Prayer for Those Displaced by the Fire

The Labor Day fire that swept through on 40 mile per hour winds burned over 120 homes in Pine City and Malden, WA. Many of them were members of our church. I pray for them. I am posting last week's sermon (we still can't meet in person due to the virus). I will write up my observations of the fire before Monday. Frank

Sermon 30 August 2020

The Lord’s Prayer

There was a time when ordinary folk didn’t know how to pray. Prayer was a group thing. Pagan gods were thought to watch over specified communities or tribes. Thus, the god of Damascus was different from the god of Babylon and the chief priest of each community was the liaison between citizens and their god. Priests who did not obtain their god’s blessing for crops or conquest were ousted and replaced.

It was much the same with the people of the One God. Abraham was both chief priest and warlord. He, and only he, communicated directly with God, then he passed God’s will on to the people. Moses was called to lead the descendants of Israel out of bondage in Egypt. God spoke to Moses out of a burning bush and on the mountain top where Moses received the Ten Commandments. But there is no record that God spoke to anyone else in the 12 tribes until Moses died and Joshua took over the job. Things were pretty much unchanged for several hundred years until Jesus came along.

Jesus taught the doctrine of a personal relationship with the Lord. God’s blessing was no longer based on the actions of the group. Jesus gave us the opportunity and responsibility to communicate directly with the Almighty. This was a threat to the power of the high priest. The power of the Sanhedrin was based on a communal relationship with the Lord. It was a burocratic relationship with the high priest at the top. You might note that the bureaucracy of the church was still alive and well 1500 years later when Martin Luther pinned his 95 theses on the door of the church in Wittenberg. It takes time and effort to move the establishment. It is no wonder that Jesus’s followers needed to asked Him how to pray. It is still popular to believe that priests and clergy have a more direct line to God than us commoners. But Jesus said all are equal in the eyes of the Lord and told His followers they could communicate with God if they believed in the power of the Father. They were free to ask for forgiveness, protection, and stuff. But only if they had faith in God’s majesty.

When Jesus instructed His disciples, I believe He assumed they would know to listen for an answer. I thought prayer was one-way communication for 60 years. Then God led me to a book that covered a year of the author’s daily walk with god. I don’t read a lot of testimonials. I usually find all I need in scripture, but someone (I think it was Jack Pea) gave me this book, and I felt obligated to read it. It changed the way I thought about prayer. Prayer is more like a phone call than a memo. Communication with our Creator is two-way. He answers prayer, always. Sometimes it is with signs. Several years ago, we were moving from Spokane to another air base in Alabama. We were trying to decide whether or not to drive both our vehicles all the way across the country and finally decided to pray on it. So, we held hands and asked God. As we finished, the phone rang. It was a friend of ours asking if he could buy our jeep. God’s answer.

Fast forward several years, and I was in a doctor’s office with a painful, swollen, infected knee. We were trying to decide whether or not to ease my pain by draining off some fluid with a big needle. It would relieve the pressure on the joint, but sticking a needle in an infected area has another full set of dangers, so I asked God what I should do. An audible voice told me to leave it be. It was as if God was on speaker or the phone, and my first response was “What”. Then God repeated, “It is what it is.” I have listened for God’s voice on other occasions, but that was the only time He actually spoke to me, but it was enough.

Prayer is never completed until it is answered. I guess we could communicate by posting a note on a bulletin board, or we could send an invitation with no RSVP, but that isn’t prayer. There is a difference between praises and prayers. We give thanks to the Lord for His goodness and expect no answer, but prayers are requests, and requests merit an answer. Sometimes the answer is no. I need to be careful to avoid asking God for those things that are not in His nature. I would have liked my sister to outlive me, but the cancer wouldn’t permit it. I can ask God all I want, but God controls life and death according to His plan; a plan my brain is inadequate to comprehend. I can ask for eternal youth, but that too is not part of God’s plan. I also need to guard against being disappointed when God says no. It doesn’t mean God doesn’t love me. Maybe it means God loves me enough to say no. That takes a special kind of love.

Sometimes God initiates the call, but I am frequently too busy to hear the ring tone. The only way I can always be ready when God calls is to keep the line open. Who said that we need to take time out to pray? That may be a good start, but I believe your communication with God can be ongoing all the time. I haven’t gotten there yet, but that is my goal. I hope that before I die, I will have perfected my walk with the Lord to the point I am in constant communication with Him. Wouldn’t that be great? I would be able to feel His love all day, and Satan would have no opportunity to work on me.

Pray with me. Dear Lord I marvel in your power. You can do things far beyond my imagination. I pray you will bless our church and show us how to improve our communication with you. I pray you will strengthen us as a congregation and as individuals as you lead us in our walk of faith. Amen