“Your Will Be Done”

     Early on in life, the traditional method of praying via the Presbyterian Church became my staple diet. Head bowed, eyes closed, fingers clasped so tightly that knuckles turned white…all the while wondering what we were doing. Any peep during the service, other than from the responsive reading, met with scolding glares. Never mind the fact that I couldn’t understand half of the responses – “Wither thou goest, I will beith with theeith for evereth.” 

     Tapping my brother’s leg, I whispered out of the side of my mouth, “This stuff sounds a lot like that country singer Mel Tillis when he tries to talk. Maybe we should stick with singing, too,” I added.

      Opening one eye with my best Popeye imitation during prayer time caused further wrath to descend upon me during my early years. (How they knew I opened an eye without opening theirs I will never know). They sensed it…the gift of oversight? All the white knuckles around the sanctuary reminded me of being on a flight experiencing serious turbulence. Maybe Jonathan Edwards was onto something with that sermon, “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” This scene repeated itself wherever I visited friends and relatives; Methodists did it. Lutherans did it. Even Baptists did it – the only difference was the preacher’s ability to say Jesus in more than two syllables.

     I’d heard the Catholics did things differently than Protestants – including praying.  Something about Hail Marys and ‘grocery beads’. Now I confess that paying close attention was not one of my strong suits growing up. Just ask Miss Morris. I apparently didn’t learn everything I needed to while in her kindergarten class.

     Being of Irish descent, a visit to my Catholic kin in Pennsylvania gave me a chance at a first-hand education. My first Mass we solemnly paraded down the center aisle, each person dipping his or her finger in water, kneeling and doing the sign of the cross before entering the pew – except for me. Felt right at home as every eye wagged its finger at me as I scooted in without washing my hands or taking a knee. The tell-tale lump in my throat got me to reflecting, “Maybe this Protestant/Catholic divide isn’t as big as they all think.”

     Didn’t get any better as the service progressed. Have you ever seen the person in the marching band who is a step behind, frantically looking side-to-side only with their eyes in an attempt to figure out which direction to head next? That was me. Like a fully automated factory, every other person rose in synch, sat in synch, genuflected in synch, and flipped the kneeling pads down and back up in synch. Looked more like an up/down football drill than any worship service I’d been to. 

     Thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, prayer, sign of the cross, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk, thunk. Sounded like the seats at Shea every time the fans rose in unison for a big play by the Mets, and then settled in until the next hurrah. No trouble telling which farm team was training me for the big leagues. 

     Frantically flipping through the Catholic order of worship, I’d just get to the right page when they finished their prayers – which everyone else had memorized. “...Died under Pontius Pilate, buried, rose three days later…” I thought the Mel Tillis imitation was bad until the priest broke out praying in Latin! 

     “There’s gotta be a better way to figure out this prayer thing.”

     After becoming a disciple of Jesus at age nineteen, I figured that praying would be a snap. Open mouth, prayers flow forth, done deal. Wrong. I sounded more like Mel than Moses...at least how Charlton Heston portrayed him parting the Red Sea.

     I searched everywhere I could think of to get a grasp on prayer. Talk about chasing after the wind. Healing services plopped me in a pew next to a person speaking something that sounded like a variation of Fred Flinstone’s, “Yabba, Dabba, Doo.” (At the time no one had explained to me the phenomenon of praying in tongues). I had one eye on that lady the entire time of prayer…and afterwards. I didn’t care if a cadre of elders escorted me out of the sanctuary – I was kind of hoping they would! 

     Charismatic prayer times seemed like a spiritual aerobics class. I kept waiting for Richard Simmons to show up and lead everyone jumping on one leg, head whipped back, left palm high toward heaven, right hand shaking the Bible as if it were a clacker at a football game. All the hootin’ and hollerin’ left my ears ringing and my head shaking. I didn’t understand a word. “Is this the right way to pray, Lord?” 

