![]() By Rev. Heather J. Blais, Rector We are in the season after the Epiphany, where we celebrate the many ways God is revealed in the life of Jesus. We affirm that God’s revelation is not just meant for a select group of people. Rather, these revelations are meant for all people, at all times, and in all places.* In story after story, we discover people who encounter Jesus and walk away with an overwhelming sense that they have just experienced the divine.** At his birth, wise religious leaders of a different faith tradition, followed a star to come and pay their respects to the Christ-child. At his presentation in the temple, Simeon and Anna recognize Jesus, the infant of an impoverished couple, as the Messiah. At his baptism, the heavens open up before a crowd of the newly baptized, only to reveal Jesus as God’s beloved child. People from all walks of life encountered Jesus and were changed. Before Jesus began public ministry, John the Baptist was preparing the way for him. This ministry was so successful that it led some to be ‘filled with expectation… questioning in their hearts’ whether John might be the Holy One.*** In keeping with a true prophet, John knew that he was not the end game. Rather his life’s work was to communicate God’s vision with the people, and help hold the space for God to be at work in the world through Jesus. John spoke plainly to his followers: "I baptize you with water; but one who is more powerful than I is coming.…He will baptize you with the Holy Spirit and fire.”*** Immediately after this, John is imprisoned for speaking out against Herod and a group of people, which includes Jesus, are baptized. Since John is in prison, it’s unclear who led these baptisms. That said - these are not the details that matter to Luke. Luke wants us to know that right after being baptized, Jesus is praying. It is only then that the heavens are opened, and the Holy Spirit descends upon him like a dove, while a voice from heaven proclaims, "You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased."*** It’s important to note that for Luke, the Holy Spirit doesn’t simply show up on the Day of Pentecost. She is a vital part of both his Gospel and the Acts of the Apostles. She shows up before his birth when Mary is filled with the Holy Spirit; she rests on Simeon when the infant Jesus was presented at the temple; she descends like a dove at his baptism; and she leads Jesus into the wilderness right before he begins his public ministry.**** Jesus tends to his relationships with Creator and Spirit through prayer. He is deeply focused on prayer, and in Luke’s gospel, we see him pray more than anywhere else. The act of praying is his primary way of communicating in the two most important relationships in his life - Creator and Spirit. Jesus prays at every pivotal moment in his faith journey - from baptism to the transfiguration, to the cross and the grave.***** During his public ministry, Jesus grounds his work in prayer by going off by himself to pray. Prayer guides his relationship with the disciples - as he chooses whom to call, as he helps them to understand who he truly is, and even before predicting Peter’s denial. He spends a great deal of time teaching his disciples how to pray and encouraging them to be people of prayer. Luke’s gospel features parables about prayer that are only found in Luke. Luke wants us to understand how important prayer is to Jesus. Prayer is how we communicate with our heavenly Parent, Christ, and Spirit. Prayer grounds and guides our work and our play; our relationships with others and our relationship with ourselves. Prayer is at our beginning and at our end. Prayer is in our common life and in our private life. For many of us, we may know intellectually that prayer is essential to our life of faith. Yet we may find it challenging to engage in prayer beyond our common life of community worship. It would be tempting to tell ourselves praying together once a week is enough. But that is a bit like eating one really beautiful and healthy meal that has been lovingly prepared each week, only to graze on whatever snacks we might find available in the cupboard, in the fridge, or at the gas station check-out line. One is done with great intention and care, while the other is mindless. Writer Flora Slosson Wuellner once wrote: “Most of our problems with prayer arise from our tendency to turn spiritual growing into a set of laws or a gymnastic exercise. I have seen great inner struggle, fatigue, and guilt result when we treat prayer like a discipline… When we pray we are relating to Somebody - the supreme Somebody. But as with any healthy relationship, it can’t be turned into a set of laws, even good laws. Any relationship that remains whole is based on a commitment of ongoing trust, which expresses itself in varying and growing ways all our lives. It is best to have some form of deliberate opening to God each day, but we need not be troubled if the form and expression change. That is as it should be. God’s love is a growing personal relatedness in which we are loved and challenged to love without limit. This transforming friendship always nurtures before it challenges as well as during the challenge.”****** Prayer is our primary way of engaging in our relationship with the Holy One throughout our faith journey. We can anticipate that our prayer life is going to look different during varying seasons of our lives. When we are young, prayer may look more like sending God a mental text of our essential needs or wants. I bet I’m not the only one whose parent taught them the prayer: Now I lay me down to sleep… For most of my childhood I offered this brief prayer before sleep, which would always conclude with a list that featured my mom, our cats, and others. As a young teenager, this list became quite long, as I discovered the complexities of relationships. This form of prayer which had always worked for me, started to feel ineffective. Not because God wasn’t hearing me anymore, but rather because I knew I needed something more of God, and that God wanted more of me. I started to pay attention to other ways of praying, and my prayer life evolved. As we grow and mature in faith, this will happen dozens of more times. Our prayer life is always shifting and evolving. Yet the Holy One remains constant in their desire to be our most dear companion. Ready to journey with us and hold our struggles, grief, and worries; to explore the questions that rest on our hearts; to celebrate the joy of our lives; to help us see all there is to give thanks for; to be in the stillness and silence with us. Ready to be the balm to any loneliness our souls may feel; to hold the cares and concerns of the human family and the senselessness we so often face. As we grow and mature in our faith, we come to appreciate that nothing is off limits in our prayer life with the Holy One. That we can make use of different kinds of prayer when we need to have different kinds of conversations. That listening may be as important as anything we might ever say. The particulars of how, when, where we pray are going to be different at different chapters of our lives - and that’s as it should be. What matters is showing up and engaging in our relationship with our heavenly Parent, Christ, and Spirit. Prayer is how we cope with a challenging world. And maybe most importantly, it’s how we hold onto and learn to embody HOPE in a way that is modeled after Christ. That lifts up God’s dream for this world above all else. This year we will be spending a lot of time with Luke's gospel. We will read and hear more stories where Jesus models a healthy prayer life and where he teaches his followers how to pray. This is an invitation for us to reflect on and possibly deepen our prayer life. Whatever that looks like at this juncture in our life. In the end, there is no right or wrong way to pray and engage in our relationship with the Holy One. What matters is that we show up to be an equal partner in the relationship, and engage with great intention and care. As we head back into the world this week, I would invite each of us to reflect on our prayer life.
Lectionary Readings:
Isaiah 43:1-7; Acts 8:14-17; Luke 3:15-17, 21-22; Psalm 29 * Daily Prayer for All Seasons, p. 41. ** Matthew 2:1-12 NRSV; Luke 2:22-40 NRSV; Luke 3:21-22 NRSV *** Luke 3:15-22 NRSV **** Luke 1:15; 2:22-40; 3:16; 4:1 ***** Mark Allan Powell, Introduction to the New Testament, p.172. ****** Flora Slosson Wuellner, Prayer, Stress, and our Inner Wounds, 18-19. Comments are closed.
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