Category: Prayer

Discerning the Signs of the Times

Speaking to the religious leaders of his day, Jesus said, “You know how to interpret the appearance of the sky [whether fair weather or threatening weather], but you cannot interpret the signs of the times (Matthew 16:3).”

Religion does not enable us to discern the signs of the times. Laws, morals, and principles to live by do not enable us to discern the signs of the times. Philosophies, theologies, and ideologies (conservative or progressive) do not enable us to discern the signs of the times. The most helpful of our theologies and ethics speak in generalities and may provide some help in broad strokes, but offer little help for discerning the signs present in the specific situations of our lives and times.

Discernment for what is happening in our world and for the actions we are to take is ultimately a spiritual activity with a prophetic element.

The Pharisees and Sadducees, to whom Jesus was speaking, had a well-developed and rational theology and moral philosophy that made sense within their systems of thought, but they were blind to the signs of their times.

There is much religion and moral thinking that operates within closed systems of thought. Religions often operate with the assumption that from their theologies and ethical thinking they can speak to virtually anything. Religious leaders can give the impression that they speak for God as they give answers from their particular theology or ethical philosophy.

People who make decisions from a particular theology or set of moral principles may feel secure in their theology, morality, and decisions. They may also be self-righteous and judgmental toward others who do not share their way of thinking. The morality of moral people can blind them to their own immorality. Paul writes of those who judge others: “In passing judgement on another you condemn yourself, because you, the judge, are doing the very same things (Romans 2:1).”

It is possible to say we live by the Bible (or some other sacred text) or act from a clear set of moral principles but, in actuality, live far from the truth—all the while judging others who do not share our views. For all our moralizing and reading the Bible and having a theology, we operate blind. As with the religious leaders of Jesus day, we do not discern what is happening around us (or in us).

Discernment is a spiritual activity. Having a well-developed theology and morality will not help us discern the signs of the times. We cannot discern the signs without discerning God’s will. (Of course, we have to pay attention to the times, to what is going on around us, but paying attention has a spiritual aspect as well.) We must discern God’s will in order to discern the times in which we live.

Paul gives a very succinct description of what is involved in discerning God’s will. He tells us to “present your bodies as a living sacrifice” (relinquish your lives to God) and “do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God (Romans 12:1-2).”

Having a morality or principles to live by (no matter how we got them) will not enable us to discern. Spiritual discernment comes with submission to God and therefore to God’s will and therefore excludes conforming to a world caught up in arrogance and self-absorption. It involves allowing ourselves, our ways of thinking and deciding, to be transformed by the renewing work of the Spirit. It involves the leading of the Spirit.

Only then can we begin to discern the signs of the times.

Furthermore, we cannot turn over the exercise of discernment to others: to religious leaders and “prophets.” There have always been far more false prophets than true prophets. We cannot give over to others the discernment that we are responsible to exercise. We must, each, submit our lives to God and grow in openness to God’s will, so that we “are no longer children, tossed to and fro and blown about by every wind of doctrine, by people’s trickery, by their craftiness in deceitful scheming (Ephesians 4:14).”

Jesus would have his followers discern the signs of the times, so that they may speak and operate from that discernment. He would not have us secured by and bound to a theology as the Pharisees were, but rather open and still before the living God, waiting for the still small voice.

Prayer becomes critical for true discernment—prayer as submission to God and God’s will. Prayer does not consist in the practice of providing a list of things for God to do for us that we believe will make our lives better. Prayer is submission of our lives to God for the leading of the Spirit, for eyes that see and ears that hear.

There is no substitute for the contemplative life, for life open to God, open for truth in the inward being. We are called from the noise of our world, including the religious noise. We are called to a letting go of ourselves, or, as Jesus says, to a losing of ourselves that we may gain our true selves, selves that are open and discerning and therefore receiving direction.

Filed under: Prayer, Society, SpiritualityTagged with: ,

Gaza

I find myself looking away, hardening myself to the pain. And yet I know that you, gracious God, do not turn away. You grieve. We see in the cross of Christ that you unite yourself to our suffering, to the suffering of our world. So, I draw near to you.

You see how we build rationales for ourselves, for the pain we inflict. We say it cannot be helped. An eye for an eye, a life for a life. But we do not even limit ourselves to that; we justify taking many more lives. We decide it is right to take life indiscriminately. We take our pain and we pour out pain.

And many of us look on and say it cannot be helped. We live by the sword and die by the sword. We have got ourselves into a vicious cycle of pain and death. And cannot free ourselves.

We cannot see it otherwise. Hamas must be stamped out. But even if Hamas were to be stamped out, something else similar would arise. And we would choose to operate in the same way toward that. We would fight pain with pain, death with death, destruction with destruction. We choose death over life, hate over love.

How is it possible to love your enemy, when your enemy is so ruthless and brutal? So, we choose the enemies we will love, maybe someone who briefly slights us. But you, gracious God, do not make such distinctions. We see that in the cross of Christ who took on our sin and suffering and prayed, “Father forgive them for they do not know what they do.” We still do not know what we do.