     Certainly graduating from a Christian university and two seminaries would bring fluidity to my prayers. Unfortunately, all that formal training didn’t include one class on prayer. So the words of James continued to haunt me. Were my prayers “self-centered, seeking to squander what I received on myself?” “Did I have evil motives or pure ones?” “How could I possibly know with certainty that I was praying God’s will?”

The true end of prayer is to say to God, ‘Thy will be done.’ The prayer of the man who is pleasure-dominated is: ‘My desires be satisfied.’ It is one of the grim facts of life that a selfish man can hardly ever pray aright; no one can ever pray aright until he removes self from the centre of his life and puts God there. In this life we have to choose whether to make our main object our own desires or the will of God. And, if we choose our own desires, we have thereby separated ourselves from our fellow-men and from God.[1]

   

     “He died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves but for him who died for them and was raised again” (2 Corinthians 5:15). Are you living your life so others may live?

     “Lord, your will be done!”

Prayer

“Lord Jesus, grant me the passion to go where you tell me because you know what is best for me. I praise you, Lord Jesus, for coming in the flesh so I might see and understand you more clearly. Help me to fall at your feet and worship you who I see throughout Scripture. And Holy Spirit, help me to perceive when the Great Deceiver is in my midst. I never want to doubt the reality of who my resurrected Lord is – and fail to properly worship you. What a joy to know that you, Lord Jesus, constantly pursue me because of your great love. I do believe that you have all authority in heaven and on earth. So ‘I bow my knee before your throne, I know this life is not my own.’ Grant me the eyes to see where you want me to go to make disciples, the wisdom to know when to baptize them, the ability to teach them your commands, and the heart to believe that truly you are with me always. You alone can empower me to love you with all of my heart, all of my soul, all of my mind, and all of my strength…and to love my neighbor as myself. May your will be done on earth as it is in heaven!” Ω       

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[1] Barclay, William; The Letters of James and Peter. Philadelphia: The Westminster Press, 2000, c1976 (The Daily Bible Study Series, Rev. Ed), S. 102.

Who Are You?

    

     What’s your name? How did you get it? Have you ever named a child? How much thought and wrestling went into it? You didn’t casually toss any old name on your child, did you? Why not? Because names matter – oftentimes knitting and binding children together with their ancestors…and sometimes giving them a sense of destiny/purpose.

     Ask my brother Dann. Before Dann was born, dad wanted to name him ‘Patrick.’ Mom was opposed to it, so ‘Patrick’ became Dann’s middle name…except to dad. From Dann’s birth until dad’s death, Dann was always called ‘Patrick’ by dad. That naming aided in a bond that caused them to be closer than dad was to any of his other five children…as witnessed by the fact that Patrick chose to be dad’s primary caretaker throughout his battle with Parkinson’s. Patrick saw dad through his daily suffering and helped him cross the great chasm from death to eternal life…because he felt called by God to the endeavor.

     If that doesn’t convince you regarding the importance of names, ask Elizabeth.

     “When it was time for Elizabeth to have her baby, she gave birth to a son. Her neighbors and relatives heard that the Lord had shown her great mercy, and they shared her joy. On the eighth day they came to circumcise the child and they were going to name him after his father Zechariah, but his mother spoke up and said, ‘No! He is to be called John.’” (Luke 1:57-60)

     Like rain upon a parched land, grace upon grace showers down upon this aged couple. Every promise brought by the messenger Gabriel came to pass. The family legacy will live on through this young boy. Rejoice!

 

     Then like a dry, chafing desert wind, the neighbors and relatives try to name the child. Elizabeth will have none of it. It is not a mild response she gives, but rather an emphatic “No!”

     But the neighbors aren’t content with their idea being summarily dismissed: “They said to her, ‘There is no one among your relatives who has that name.’ Then they made signs to his father, to find out what he would like to name the child. He asked for a writing tablet, and to everyone’s astonishment he wrote, ‘His name is John.’” (61-63)

     If they didn’t get Elizabeth’s intent, Zechariah’s strikes like a lightning bolt, “His name is John.” Zechariah does not fear what his neighbors and relatives think. Rather, his desire is to be obedient to God’s message brought by Gabriel. Zechariah responds with faith, not doubt as he did in the Temple nine months earlier.

