Luke 11:1-13

          May the grace, mercy and peace of God our Father be with us in the name of his son, our risen Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Amen.
          Why do you pray? It is a good question to consider as you mature in your faith. I think that is what is behind the request that the disciples make of Jesus as they ask him to help them with their prayer life in Luke 11. They are maturing in their faith, and they want help with this prayer-thing. Up until this point in Luke’s gospel, the disciples have been described as a rather naïve, childlike bunch with mixed results. Mostly they just observe Jesus as he teaches and heals people in his travels, and when they do speak, Jesus usually uses it as a time to correct them- like when they were in the boat and were afraid that they would perish while Jesus was asleep in the stern, or then the 5,000 people were gathered for the day to listen to Jesus and they wanted to send them away to get something to eat. But they are trying their best to wrap their minds around this savior and understand God’s powerful presence in their lives. They have a successful missionary journey under their belt, from which they came back and shared with Jesus the wonderful things that they did. They are good students because they are not afraid to ask questions even when they might be rebuked; not afraid to do something even when they might be corrected. Someone recently shared an anonymous quote with me that goes like this, “If you aren’t making mistakes every day, then you aren’t doing enough in your life!” These are active disciples, not afraid to step out and ask or do something that they know Jesus will have some to say about.
          So it is good to hear the disciples ask Jesus for guidance as they watch him praying- it shows real maturity on their parts to want to do this in a more meaningful way. That leads me back to my original question to all of you- why do you pray? To be quite frank, most prayers make the pray-er sound pretty selfish! We tend to ask for a lot from God in our prayers- for miraculous healings, for food for the hungry, for guidance with a tough problem, or for the people around us to get their acts together! Many of our prayers sound like we picture God as some kind of divine Federal Express officer, ready to deliver what we want, especially when we think we should absolutely, positively have it over night. Interestingly enough, Jesus supports this view of prayer after he gives a brief model- a short version of what we call The Lord’s Prayer. He says to ask and it will be given to you; seek and you shall find; knock and the door shall be open to you. He tells a parable about a fellow with a night-time guest that he needs to feed, going to the neighbor to borrow some bread to feed him. The neighbor doesn’t really want to comply, but because this gentleman is persistent, he does as he asks. What kind of picture does that paint of God, the receiver of all of our prayers? It reminds me of the great and powerful Oz- who ends up being an ordinary human being with lots of special effects at his disposal, who grants Dorothy and her friends their requests because they won’t leave him alone.
          I think that what Jesus is trying to tell his disciples- and us- is that no matter how mature you are in your faith (and in life in general) you are to talk with God regularly like a little child talks with his or her parents. He is teaching us that prayer isn’t about asking the right way in order to sway God to giving us what we want; prayer is about relationship. It is about seeing God as “Abba,” an Aramaic word that literally means, “Daddy,” even when we are well advanced in our years. In the mindset of our culture, to grow up means to grow more independent; but in the mindset of the Christian faith, to be a prayerful person means to acknowledge that you are always dependent upon God- the one who created us and everything around us, the one who sent his son to die so that our sins may be forgiven and our lives saved, and the one who still moves over the face of the earth to call, gather, enlighten and sanctify his children.
          I see it this way- even though I am a grown man, a father myself, I still need my parents. I am fortunate that my parents are still alive, living close by, and themselves relatively independent, so I am able to talk with them regularly. I need to do that (and quite frankly, probably don’t do it as much as I should). I don’t need them so much anymore for what I did as I was growing up, though it is nice to go out to eat with them or get something from them to wear or use on birthdays or Christmas. Now, I need them for their emotional support and relationship. We all need people to talk to for that emotional connection and relationship- whether it is our parents, our children or spouses, other extended family, church family, neighbors or friends. We all need people in our lives that we can tell our deepest desires to, knowing that we won’t be judged because of them. We all need someone who may not give us exactly for what we ask as we ask it, but we know also will not take our deepest needs and desires and use them against us, giving us a snake instead of a fish, a scorpion instead of an egg.
          Jesus is saying that while you may have a flesh and blood person like that to share these things, you also have your daddy in heaven, whose name is holy. He gives us what we need daily to live and forgives our sins as well as inspires us to forgive those around us when they sin against us. His kingdom is coming, and only he can guard us from the time of trial. Since we have such a wonderful God as this, talk to him. Tell him what you want, your hopes and dreams. Share what is in your heart, because prayer is not primarily about getting things from God, it is about the relationship you have with God. Jesus’ words are more than a teaching to his maturing disciples- they are an invitation to trust in God enough to talk with him openly and honestly, with a candor that comes from intimacy.
          Wouldn’t it be great if we could all have the kind of relationship with God that Abraham had. I know that we usually chuckle at the interplay between Abraham and God in Genesis 18 as they haggle over the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah, but behind it all is a relationship where Abraham trusted that God would not tire of the conversation and point a finger and smite Abraham with a lightning bolt because he is getting on the last nerve of the almighty, all powerful Yahweh! As he negotiates with God, Abraham demonstrates an intimacy with God which one might describe as “childlike”. Indeed, even as we grow more mature in our faith, Jesus encourages that childlike nature in all of us to remain. Maybe, just maybe, prayer is the major component to our faith whereby we keep and nurture that childlike nature that is so important for our relationship with God. Yes, Abraham negotiated with God enough that he got his way- but if you remember the rest of the story, God evidently didn’t even find 5 righteous people in the cities, thus they were destroyed. It sounds like God used this interaction as a teaching moment for Abraham- much like a parent will use these conversations as teaching moments for their children.
          Tom Long- a Christian writer- talks about a scene from the movie, “Shadowlands”- a film based on the life of CS Lewis- in one scene, Lewis has returned to Oxford from London where he just married Joy Gresham, an American woman, in a private ceremony performed at her hospital bedside. She is dying from cancer, and through the struggle with her illness, she and Lewis have discovered the depth of their love for each other. As Lewis arrives at the college where he teaches, Harry Harrington, an Episcopal Priest, asks what news there is. Lewis hesitates, then, deciding to speak of his marriage and not the cancer, says, “Ah, good news, I think, Harry. Yes, good news.” Harrington, not aware of the marriage and thinking that Lewis is referring to Joy’s medical condition replies, “I know how hard you’ve been praying…Now, God is answering your prayer.” Lewis responds, “That’s not why I pray, Harry. I pray because I’m helpless. I pray because the need flows out of me all the time, waking and sleeping. It doesn’t change God; it changes me.” Long writes, “Prayer is not a message scribbled on a note, jammed into a bottle and tossed into the sea in hopes that it will wash up someday on God’s shoreline. Prayer is communion with God. We speak to God, but God touches, embraces, shapes and changes us. Whether we pray for rain or pray for sunshine, our prayer is answered, because in the act of praying we receive the gift we really need- intimacy with God.”
          Why do you pray? Is it because you need God? Is it because you trust God with your inmost thoughts and desires? Is it because you want a deeper relationship with him? Yes- me too! Amen.