So you let us, prodigal sons and daughters, go off to the far country until we come to ourselves. What does it take to come to ourselves? How bad must our mess become, before we say, “I will return to my Father?”

I live in a nation that amasses great amounts of sophisticated weaponry and then spreads it around the world. We not only support our own killing but the killing others do. We believe in killing. We are committed to war as a solution. We call our blindness, reality.

Gracious God, help us. Give us eyes to see and ears to hear. Give us ears to hear the cries of the people of Gaza. Help us not to look away from their suffering or that of the families of the slain in Israel. Help us to take their pain and ours to you.

Where else can we take it? If we do not bring our pain to you, we will take it out on others, pain upon pain.

Help me, help us, gracious God, to not harden ourselves. Help us not to simply guard ourselves from the hurt and pain, but to come to you with it and to be witnesses to your love which is the only reality that overcomes evil.

Gracious God help us. Have mercy on us. Turn our hearts to you; turn our hearts to love.

Filed under: Death, Love, Prayer, WarTagged with: , , , ,

When Christmas Is A Wilderness

Jesus asked what people were looking for when they came out to the wilderness to see John the Baptist (and, by implication, what they were looking for when they came out to see Jesus). Jesus said, “What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who wear soft robes are in royal palaces.” Jesus implied that they did not go out to see such things because the wilderness was not the place to find them. They came out to the wilderness to seek God’s reign. They sought the coming and power of God in their lives. They sought healing and new life in God—in the wilderness.

For many people, Christmas comes as a wilderness. At a time when families gather, when there are parties, “soft robes,” lights, and jubilation, there are those who experience most intensely the loss of loved ones or experience depression and anxiety. There are those who, when the parties are over, feel deep emptiness.

We all experience wilderness—times of trial or emptiness, sometimes most profoundly at Christmas. The God, who has come to us in Christ, comes to be where we are in the wilderness. Often, it is when the music stops and the party is over and we are alone in the wilderness and receptive, that Christ’s presence is most made known.

We need the wilderness. Prayer is often experienced as a wilderness. Our self-absorption is not interested in prayer. To our pride and arrogance, prayer appears as a wilderness. Prayer offers emptiness, the emptying of ourselves. Prayer calls us to let go of our lives to God, to trust.

When prayer feels like wilderness, we must enter into the wilderness, enter into the emptiness and silence, and then let the Spirit lead us in the wilderness as the Spirit did for Jesus. When prayer is experienced as wilderness, we simply need to go there. Enter the wilderness where the Spirit leads us to God who, through Christ Jesus, is present in all the circumstances and struggles of our lives.

Whatever the wilderness, this Christmas, the Spirit is present to prepare our hearts to receive Christ afresh. Thanks be to God.

Filed under: Faith, Prayer, Suffering

How to Pray for Lying Leaders

One of the things I love about the Bible is its humanity, its expressions of a wide range of human experience—the good, the bad, the ugly, and the sublime. This diversity of expression is true of the Psalms, a book of prayers and songs. The Psalms express our fears and joys, despair and depression, sin and guilt, grace and mercy, rescue and deliverance, gratitude and praise to God.

There are psalms that express deep suffering at the hands of others. The praying person cries out for deliverance from enemies and often calls God to bring judgment down upon their oppressors. Sometimes their prayer includes specific suggestions on how God should act. Some of these suggestions, I cannot imagine praying. But these prayers come from experiences of brutal oppression. And God hears our prayers, our deep suffering. But God does not necessarily do what we ask.

Still, we need to pray out what we are feeling. I had a member of my congregation share with me his anger toward God for his wife’s debilitating illness. His anger kept him from praying. He had been told that he was not to question God. I pointed to a psalm where the person praying was definitely questioning God. This member of my congregation could go to God and share freely how he felt toward God; it was not as if God did not know. And God was certainly “big enough” to take his anger, which was not so true with the people in his life.

Which brings me to Psalm 59, a prayer for deliverance from enemies. I do not feel free to pray for every manner of God’s wrath that the psalmist calls down on his enemies. But I can pray this:

“Make them totter by your power and bring them down,
O Lord, our shield.
For the sin of their mouths, the words of their lips,
let them be trapped in their pride.
For the cursing and lies that they utter.”

How do we pray when our petitions concern leaders and people of influence who lie, distort, and put out all manner of disinformation, who, in their pride and arrogance, show no compunction about leading people astray, who prey upon people’s weaknesses and self-absorption, their fears, prejudices, grievances, misplaced anger, and gullibility? How do we pray for leaders who bow down to and serve the god of personal power?

While many people are concerned with the undermining of democratic institutions (I have this concern as well, along with the undemocratic aspects of our institutions.), my main concern has to do with our basic humanity. After all, our democratic institutions allowed “we the people” to put Donald Trump into the office of president. The deeper issue is the way those in positions of leadership lead us further into our self-deceit and further away from our humanity created in the image of God.

