Pulling Ourselves Together

When you pray, you are not to be like the hypocrites; for they love to stand and pray in the synagogues and on the street corners so that they may be seen by men. Truly I say to you, they have their reward in full. But you, when you pray, go into your inner room, close your door and pray to your Father who is in secret, and your Father who sees what is done in secret will reward you.
And when you are praying, do not use meaningless repetitions as the Gentiles do, for they suppose that they will be heard for their many words. So do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask Him. Matthew 6:5-8

Intro: The spiritual skill we will consider today is Recollection

Some writers see Recollection as preparation for prayer and others as a form of prayer
– but this is not a serious or heated debate
• the moment you prepare to pray, you are already praying
– to get an overview of Recollection, I want to hop through Matthew chapter 6

This is the middle section of Jesus’ “Sermon On the Mount”

What Jesus is doing in this sermon, is leading his disciples into a genuine life in God
– to get there, he has to guide them between two failed alternatives
• they were “not to be like the hypocrites”  or “the Gentiles” (vv. 5 & 7)
• the prayers he describes are inconsistent with a real encounter with God
◦ he is our Father “ who is in secret,” so that’s where we meet him – not on a public stage
◦ he is our Father and he already knows our needs, so it isn’t necessary to pile up words
• the genuine prayer is a real conversation with God
– at this point, Jesus taught them the “Lord’s Prayer,” which begins with “Our Father”
• we do not converse with our Father as stage actors or beggars
◦ but as children with a loving parent

Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth where moth and rust destroy and where thieves break in and steal. But store up for yourselves treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor rust destroys, and where thieves do not break in or steal; for where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.
The eye is the lamp of the body; so then if your eye is clear, your whole body will be full of light. But if your eye is bad, your whole body will be full of darkness. If then the light that is in you is darkness, how great is the darkness!
No one can serve two masters; for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and wealth.
For this reason I say to you, do not be worried about your life, as to what you will eat or what you will drink; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. Is not life more than food, and the body more than clothing? Matthew 6:19-25

Jesus is concerned with divided loyalty
– notice how verse 19 works on us: the potential loss of earthly possessions can stir up anxiety
• yet anxiety is exactly what he wants us to live without
• the solution is to transfer our treasures to heaven
◦ having our treasures in heaven draws our hearts to heaven
◦ this gives us an entirely new perspective — one that is free of worry over worldly “things”
– once our hearts are oriented to heaven, our bodies need to be adjusted to the new reality
• the eye (or sight) is what admits light into body
◦ “clear” translates a word that means “single” – that is, focused on one thing
◦ St. James described the opposite condition:

A double-minded man is unstable in all his ways (Jas. 1:8)
– and this is why the psalmist prayed:
Unite my heart to fear Your name. (Ps. 86:11)

• it is like having two masters – you can’t serve both
– “For this reason” connects verse 25 with verse 24
• in other words, anxiety is service to wealth (or Mammon–i.e., materialism, as if it were a god) Continue reading →

Listening At God’s Door

Now the boy Samuel was ministering to the LORD before Eli. And word from the LORD was rare in those days, visions were infrequent. It happened at that time as Eli was lying down in his place (now his eyesight had begun to grow dim and he could not see well), and the lamp of God had not het gone out, and Samuel was lying down in the temple of the LORD where the ark of God was, that the LORD called Samuel; and he said, “Here I am.”
Then he ran to Eli and said, “Here I am, for you called me.” But he said, “I did not call, lie down again.” So he went and lay down. The LORD called yet again, “Samuel!” So Samuel arose and went to Eli and said, “Here I am, for you called me.” But he answered, “I did not call, lie down again.” So he went and lay down.
Now Samuel did not yet know the LORD, nor had the word of the LORD yet been revealed to him. So the LORD called Samuel again for the third time. And he arose and went to Eli and said, “Here I am, for you called me.” Then Eli discerned that the LORD was calling the boy. And Eli said to Samuel, “Go lie down, and it shall be if He calls you, taht you shall say, ‘Speak, LORD, for Your servant is listening.'” So Samuel went and lay down in his place.
1 Samuel 3:1-9

