July 24, 2022
Proper 12, year C, track 1
Deborah Hawkins
Title: “How much more”

Teach us how to pray, someone asked. Do we hold our hands like this or like this? Should we kneel or stand or sit? What are the best ways to address God? We don’t want to mess up on this we know it is important. Life is difficult and we know we need God’s help so we need to get this right. Jesus, John the Baptist taught his disciples various prayer techniques. We are your disciples. Teach us yours. 

The disciple asking probably figures Jesus has a privileged line straight to God, some secret knowledge that he could share with them. Teach us, they ask, the secret handshake, the special words, give us the insider’s access to God.

So he taught them what we now call the Lord’s Prayer. Just a couple of short declarative sentences. Say these things. Ask for this.

Father, hallowed be your name.

We begin not with a request but a reminder, for us, of just who it is we are addressing. Father is a common name for the Divine in Jewish prayer (Amy-Jill Levine, Sermon on the Mount). Other names include Husband or Spouse (Hosea in the first reading today enacts that one), Shepherd, Mother, Almighty, King of Heaven. There are many but each evokes, when used in reference to God, the highest ideal. Begin your prayer with “Father”, Jesus tells us. Know you are cherished and cherish the One who truly knows you.

Your kingdom come

Scripture records many “kingdom” stories. We hear of slaves in the kingdom of Egypt, exiles in the kingdom of Babylon, the shenanigans, conceits, and wars of the kings of Israel and Judah. Jesus and the first disciples lived a kingdom. They knew what it meant to be subjects of Herod, who was himself a subject of Rome. Many people in the world today still live under such oppressive conditions. For some this plea, this demand, is a source of hope. 

Scripture is full promises of a coming kingdom where, as Isaiah records “the Lord of Hosts will make for all peoples a feast of rich food, a feast of well-aged wines… This is the Lord for whom we have waited; let us be glad and rejoice in his salvation.” (Isaiah 25:6,9b) But even those of us who don’t live in oppressive kingdoms, whose lives might be seen by others as a bed of roses, can attest to life’s thorns. We all long for the Kingdom of God that Jesus keeps talking about to be made real in our lives. 

Elsewhere in Luke, someone (and whenever someone is not named we are being invited to consider whether or not that someone might be us) will ask Jesus “when the Kingdom of God was coming?” His answer was, “it is among you,” (Luke 17:20) or “it is within you.” Translations vary.  This prayer, “Your kingdom come,” is not only a very real plea for help when the Kingdom of God seems nothing but a vague dream, but is also a reminder that the kingdom is present and, more than that, we are to be active participants in making it visible in the world.

We thought we were asking God for something. Turns out God is also asking something of us.

Give us each day our daily bread

What do you need to get through today, just today? Ask for it. God may know our needs before we do, but ask anyway, everyday. Talk to God everyday, even more than once. Then remember the story of the manna in the wilderness. 

The Hebrew people were wandering in the wilderness and they were hungry. They said, “God we need bread.” They got manna which roughly translates to “what is this?” Not what they asked for.  

Remember last weeks gospel lesson? It comes immediately before this section. Distracted Martha, the designated host of a church convention taking place in her home, says, “Right. I have to be crazy busy taking care of whatever I think are everyone else’s needs. Jesus, I need help, make my sister help me.” Jesus tells her, “No, that really isn’t what you need. Quiet attention to one thing right in front of you, that is more than enough.” And I think he may have added, “and despite what anyone else may say to you, no one else here needs more than that from you, either.” 

So ask. Don’t be surprised if you don’t get what you ask for, but trust you will be provided with what you do need. 

And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us

Now I have to confess, this part sometimes makes me nervous because – no I don’t. When that happens it is easy to shift over to concerns about the specific words used in this prayer. Is it sins or debts or trespasses or ofensas o pecados? Is this Rite I or Rite II or have I perhaps walked into a Baptist church service or something? If you don’t want to look at the big picture, start digging in the weeds.

The two versions of this prayer we are given in the gospels – in Matthew and in Luke – are Greek translations of what Jesus taught in Aramaic. The prayer we pray together every Sunday and that Christians around the world pray together every Sunday and throughout the week are translations of composites of translations found in the gospels and other early church records. A little variation is to be expected. What is amazing is how similar they are.

Lord, you are always ready to forgive us. The forgiveness we receive is limited only by the forgiveness we offer. Your kingdom is a place of forgiveness, not cruelty; peace, not vengeance. We have already asked “Your Kingdom come” knowing it takes both your help and our work for its presence to be tangible. Part of our work is to express our gratitude for the forgiveness and mercy we receive from you, Oh God, by making the work of forgiveness a priority in our lives. Help us. 

Which brings us to:

And do not bring us to the time of trial.

After the Last Supper, when Jesus went to the Mount of Olives to pray, he told those who followed him, “Pray that you may not come to the time of trial.”  Then he turned to God, fell to his knees, and asked the cup be taken from him, “yet, not my will but yours be done.” (Lk 22:39). 

None of us want to be brought to the time of trial, be tested, or led into temptation. We hope and pray whatever those times may be, they will pass us by. But more than that we are reminded that when they do come into our lives we are not left alone. Jesus is ever our companion on the way. 

Jesus continues on with a story of a neighbor whose impudent prayers for help caring for an unexpected guest are answered grudgingly. Perhaps we fear that is how our prayers are heard in heaven. Do you ever wonder if that is the case or wonder why your deepest, most heartfelt prayers for a little bit of peace, justice, mercy, not even for yourself but for others seemingly go unanswered? Jesus knows that experience. Don’t give up, he tells us, don’t give up. 

And why not? Jesus shifts to rhetorical questions reminding us of God’s steadfast love. All we have to do is ask, all we have to do is search, all we have to do is knock and our needs will be supplied. In fact, there is more. The next sentence after today’s reading, Jesus casts out a demon from someone who is mute so now they can speak. Even when we can’t ask, our needs are met. 

Jesus tells us, if all of you who are not perfect give good gifts to those you care for, how much more will God, who loves you, who created you, give good gifts to you.

Teach us to pray, we ask, unsure how our prayers will be received. We end up receiving so much more than we could even ask or imagine. Teach us to pray, we ask, and we receive the gifts of God and are made truly “alive together with him.” 

Thanks be to God.