Sermon for Pentecost 10
Luke 11:1-13 + Genesis 18:20-32 + James 5:13-18
You may have noticed that we have a very small hymn selection today. We’ve been singing many stanzas of just one hymn – Luther’s hymn that paraphrases the Lord’s Prayer. We pray every Sunday, but today’s Gospel makes prayer our theme. At least once in the course of the liturgy, you hear me say to you, “Let us pray.” What does that mean? What is “prayer”? How do you think about “praying”? I think a lot of people have the idea that prayer is some mystical mode that you enter, some state of communing with God. So “Let us pray” would mean, “Let us turn on prayer mode,” or, “Let us commune with God now.” Is that how you think of prayer? That wouldn’t fit the Scriptural definition.
Or maybe you’ve heard a simple definition of prayer as, “talking to God.” So, “Let us pray,” would mean, “Let us talk to God now,” or “Let us tell God what is on our minds.” Is that how you think of prayer?
That’s not really accurate, either. “Prayer” is “talking to God,” but it’s not like the chit chat you have around your supper table, and it has little to do with “telling him what’s on your mind.” We tell God lots of things, I suppose. When you “tell God” how great he is for some promise he has kept or some act of salvation he has done, that’s really called, “praise.” When you “tell God” thank-you for those things, that’s called, “giving thanks.” When you “tell God” about your sins, that’s called “confession.” Sometimes we may use the word “prayer” for those things, but prayer, properly speaking, is not telling God anything. “To pray” is to ask God for something. “Prayer,” – the kind of prayer Jesus himself teaches us to pray in the Lord’s Prayer – is nothing more and nothing less than a request made to God. So “Let us pray” means, “Let us make a request of God.” The Prayer of the Day, toward the beginning of the service, is the main request we make of God today, the one special thing we seek from him, based on the reading from the Gospel. The Prayer of the Church is the set of requests that the Church makes for the world and for herself.
In today’s Gospel, which includes that most famous of all prayers, the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus lays before us, not just the what of prayer, but especially the why of prayer. There are so many reasons to make requests of God.
First and foremost, because God has commanded that you make requests of him. Ask! Seek! Knock!, Jesus says. It’s part of the Second Commandment – “You shall not misuse the name of the LORD your God.” In other words, “You shall use correctly the name of the LORD your God.” You shall call upon his name for help. You shall pray to him. You shall make requests of him. Prayer has God’s command.
So, that means, prayer is not optional. It’s not just something a Christian can do, but something a Christian must do. Continually. Not, “If you happen to have a moment this morning, or this afternoon, or this evening, or if you remember, sometime this week, if you feel like it, go ahead and pray.” As surely as God commands you not to murder your neighbor, he commands you to use his name correctly, to make requests of him, to call upon his name, to present your needs before him and look to him as the one who will fill them all, out of his great mercy and love, according to his good and gracious will.
God has given his name to you to use at all times and in all places, to make requests for needs both big and small, for yourself, and especially for others, for physical needs, and especially for the honor of God’s name and the coming of God’s kingdom. But how often don’t you go through a day without asking God for a single thing, or maybe only for a single thing? Could anyone describe you as earnest in prayer? To be sure, some are more faithful at prayer than others. But to one degree or another, you trust in yourself to provide for yourself, and you take for granted God’s help, or you consider yourself too unworthy to pray. You fail to call upon God’s name as he commanded, and therefore you also fail to give him the honor he deserves. There goes the First Commandment, too.
You – and I – sin against God’s commandment when we fail to make requests of him continually, and that means you don’t just lose out on the benefits of prayer. You earn for yourself God’s anger. He will punish all who break his commandments, including the command to pray.
