YOURS FOR THE ASKING

2 Kings 5:1-15

Luke 11:1-13

(After reading the scripture, acknowledge different form of Lord’s Prayer.  Draw attention to Matthew cross reference & footnotes in the Bible.  Only Luke and Matthew have this prayer.)

What did Jesus really say?  We can’t be entirely sure… what we can be sure about is that he did pray and that it was essential to his life and ministry.  And his disciples saw that and said to him, “Lord, teach us to pray…”  It’s a simple request…  But wait a minute… these are adult Jews who, we assume, have been praying all their lives.  They know lots of prayers!  What do they mean then, “teach us to pray?”

I think they mean, “Lord, we see you go off to pray, often tired, sometimes discouraged, and you return renewed and full of peace.  What’s your secret?  Teach us to pray like that.”

Jesus responds to their “simple” request with a “simple” answer.  ‘When you pray, say, ‘Father, hallowed be your name.’”  Notice that he didn’t begin by laying out a lot of rules; he began with relationship… because prayer is about relationship… our relationship with God. 

Jesus begins by addressing God as “father.”  Now, that term may be problematic for some of us, but if we can set those concerns aside for the moment and go to the heart of what Jesus is meaning, we see that Jesus knows God through the deep, bonded relationship of a child to a loving parent.  And we also see that he knows us to be in that same kind of relationship with God… a loving relationship of dependency and trust.

Based upon that, Jesus tells us to ask for what we need.  The clear implication is that we can expect to get it.  He reinforces this point in two long paragraphs after the simple prayer, which say, in essence, “If a reluctant neighbor will get up and give bread to his persistent friend, or if you, who are less than perfect, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more can you count on your heavenly parent to give you what you need?”

Ask – expecting an answer.  God is trustworthy.  God will respond.  Whatever you need is yours for the asking.

In talking about prayer, it’s important to notice what you believe about God, because that directly influences how you pray and what you pray for.  Or to say it the other way, if you want to know what you believe about God, look at how you pray and what you pray for.

Do you pray often or infrequently?  Do you pray only for yourself?  only for others?  Both?  What do you expect God to do for you?  What do you do when you feel that your prayer is not answered?

What we believe about God is heavily influenced by our earliest life experiences, especially with our parents or primary caregivers.  Whether we are aware of it or not, how our parents treated us shapes our view of God.  And these perceptions are reinforced when Jesus tells us God is like a parent.  That can be either good news or bad, depending upon your life experience.

I still get caught in old traps.  Sometimes I find myself feeling angry because God is manipulating or punishing me by holding back something I’ve prayed for.  I feel this, even knowing that it’s simply not so!  That may be how I was treated in the past, but it’s not how God acts.  It takes some very intentional work… including prayer… to move beyond our limited experience to a fuller understanding of what Jesus is telling us about God.

Remember, Jesus is our window into what God is like.  And what we see in Jesus is love in action.  From Jesus we learn that God is full of love, mercy and grace… that compassion, forgiveness and healing flow like a river of life to us at all times.

If you know that God is always ready to give… always surrounding you with love, forgiveness and healing… then your prayer life will be directed toward opening yourself to receive those gifts.

If, on the other hand, you see God as some kind of autocratic father-figure or law-giver who has all these goodies in his pack and is waiting for you to do or say the right thing, or to ask often enough, or to get down and beg and grovel before he’ll give what you need, your prayer will be very different.  Or, if you believe that God is like an absentee landlord, you probably won’t feel the need to pray at all.  Or if you believe God is just for emergencies, kind of like the little red boxes that say, ‘Break in case of fire,” then you’ll probably only pray in a crisis.

What you believe about God influences how you pray, how often you pray, and what you pray for…

Jesus shows us that…

- God is already present among us;

- God is love… so if God is already present, then love is already present, enveloping and surrounding us;

- God’s forgiveness is ever-present to us (Jesus was always quick to forgive, even before it was asked for);

- God’s healing power is already at work within us (Jesus always responded to a request for healing).

This is a relationship of love, unlike anything we have otherwise experienced.  And our task in prayer is to open ourselves to it so that we may be nurtured and healed.

What keeps us from opening up to this flowing river of love, forgiveness and healing?  One reason we may be slow to experience the joy of God’s love is that it requires turning control over to God, which can feel risky and vulnerable.

Look at Naaman, the Syrian army commander in the passage that Laura read for us.  When Naaman came to Elisha to be healed, he was peeved because Elisha didn’t come out to him personally, but sent a servant.  And then, Elisha didn’t do anything special… he just directed him to go wash in the river seven times.  Naaman was really annoyed by that.  His servants had to convince him to try it.  Healing was available to him, but he had to participate by actively receiving it.  And this receiving involved some humbling.  It’s pride born of fear that often gets in our way.

It’s easy to see it in Naaman, isn’t it?  I just want to go shake him and say, “Naaman, don’t be stupid.  Just go get in the river, and you’ll see what God can do for you!”

Easy to see in Naaman, but not so easy to see when it is we who need healing… especially if that healing requires giving up old habits, or trying new, scary things, or forgiving someone who has wronged us, or anything that stirs our fears.  Forgiveness for and healing of fear is always a subject of prayer for me.

