Focused Prayer Makes a Difference

It is the season for financial stewardship campaigns in the church. This blog is focused on prayer; one of the primary values you need to make your financial commitment.

Over my years in ministry, I have met few people who have given God thanks for the opportunity to give. Today, I want to explore the opportunity to not only to give but to focus on God, the giver of all good gifts, in and through prayer.

For most of us, prayer is difficult. It is so difficult that we can only take it in small doses and usually with humor. So, let’s begin.

Mastering Prayer

Two women met unexpectedly one day in the parking lot of a local bookstore. One had a bundle of books in her arms.

Her friend asked her, “What in the world are you doing? Opening your own bookstore?”

The woman with the books replied, “No, these are all books about prayer. All my life I have been hearing about the importance of prayer, so I finally decided to learn how to pray. I have bought fourteen books on the subject. And not only that, but I have also signed up for two courses in prayer, one at my church and one at a friend’s church. I am really going to master the subject!”

Several weeks later, the friend ran into the woman again, this time at the grocery store. “How is the big project going?” the friend asked. “Have you learned to pray?”

The woman hung her head and made a gesture of despair. “It was too complicated, and I gave it up.” As an afterthought, she added, “Now I’m taking a course in yoga.”

The Difficulty of Prayer

Is prayer really that difficult? I know that often we turn to prayer when we are in distress. I heard about a football coach in a re-building season, who was desperate.

Someone asked him, “Coach, I hear you keep a chaplain on the bench to pray for your team during the games. Would you mind introducing me to him?”

The coach replied, “I’d be glad to. Did you want to meet the offensive chaplain or the defensive chaplain?”

All of us utter desperate prayers in times of distress. But prayer is not just for the crisis in our lives. Prayer is an ongoing part of life. It is a fundamental value as a follower of Jesus.

Prayer was so important to the gospel writer, Luke, that he wrote about the prayer life of Jesus and recorded several stories Jesus told using prayer as the subject. Let’s start with one of those parables.

Read Luke 18:1-8

18 Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart. ² He said, “In a certain city there was a judge who neither feared God nor had respect for people. ³ In that city there was a widow who kept coming to him and saying, ‘Grant me justice against my accuser.’ ⁴ For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, ‘Though I have no fear of God and no respect for anyone, ⁵ yet because this widow keeps bothering me, I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.’ ” ⁶ And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. ⁷ And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? ⁸ I tell you, he will quickly grant justice to them. And yet, when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?”

Reflect on Luke 18

“Then Jesus told them a parable about their need to pray always and not to lose heart.” To understand the depth of the parable there are a couple of things to remember. Parables are reflections of reality as opposed to being mirrors of morality. Said another way, parables do not tell us what we should be doing but rather what we are doing. At a deeper level, parables show us who God is and reflect who we are in relationship to God and God’s action.

With that in mind, this parable is not about praying more or praying harder. The instruction to “pray always and not lose heart” reflects a greater reality.  The parable is about focusing on God. Let’s look at the parable.

Will Not God Grant Justice?

There are two characters. The first is a judge who “neither feared God nor had respect for people.” By biblical standards he was a bad judge. The judge’s responsibility was to settle disputes fairly and to restore justice. The weaker members of the community were dependent on him.

The second is a widow who was one of the weaker members of the community. Widows in the Israelite tradition were extremely vulnerable. They could not inherit their husband’s property, there was no organized social welfare program, and there was no opportunity for employment. Since they were easily victimized, widows were dependent on the judge for protection and fairness. In this story the judge is the woman’s only hope for justice.

So, “the widow kept coming to the judge asking for justice.” For a while he refused, but later he said to himself, “I will grant her justice, so that she may not wear me out by continually coming.”

The words “so that she may not wear me out” literally mean “hit me the eye” or is a metaphor for “give me a black eye.” The judge responded to the widow’s persistence, not with justice or compassion, but with concern for his reputation with the public. Part of the reflection of reality is, even the bad judge does the unexpected thing of granting justice in response to a powerless widow.

“Will not God grant justice?” If an unjust judge responds, not based on justice and compassion, but merely because of persistence, how much more will the just and loving God respond to those who appeal to him.

This is the reflection of reality. God will not hesitate, as did the unjust judge, to respond to those who call on him.

Respond to Luke 18

Prayer is mentioned in each of the gospels. Both Matthew and Luke record “the Lord’s prayer.” John records a prayer by Jesus in the 17^th chapter of his good news. But only Luke focuses on the prayer life of Jesus.

The Focus of Prayer

Luke points out that Jesus had a pattern of doing ministry and then retreating to pray. Jesus would feed people, teach them, and heal them and then go to a lonely place to pray.