Intro: As a child, every time I heard this story I thought, “This is how I want God to speak to me”
– audible, clear and direct (today I’d be happy to receive an email or text from him)
• although God has never has spoken to me this clearly, my role remains the same as Samuel’s
• to sit with God, silence my heart and say, “Speak, LORD, for Your servant is listening”

God has never stopped communicating with humankind in general or his people in particular
– we just have to work harder at hearing his voice than Samuel did
– “spiritual listening” is like other forms of listening
• a skill that we can develop with practice
• like music lovers who can:
◦ identify each instrument in an orchestra
◦ or tune in to the bass line in rock music

For the last few weeks I’ve talked about forms of meditation that require mental focus
– this morning we are going a new direction and I’ll be talking about prayer
• so why begin with listening as an introductory stage to prayer?
◦ first, because we already know how to ask for stuff

Joan Chittister, “It would be impossible to have spirituality without prayer, of course, but it is certainly possible to have prayer without having spirituality at all.”

◦ what she describes is religious practice that amounts to no more than an empty shell
• Samuel’s story illustrates the importance of listening
– although Samuel heard God’s voice he did not know it was God who spoke
• the reason for this is given in  verse 7, “the word of Yahweh” had not “yet been revealed to him”
◦ he began his apprenticeship in prayer (and prophecy) by listening to God and getting to know him
◦ it was through his word that God “appeared to Israel” and “revealed Himself to Samuel” (v. 21)
◦ this is still how we come to know God and put our faith in him

How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher? . . . So faith comes from hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ (Ro. 10:14, 17)

• anyone can learn to “say prayers”
◦ but the real conversation doesn’t begin until we know God
◦ Paul certain “said prayers” (many, no doubt) prior to his conversion, but not until he had met Jesus could the Lord tell Ananias:

Get up and go to the street called Straight, and inquire at the house of Judas for a man from Tarsus named Saul, for he is praying (Acts 9:11)

◦ Paul’s first real prayer did not consist of requests or petitions, but two questions:
“Who are You, Lord” and
“What shall I do, Lord?” (Acts 22:10) Continue reading →

Meditation On Human Behavior

Now one of the Pharisees was requesting Him to dine with him, and He entered the Pharisee’s house and reclined at table. And there was a woman in the city who was a sinner; and when she learned that He was reclining at the table in the Pharisee’s house, she brought an alabaster vial of perfume, and standing behind Him at His feet, weeping, she began to wet His feet with her tears, and kept wiping them with the hair of her head, and kissing His feet and anointing them with the perfume. Now when the Pharisee who had invited Him saw this, he said to himself, “If this man were a prophet He would know who and what sort of person this woman is who is touching Him, that she is a sinner.” Luke 7:36-49

Intro: Helmut Thielicke, when preaching a sermon on this passage, began:

“I never cease to be amazed by the colorful characters whom we meet in the Bible. They are not all alike and we are not dealing with painted saints. We do not encounter among them the same kind of reverent monotony we find in Eastern icons. They are thrown together in sharply contrasting mixes in this story of the Pharisee and the sinful woman. . . . Even between Jesus and the two who shared with him the hill of Golgotha there are worlds of difference.”

It is because Thielicke’s observation fits our theme perfectly that I chose this passage
– my talk is titled, “Meditation On Human Behavior”
• nothing is more surprising, disturbing, or touching
◦ but discussing this theme is tricky, because we’ve all become amateur psychologists
• meditation suggests a different approach than examination, analysis, diagnosis and therapy
◦ so we have to set our knowledge of psychology to one side
– we meditate when we want to get beneath the surface of a thing
• in this case, when we look behind a person’s actions, not to see why, but to see the person

This story opens windows on the inner person
– and the importance of not being deceived by superficial measurements
• in the home of the Pharisee, nothing was what it appeared to be

Most of us have meditated on human behavior–a lot
– but, as a rule, our meditation has not lead us to discovery of a person
• our tendency is to attribute (or “project”) motives and explanations for the actions of others
• so in a way we see only pale versions of ourselves in the actions of others
– realistically, we do not have enough time to observe others without judgment
• judgments that come so quickly and easily
◦ our brains developed this ability for our protection
◦ in an instant we must determine whether the stranger approaching in the dark is a threat
• but this faculty must also be set aside to see accurately the person underneath the behavior