Another block for us is that we often don’t really believe God loves us.  We know ourselves… the darkness within; the desire to see ourselves as the center of the universe; we know our weaknesses, our addictions, our inadequacies, our false fronts, our petty grievances, our unfaithfulness, our greed… shall I go on?!  How could anybody love us, least of all God?!

But that’s just it, don’t you see?  The good news is that God knows you… really knows you… and loves you anyway!  The good news is … that river of love, forgiveness and healing is already swirling all around you, ready to flow into any opening you make, in order to support you, nurture you, heal you, to help you clean out the old garbage in your life… and to walk through the pain of change with you… so you can become all that God intends you to be… and can become a channel of love and healing to others.

So then… how do we pray?  What do we ask for?

There has been an ongoing story in the Seattle Times about Gloria Strauss, an eleven-year-old girl, who has been battling a virulent cancer for quite a while.  She is surrounded and supported by a strong Catholic family and community of pray-ers and doers.  It’s been amazing to follow their story.  Gloria should have died some time ago, but she has been persevering, powered by prayer and an unshakeable faith that God will heal her. 

Lately, however, the cancer has gotten the upper hand.  She requires more pain medicine and is clearly failing physically.  This is challenging the faith of some of her supporters.

Tom Curran is a friend of the family who directs a ministry to Catholics.  He’s been holding weekly prayer sessions for Gloria.  A common question that comes up is, what do you pray for?  “He says people fear they are praying wrong.  They wonder if they are good enough to be asking for a miracle.” 

“His response is, ‘you’re asking for Jesus to come close to this situation and to be who he is…  You’re saying, I want you, Jesus.  Come close.  Be who you are.  And bring salvation.  That’s the first miracle.  When we say yes to Jesus, and we come and we pray, in some mysterious way, God uses that.

“‘I pray with great confidence.  I don’t come seeking some thing.  I come seeking someone.’  A healing miracle can occur in two ways, Curran says: ‘It can come in the form of a complete medical healing or a complete final healing.  God will heal Gloria.  You’re praying in a way that flows with God’s healing.’”

I don’t know which is more amazing… the story itself, including the way in which so many people have been touched and changed by this little girl… or the fact that it has made the front page of a major newspaper!  God definitely is working miracles in this situation.

I love how Tom Curran framed his prayer… “I want you Jesus.  Come close.  Be who you are.”  It acknowledges that God is already present, and the prayer serves as a conduit for Christ’s energy to be focused in a special way.  We don’t need to know exactly what to pray for.  In fact, when we pray for someone, it is always wise to leave the specifics to God.  We can simply hold that person up to the light and love of God.  We just need to participate in the process.  And in that process, we are touched by Jesus’ power as well as the person for whom we are praying.  It’s a win-win situation.  Later, in our prayer time, we will have a chance to try this kind of prayer.

This you can trust, if you align yourself with God’s will… if you pray for that which brings healing, restoration, wholeness, transformation… you can be sure that God will answer your prayer at the deepest level possible.

I’ve mentioned before about the amazing journal that is being kept online by the parents of Felix Lilly, a 10-year-old boy, who fell out of a tree 7 weeks ago and was critically injured.  It was touch and go for several days… then there was no assurance that he’d come out of his coma… then there was a big question about whether he’d be able to walk, talk, even eat on his own.

Well, there is good news today!  In yesterday’s journal entry, Felix’s mom, Tina, was jubilant.  He’s talking a bit, was able to eat his first solid food, is walking with assistance, and even sang along with Tina for a few phrases.  Here is how she expressed her feelings and what she has learned through this difficult process.

“I can’t express how lucky and blessed I feel, but know that the only way to redeem the blessing of seeing my son heal is to give the rest of my life to honoring God and His Great Love.  It has been a blessing and true gift to wake up every morning to witness Felix healing, to be next to his bedside and sing to him, care for him, pray for him and turn agony into hope, grief into faith, and pain into love.  I realize that there is no other reason… no other reason… to be alive, than to wake up every morning to do the humble and selfless work of Love.  A day spent without helping others who are suffering or who are less fortunate than ourselves, is a day lost to darkness.  A day spent in self-absorbed complacency and snug comfort is a day handed over to death.

“It has been an overwhelming experience for our family to receive all your heartfelt care and prayers.  (She’s addressing this to the large community of people who have been responding to their journal online and praying for their family.)  Each one of you is a shining Light of Hope and Grace.  Many of you have been thankful to us for our journal entries and the healing energy of our shared witnessing, but the Light and Love you’ve experienced is your own Light shining forth and a reflection of your own Goodness.  (I get this picture of Christ’s Light being reflected back and forth… back and forth.)  When a flower opens, it doesn’t keep some of its petals folded.  It opens all of itself from within itself to the Omnipresence of One Indivisible Reality, which we are all part of.  We are all One Light.”

“When a flower opens, it doesn’t keep some of its petals folded…”  Jesus is encouraging you to open yourself fully to God in prayer so that the Light of Christ may shine upon you and through you to the world.

Thanks be to God!  Amen.