     “The neighbors were all filled with awe, and throughout the hill country of Judea people were talking about all these things. Everyone who heard this wondered about it asking, ‘What then is this child going to be?’ For the Lord’s hand was with him.” (65-66)

     More soul-refreshing rain falls from heaven as Zechariah’s mouth opens. Then, like a drenching summer storm sending flood waters rushing down the desert ravines, the news descends upon the entire region. And what words shower forth from Zechariah’s lips after a nine-month drought?  Praise, sweet praise, singing of God’s great mercy:

     “His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied: ‘Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David (as he said through his holy prophets of long ago), salvation from our enemies and from the hand of all who hate us – to show mercy to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant, the oath he swore to our father Abraham: to rescue us from the hand of our enemies, and to enable us to serve him without fear in holiness and righteousness before him all of our days.’” (67-75)

     If the neighboring tongues were set loose merely by John’s given name, this was going to whip the gossip into the storm of the century. “God has come to redeem his people? The mighty and glorious Messiah? After all this time, it’s really here?  Salvation from our enemies? God desires that we serve him without fear?

     Like thunder reverberating against windowpanes, tremors shake the people loose from their apathy. Suddenly the significance of this little one named John is felt (“Yahweh is gracious”). “What then is this child going to be?” Ask Zechariah:

     “‘And you my child, will be called a prophet of the Most High; for you will go on before the Lord to prepare the way for him, to give his people the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins, because of the tender mercy of our God, by which the rising sun will come to us from heaven and will shine on those living in darkness and in the shadow of death, to guide our feet into the path of peace.’ And the child grew and became strong; and he lived in the desert until he appeared publicly to Israel.” (76-80)

     John’s task was to ready the people to meet their Creator, Redeemer, and Sustainer, Jesus Christ. The way of the Lord is the way that leads to salvation. Darkness would soon be fleeing as the voice cried out from the wilderness – “Prepare the way for the Lord, make straight paths for him.”

     Who are you? If you have been redeemed by the blood of Jesus, you have been adopted into the royal family. You are a child of the King! Are you living out that calling upon your life? Or is the Great Deceiver trying to convince you that you haven’t received a new name, a new life, and that you are a new creation?      

     Cling tightly to the words of John, and live in that light: “See what great love the Father has lavished on us, that we should be called children of God! And that is what we are!” (1 John 3:1)

Prayer

“Heavenly Father, we praise your Name. You are the eternal Promise Keeper from age-to-age. Great is your faithfulness. Morning by morning, new mercies we see. Help us to be like Elizabeth’s friends and relatives who rejoiced with her because of your manifold blessings in her life. Never let us be jealous or spiteful of the blessings you bestow upon our brothers and sisters. Holy Spirit, grant us the boldness to stand firm on your commands, like Elizabeth, even when those closest to us balk. Help us to be like Zechariah. When we open our mouths, let your praises ring forth. Let our lives and words be melodies that cause the world to desire to dance to your tune. We do praise you, Lord Jesus, for sending the gift of the Holy Spirit. Only by his indwelling are we able to know any of your will for our lives. You are the God of Israel and we have been grafted into that marvelous tree of life. Praise your merciful Name for remembering your Holy covenant with Abraham. What joy to know that we are part of that family, children of God, and all those promises belong to us also. Thank you for promising to rescue us from the hand of our enemies. And we, too, will dwell in the house of the Lord forever. Bind Satan, the deceiver. For you enable us to serve you without fear in holiness and righteousness before you all of our days. We receive these promises in the name of Jesus. Let our lives mirror John’s calling – help us to give people around us the knowledge of salvation through the forgiveness of their sins. Use us to shine your light into the darkness and the shadow of death in order to guide others’ feet into the path of peace. For you are the Way, and the Truth, and the Life.” Ω