The way human behavior unfolds in scripture

The Bible tends to shift its interest when observing (or legislating) human behavior
– it may turn its magnifying glass on the heart, imagination, spirit, body, or will
• it is always interested in free will and the choices people make
– the Bible also observes the idiosyncrasies of individuals
• reading the New Testament letters we easily distinguish Paul from James and both from John

One scholar whose work has given me a better understanding of biblical stories is Robert Alter
– he explains that the biblical form of character development is not like our western novels
• generally, scripture does not have much said about the inner lives of our heroes
◦ or give details of their physical appearance, outside of what is necessary when building the plot
◦ and, like the woman in this story, many characters are anonymous (nameless)
• so when looking at human behavior:

“the Bible’s artful selectivity produces both sharply defined surfaces and a sense of ambiguous depths in character . . . .” (Alter)

– reading stories, expectations naturally form around certain character types
(for example, heroes and villains)
• but that is not always how it goes in scripture
◦ a righteous leader can lose his temper unrighteously
◦ a king “after God’s own heart” can murder a man to cover up an act of adultery
• the good person sometimes does bad things
◦ and the bad person sometimes does a good thing

“There is, in other words, an abiding mystery in character as the biblical writers conceive it, which they embody in their typical methods of presentation.” (Alter)

◦ that is to say, the men and women in scripture are like us — “a riddle wrapped in an enigma” Continue reading →

Nature Meditations

And He said to His disciples, “For this reason I say to you, do not worry about your life, as to what you will eat; nor for your body, as to what you will put on. For life is more than food, and the body more than clothing.
Consider the ravens, for they neither sow nor reap; they have no storeroom nor barn, and yet God feeds them; how much more valuable you are than the birds! And which of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life’s span? If then you cannot do even a very little thing, why do you worry about other matters?
Consider the the lilies, how they grow: they neither toil nor spin; but I tell you, not even Solomon in all his glory clothed himself like one of these. But if God so clothes the grass in the field, which is alive today and tomorrow is thrown into the furnace, how much more will He clothe you? You men of little faith!” Luke 12:22-28

Intro: We are learning skills for our spiritual journey

We are blessed today with a passage that combines two important skills:

1. Ridding our hearts and minds of anxiety
2. Meditating on nature

“Worry” is a specific type of thinking (the Greek root suggests a divided thought)
– in Luke 10, it is related to being distracted and bothered (Lk. 10:40-41)
• in the King James Version it is translated “cares” in two places
◦ in Luke 8:14, where cares choke the life out of God’s word
◦ in Luke 21:34, where hearts are weighed down with worries and caught off guard
• anxious thoughts have two distinct characteristics:
◦ they have a negative emotional quality (fear, insecurity, anger, a sense of unpreparedness, etc.)
◦ they become preoccupations – the mind gets stuck on them
– “life” and “body,” as with “food” and “clothing” are merely illustrations
• they represent the millions of things that can become sources of worry
◦ both material and psychological (e.g., “What does this say about me?”)
“And which of you by worry can add a single hour to his life’s span?”
• in other words, anxiety adds nothing of value to everything we have to do or face
◦ worry does not improve anything — its effect is to drain strength, not energize

For the believer, worry is the assumption God is not doing anything
– Jesus says, “Look around at the natural world”
• this is a realm where God is constantly at work
• the logic of Jesus:
If something is true or good in the natural world, how much more is it true of God
(for example, Lk. 11:11-13; 13:15-16; 18:1-8)
– of course the disciples had seen ravens and lilies, but they not made this connection
• it never occurred to them to “consider” or “observe” the natural world to gain wisdom
• yet, it was already there in the Scriptures

The eyes of all look to You,
And You give them their food in due time,
You open Your hand
And satisfy the desire of every living thing. (Ps. 145:15)

◦ this is the world that is lost to us — not the age of dinosaurs or Greek civilization
◦ but the created world that breathes the life of our Father Continue reading →