Luke records Jesus praying after his baptism. While he was praying, heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit came down on him in the bodily form of a dove. And there was a voice from heaven: “You are my beloved son….” While he was praying, Jesus received his call to ministry.

Still wet from his baptism, he goes off to a deserted place, the wilderness, to pray. He goes to focus on God’s call for his life. And he is tempted. Is he to be a humanitarian or a politician? Is he to keep the crowds happy by doing more spectacular things? He had experienced success. I think his temptation was to stay with the crowds. But he prayed to keep his focus upon God’s call. Do I go with the crowd, or do I go to the cross?

Jesus’ Pattern of Prayer

On one occasion, he went to the mountain to pray and prayed to God all night long. Early the next morning he called together his disciples. He focused his prayer upon God and God’s purposes in an all-night prayer vigil before choosing his disciples.

On another occasion, he was in his pattern of going off to pray and returning to minister. When he had finished praying, one of his disciples said, “Lord, teach us to pray…”

As Jesus had kept his focus upon God’s call, his followers were now asking him to teach them to keep that focus. Jesus gave them a prayer, but he did not instruct them on a certain posture. He gave them a pattern to help them keep focus.

God’s Generosity

Luke even has Jesus telling parables, using prayer as an example. Immediately after giving them the pattern of the “Lord’s prayer,” he tells the story of the grouchy neighbor. Then he says, “Ask and you will receive. Seek and you will find. Knock and the door will be opened to you. Everyone who asks, receives. Whoever seeks, finds. To everyone who knocks, the door is opened. The reflection? If a grouchy neighbor responds after saying “no,” how much more will God give to those who ask. The focus is upon God’s generosity.

The parable of the judge and widow is similar. Jesus uses prayer to keep focus upon God. Let’s look at the widow. Because she is marginalized and powerless, she is vulnerable. Is she the main focus of the parable? What is the reality being reflected? She persists in her asking the judge for justice but is the parable telling us we should care for the marginalized and powerless? Or does it reflect the need to focus our prayer upon the One who responds quickly?

Care for One Another

Let’s look at the judge. He has the power. Is he the main focus of the parable? Does he represent the government that has the power to provide feeding programs for children, care and support for women, healthcare for the elderly?

Does he represent the church that has the opportunity to provide care and compassion through missional giving (apportionments)?

Does he represent those of us who make up the body of Christ, the church? We are in the middle of another stewardship campaign, doing the best we can do to convince ourselves of our need to give.

The judge represents all the above. He represents all who must be asked over and over, whether government, church, or individuals, to give so we can be faithful in our care for one another.

Focus Your Prayer

Take that reality and listen to the words of the parable, “And the Lord said, “Listen to what the unjust judge says. And will not God grant justice to his chosen ones who cry to him day and night? Will he delay long in helping them? I tell you; he will quickly grant justice to them.”

The reflection of reality is, if we receive from all our asking from the government, for the church, and from individuals, how much more will we receive from the God who loves us. So, where do we focus our asking, our prayers?

Thank you, Lord

Jim Wallis, founder of Sojourners magazine and of the Sojourners community located in Washington, D.C., talks about a group of Christians who were doing their part to respond to the needs of people. It was a Saturday morning. The food line had formed early outside the Sojourners Neighborhood Center, just one‑and‑a‑half miles from the White House. Three hundred families stood in line to receive a meal and a bag of groceries that would get them through the week.

Just before the doors opened, those who had prepared food and were going to hand out the groceries, joined hands in a circle to pray. The one who usually led the prayer was Mary Glover, a sixty-year-old black woman who knew what it meant to be poor. She was known as the best person to pray in the group because she talked to God like she knew who she was talking to.

On this particular Saturday, she first gave thanks for the day, “Thank you, Lord, for another day to serve you.” Then she said, “Lord, help us be focused. We know that you’ll be coming through this line today, so help us to treat you well.”

So, where will you focus your prayers? In the pattern of Jesus, go off to a lonely place and focus upon God’s call to love as you have been loved, and to give as you have received. Then come back to do ministry. Be as generous with the people around you as God has been generous to you!

Return

Give God thanks for the people you encountered today. How did you focus your prayers? What did you learn about yourself? What will you do differently tomorrow? Give God thanks for the people who have helped you become more who God created you to be.

Prayer

Blessed are you O God, giver of all good gifts to me, my family, friends, and colleagues. Thank you for the opportunity to be in partnership with you in loving your people at Christ Church, in Charleston, the Kanawha Valley, West Virginia, and the world. You have been so good to me through so many people and through so many circumstances. I am grateful. I give you thanks, for the opportunity, to give as you have given to me. I offer myself and my financial stewardship to you in the name of Jesus. Amen