Oh, look! At the beginning of our Gospel – the man who spent his life either speaking the name of God to others, or calling on the name of God in prayer. “One day Jesus was praying in a certain place.” Luke especially emphasizes how often Jesus prayed to his dear Father. There is the man who did what men are supposed to do, without fail. There is the man who obeyed the command to pray – joyfully and gladly, continually and earnestly. He is the Christ, which means, he is mankind’s Substitute – both in the obedient life he led and in the innocent death he died on the cross to pay for the sins of men. Men will be judged, either by their own faithfulness in prayer, or by Christ’s faithfulness in prayer. Wouldn’t you rather be judged by Christ’s faithfulness than by your own? Then trust in him for that. God says to you, “Repent of your lazy indifference toward God’s name. Repent of your arrogant refusal to ask, to seek, to knock on heaven’s door. And believe in my Son, Jesus Christ as your Substitute and Savior.” And by faith in Christ, you are safe. Your sins are forgiven and his righteousness counts as your own. And you have a loving Father in heaven who welcomes you into his throne room and says, eagerly, “What can I do for you today, my child?” Isn’t that a reason to make requests of God? Because Christ Jesus, our Savior, has given us the right to call God “Our Father”?
There’s another reason to pray – to make requests of God. Even those who rarely take the time to pray to God usually find themselves down on their knees – when? When a really big need comes along. When there’s a funny-looking spot on an X-Ray. When a child is in danger. When you look and your car is running on empty in the middle of nowhere. Another reason to pray – to make requests of God – is how desperately you need the things you are to request. In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches us what our most desperate needs are by teaching us to ask our Father in heaven precisely for those things.
There’s a lot of teaching about our needs in the seven petitions – the seven requests – of the Lord’s Prayer. There’s no way we can give each petition its due in a sermon. So, I would like to invite you all to come to Bible class next Sunday, when we will begin an eight-week study of the Lord’s Prayer.
For now, recognize how each of those seven requests addresses our greatest needs, most of which we don’t even realize we have. Why pray that God’s name be hallowed – be kept holy? Not only so that God may be honored among us, but because, without his name – rightly taught, we have nothing. God’s name is his revelation to us. If his revelation is tainted or corrupted, then we don’t know him and can’t be saved. The devil – our real enemy – works night and day to spread false teachings and false beliefs among us. He works also to tempt Christians to fall into grievous sins that tarnish God’s reputation in the world. We need God’s help to keep his name holy among us.
We need his help for his kingdom to come among us, too – for Christ to extend his rule into our hearts and lives. The devil wants to set up shop there. The world wants to rip us out of Christ’s kingdom, and our sinful nature does not want Christ for a king. We need to ask for God’s help.
We need for God’s will to be done, because the devil, the world, and our sinful nature will what is contrary to God’s will, all the time. And for as much as we fool ourselves into thinking that this ole world keeps on turning all by itself and that we’re in control of providing for our physical needs, the truth is, we depend on God alone for our daily bread – for all the things we need for this body and life.
And because the devil, the world and our sinful nature are always with us, and sin is our constant companion, we always need God’s forgiveness. Because those enemies work night and day to lead us into temptation, we need God’s divine help to bear up under temptation so that, even though we are tempted, we don’t give in. And we need him to deliver us from the Evil One who wants nothing more than to torment us Christians with every kind of evil, and see our faith extinguished and our life snuffed out. Because of these many great and desperate needs, we make requests of God to help us in each one.
After teaching his disciples the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus teaches them one more reason to make requests of God: because of God’s promise to hear and fulfill your requests. Prayer has not only God’s command, but also God’s promise. Ask – and it will be given to you. Seek – and you will find. Knock – and the door will be opened to you. Our Father does grant our requests. He has given us his Word, and with his Word, also his own Holy Spirit – to help us keep God’s name holy and lead holy lives. He speaks to us through the Gospel and brings his kingdom to us and others. He supplies daily bread and so much more. He hands out forgiveness for our trespasses in Word and Sacrament. And by his almighty power, he protects and defends us from temptation and from all evil.
We have good reason to pray, because through the work of Jesus Christ, we have a gracious Father in heaven who knows how desperate our situation is in this world, who teaches us what requests to make, and then promises to hear them and fulfill them, better than any earthly father could ever do. Equipped with both God’s command to pray and God’s promise to hear and fulfill our prayers, we have no reason not to make requests of God. We have every reason to pray. Amen.
