Proper 12 :: Genesis 18: 20–32; Psalm 85; Colossians 2:
9–16; Luke 11: 1–13
This is a homily by
Fr. Gene Tucker, given at St. John’s Church in Huntingdon, Pennsylvania on Sunday,
July 24, 2016.
“PRAYER: HOW MANY TIMES
IS ENOUGH?”
(Homily text: Genesis 18: 20–32 & Luke 11: 1-13)
How
many times is enough to ask God for something?
Is
once enough? Is more than once enough? Is it good to keep on praying until we
get an answer?[1]
Both
our Old Testament reading from Genesis and our Gospel text from Luke deal with
prayer, and – in particular – the necessity of continued prayer. One might even
say that Jesus gives us permission to be a bit of a pest in asking God to give
us those things we need.
Let’s
look a little closer at this.
Abraham
is conversing with God about the future of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah. (I
will admit I love this text, perhaps because I can picture myself looking on
and listening in to the back-and-forth between God and Abraham.) He begins by
asking God if the cities will be destroyed if fifty righteous people are found
in them. Then, perhaps thinking through just how wicked those two cities are,
he adjusts his request downward, saying to God, “Well, what if forty five
righteous are found?”
You
know the progression from there….Abraham adjusts his request again, down to
forty, then thirty, then twenty, and finally, to ten righteous persons.
If we
count the separate petitions, there are six in all. Six connected-but-separate
requests.
Now,
let’s turn our attention to today’s Gospel text.
Our
text begins with Luke’s version of the Lord’s Prayer (in contemporary
language). Luke’s version differs from the more-usually-known version from
Matthew. It is possible that the Lord gave a different version of His model
prayer on different occasions. Perhaps that would account for the differences
between Luke’s and Matthew’s versions. I don’t know, but I’ll venture to say
that is a plausible explanation for the differences between Luke and Matthew.
But
then, the Lord launches into a teaching about prayer. In the teaching, the man
standing outside the house asking for bread is initially rebuffed. The
householder says from within the house, “Do not bother me; the door has already
been locked, and my children are with me in bead; I cannot get up and give you
anything.”
But
notice that the man asking is persistent…Jesus says that, not because the man
is the householder’s friend, but because of his persistence, his request for
bread is granted.
So
Jesus seems to be telling us (in so many words), “Keep at it, keep on asking
until you receive an answer.” (That’s my assessment of what the Lord is saying,
just to be clear.)
So,
returning the question we began with: Just how many times is appropriate for us
to ask God for something?
One
answer would be: Once. The reason for
this answer is that God already knows our needs. God also knows our necessities
(not our desires, those two are different), and God also knows our ignorance in
making our requests, as a wonderful prayer in the Prayer Book says.[2] So there
is a biblical basis for saying that uttering our prayers for something just
once is sufficient.
But
Abraham’s experience suggests that more petitions than one are acceptable.
Jesus’ teaching, heard this morning, also seems to suggest that repeated
requests are acceptable to God: “So I
say to you, Ask, and it will be given to you; search, and you will find; knock,
and the door will be opened.”
Some
attitudes about prayer are in order here:
- Prayer that comes with the expectation that one prayer will take care of our needs: Sometimes, people pray, expecting that God will swoop in and solve all the problems of humankind. This attitude is akin to the idea that – if only God would act – all the challenges of life would be solved instantly.[3]
- Prayer that expects
God to do all the heavy lifting: Closely related to the point just made is the
idea that we human beings don’t have a role in continuing to lift our prayers
to God, or to do anything else, for that matter. But the persistence of Abraham
and the persistence of the man standing outside the door of the house asking
for bread make clear that prayer arises out of our relationship with
God …. notice that Abraham bases his request on his close and intense
relationship with God. Likewise, Jesus makes clear that the man asking for
bread makes his request because of his relationship with his neighbor. Prayer is
work. Prayer is often sustained effort, effort that changes us as we faithfully
live in the expectation that God always answers prayer. Prayer causes us to
reflect on our requests, seeking to see if our wants and needs are in accord
with God’s will or not. Prayer causes us to look around and see just what
actions God wants us to do, ourselves, as part of the answer to our prayers.
- Praying for what we want, not what we need: A wonderful priest once said to me, “I pray that God will give you what you need, not what you want …. there’s a difference.” These very wise words might cause us to reflect on just what it is we are asking God for, and to dig into the reasons which lie behind our request.
When
we pray, we are assured that we will always have an answer from God. God’s
answer will fall into one of three categories:
- Yes
- No
- Not now
In
all of these answers, there lies the truth that what God desires for us is
better than what we desire ourselves, for God’s perspective of things is far
greater and wiser than ours is.
Finally,
a balanced prayer life is marked by an ongoing conversation with God: We make our prayers to God, but also take
time to listen for God to speak to us through the power of the Holy Spirit. Often,
God’s voice is heard in stillness and in silence. Thanksgiving also plays an
important part in a balanced prayer life, as we reflect back on God’s goodness
and graciousness in times past, and remember with thanks the ways in which His
will was better for us than our own wishes were.
So,
“Pray without ceasing,” as St. Paul exhorts us to do in I Thessalonians 5: 17.
Pray until God’s will is known and God’s answer has been received.
AMEN.
[1] I am reminded of my mother’s example in
praying for my father….she prayed for him over a period of about thirty five
years, and I am sure she prayed for him daily, if not more than once a day. So,
doing some rough calculation, I wager that my mother prayed for my father at
least 12,775 times during that period. In God’s good time, and in God’s most
excellent way, her prayers were answered and my father’s life was redeemed.
Thanks be to God!
[2] This is the Collect for the Sunday closest
to July 20th each year, Proper 11, which can be found in The Book of
Common Prayer on page, 231.
[3] Such an attitude often lies behind some
Christians’ intense focus on the Lord Jesus’ return to earth. Such a view,
while it affirms a truth of the faith, tends to lead us to think that the
world’s problems would all be solved if only the Lord would return sometime
soon. But the truth is that we Christians have work to do to make the world a
better place until such time as the Lord does return.
