God has started in Philippi will be finished.
In the second letter from Paul to Timothy, Paul is in prison. He faces an uncertain future. Many of his companions have deserted him, only his close friend, Luke, remains.
And yet Paul still opens this letter with the confident words, (1:12), "I am still full of confidence, because I KNOW whom I have trusted and I am SURE that he is able to keep me safe."
I know.
I am persuaded.
I am confident.
I am convinced.
Biblical scholar Fred Craddock says you can take Paul by the hand and lead him to the edge of his own grave. Let him hear the flapping wings of the vulture perched on his own gravestone. Let him taste the dusty odor of the freshly dug earth. Let him curl his toes on the edge of his grave. Then look at Paul and ask, "All right Paul, NOW what are you so sure of?"
And Paul would look at you and without hesitation say, just as he did in his letter to the Romans, "I am persuaded that neither Death nor Life shall separate us from the love of God."
I am persuaded.
I know.
I am confident.
But --- you can walk with Paul into the sanctuary. Sit with him in a pew on Sunday morning as the people gather together for worship. And then Paul will turn to you
and admit, just as he did in his letter to the Romans, that he does not know how to pray.
Amazing!
This man who has so much confidence, this man who is so secure in his knowledge of religion and of God, this man who is always confident, who is always persuaded, and who always knows -- does not know how to pray.
Paul says in his letter to the Romans, "In the same way the Spirit also comes to help us, weak as we are. For we do not know how we ought to pray."
We don’t know how to pray. Why did he say that? Why? That is an unusual thing for the Apostle to say. For he is always so sure of everything else.
We want to look at Paul and say, "Come on Paul. Get with it. Prayer is simple.
It’s easy!"
All you have to do is rattle off a few words, say "amen," and that’s that. What
could be easier?
Maybe, just maybe, what Paul is trying to do here is to slap us in the face and say, "Come on people! You get with it. Prayer is NOT as easy as you think."
How many times have I been in gatherings of Christians, standing in a circle holding hands, each one of us taking a turn leading prayer. One asks for peace in the
world and a new car. Another asks for an easier time of it at work. Another asks for
healing.
Brief. Simple. And somewhat shallow.
Ten minutes later, if you ask them if they remembered what they prayed for, they might not remember.
If they don’t remember their own prayers, why should God remember them?
If they treat their own prayers lightly, why should God regard them in any other
way?
Familiar is the scene of a family gathered around the table on Thanksgiving Day.
Freshly baked bread, everyone’s favorite vegetables, a big Butterball turkey waiting to be
carved up. The head of the household leads a prayer of grace, and as he prays he mentions the poor and the hungry around the world. In his mind, an image of a child who has appeared on TV in advertisements of some charity, belly swollen and empty and her eyes dulled by malnutrition. He prays for the hungry while his mouth waters. And then he sits down and eats. And late that night he gets up from his bed and stumbles into the bathroom to open the medicine cabinet. Hunting for the Alka Selzer he complains, "I ate too much."
We don’t know how to pray.
It’s not as easy as it seems.
There is something missing from our acts of prayer.
You know, one might easily think that when Paul said, "I don’t know how to pray," one might think that his problem was that he had never tried it. That he simply was not a man of prayer.
But no. In Romans, Paul says, "We don’t know how to pray." But elsewhere he constantly reveals that he was a man devoted to prayer.
He opened the letter of the Romans by saying, "I always remember you in my prayers."
And he concluded his letter by saying, "I want you to pray for me."
And yet, in the middle of the letter he stops and says, "But you know, WE really don’t know HOW to pray."
What is it about prayer that we don’t know about? Why isn’t it as easy as it should be? Why isn’t it as simple as it seems? What is missing?
You know, when Paul begins to close this letter of the Romans, he asks the people (15:30), "join me in praying fervently. Pray that I may be kept safe." And you notice how he asks them to pray?
"Fervently" -- or at least that is what my translation says.
Others say "strive with me."
You know what the Greek word was that Paul used? The original word used in Paul’s language was SUN AGONIZO. The Agon was the arena where you wrestled until the death. Agon -- where we get the English word, "agony."
SUN is "with."
"With agony."
"Agonize with me in prayer."
What is missing from our prayers is emotional commitment, passion, feeling -- or as Paul’s case had it, "agony."
If we sit comfortably on our pew and pray with a shallowness, then Paul is right.
We don’t know how to pray.
If I sit at my fat table and pray for starving children and then have to get up from the feast and loosen my belt a notch, that is not prayer.
You know what real prayer is?
Real prayer is when my prayer begins to feel the pain of the growling stomach. To cry at the death of the nameless children, to be heartbroken at the bleakness of the future of those who live in lands we will never visit, who will die a starvation we do not know, but feel empathy for.
I stand in my freedom, living in a land of constitutional rights and I briefly pays to
pray, "Lord, remember the oppressed." Is THAT real prayer? No. Real prayer is the banging of bloody knuckles against the locked doors of a prison cell. SUN AGONIZO.
Pray with me. Agonize with me in prayer.
We stand in church and pray, "Lord, help us to grow in number." That is not real prayer.
Real prayer comes when you’re standing at your kitchen window and you look out and see your next door neighbor, and you know that he has never been to church. You know that he does not know the Gospel. You know that he lives life in darkness. And you begin to pray. Fervently, passionately and with great agony, begging God to let the church grow and to receive that one soul into its number.
SUN AGONIZO, praying fervently, agonizing and wrestling in prayer.
Paul said, "We don’t know how to pray."
Why did he say that?
The only reason I can think of is because it is true.
We don’t know how to pray as we ought to. We pray with a shallowness. We
need to pray more fervently, with greater passion and feeling. We need to agonize over
and wrestle with the things we pray about.
Copyright 2005, Dr. Maynard Pittendreigh
All rights reserved.
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