All the lies and distortions ultimately take us away from living out our essential humanity as expressed by the prophet Micah: “He has told you, O mortal, what is good, and what does the Lord require of you but to do justice and to love mercy and to walk humbly with your God?”

Lying leaders and influencers lead others away from their true humanity. They beguile people away from doing justice, loving mercy, and living faithfully. Which means that we, as a nation, are being led deeper into injustice, hatred, the despising of others, division, and violence.

So, how to pray when lying leaders refuse to change, refuse to repent. Considering St. Paul’s words about reaping what we sow and pride going before the fall, pray for the reaping and the fall that is coming:

“Make them totter by your power and bring them down. For the sin of their mouths, the cursing and lies that they utter, let them be trapped in their pride.” Amen.

Filed under: Justice, Leadership, PrayerTagged with: , ,

No Substitute For Discernment

Those of us who are citizens of the United States of America are presently involved in making decisions regarding leadership in our nation, decisions about who to vote for. We are having to discern and decide among human beings, like us, who are flawed. People of faith pray for guidance as they listen to candidates and weigh various factors of our present situation. Some, however, may look to religious leaders for direction and may tell themselves that it is enough to get direction from this or that “man of God” or “woman of God,” as if we could simply rely on another person to tell us what to do without exercising discernment. However, Jesus tells us that we each have a responsibility to exercise discernment. He tells us that not everyone who says “Lord, Lord” is connected to God’s reign. Therefore, we are responsible to know them by their fruits; we are to exercise discernment in relation to religious leaders and what they tell us.

Jesus tells us not to be like religious leaders who are hypocrites or play-actors and who do what they do “so that they may be praised by others.” What we see of them, their outward actions and words, is a cover for what is inside. We are to exercise discernment so that we recognize false prophets. Outwardly Jesus tells us they wear sheep’s clothing, but “inwardly they are ravenous wolves.” (Matthew 7:15-16) They may talk religiously, read their Bible, and tell us that they are for a return to morality in America. But Jesus says, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only the one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” (Matthew 7:21)

Jesus tells us that we know false prophets by their fruit, that is, by their actions and by what is important to them. What they treasure tells us where their heart is. “For where your treasure is, there your heart will be also.” (Matthew 6:21) We cannot see into another person’s heart; we cannot see what motivates them, but we can see their fruit. We see what gets expressed and acted out, and, in this way, we see what they treasure, what they go after, and what is truly important to them.

Do their lives manifest what Jesus calls the weightier matters: doing justice, loving mercy and living faithfully? Do they, like Jesus, actively care for the plight of the poor, the outcast, the refugee? Do they extend God’s mercy and welcome to the broken and the bound. Are they about healing and liberation? Or, instead of God’s welcome, do they lay heavy burdens on others by condemnation and blame, or even by belittling and ridicule?

Whether we are discerning our next steps or discerning whether to listen to a particular teacher, proclaimer, or prophet, it comes down to a matter of discerning God’s will: The one who enters God’s reign is the “one who does the will of my Father in heaven.” We must discern not only our next steps (God’s will for us), but discern false leaders and proclaimers. This is critical for our life together and for the building of true community. We must be careful that we are not led astray or that we lead others astray. If our prejudices, fears, and attitudes toward others govern how we see things, then we will be attracted to religious leaders that cast blame on others and demean those we do not like.

We must do what Paul tells us to do: “Present your bodies as a living sacrifice” and “be transformed by the renewing of your minds, so that you may discern what is the will of God.” It is only by relinquishing our lives to God that we are able to discern God’s will. It is this discernment that enables us not only to see what is of God and what God calls us to do but to recognize the voices that declare God’s will and those that do not.

Filed under: Faith, Leadership, Prayer, SpiritTagged with: , , ,

Where Security Resides

At some point in my early twenties, in college, it occurred to me that I was not simply seeking knowledge for the sake of knowledge and truth. I had told myself that that was what I was doing; it was a conscious desire. But I came to admit that there was more going on than simply a search for truth. There was a desire to secure my life with knowledge. There was the feeling that if I just knew enough, I would feel more secure in the world and perhaps feel that things were a little more under my control. I became increasingly aware of this attempt to secure my life, along with the realization that it was not working.

When it came to my relationship with God, in whom there is true security, I found that I was often attempting to think my way to God, a decidedly futile project. I despaired of it and continued a journey of surrendering my life to God.

I am seventy now and am mindful that my efforts to secure myself have never gone away, even as I have found security in God who, in the words of Karl Rahner, is Incomprehensible Mystery. My security is in the Incomprehensible! It is in the Mystery! Since my attempts at securing myself have not disappeared, I have been on a journey of relinquishing my life. My security is found in losing my life, my insecurity in trying to secure my life. (“For those who want to save their life will lose it, and those who lose their life for my sake will find it.” – Jesus)

The struggle remains. And God’s grace remains. God knows where I am in the midst of this struggle, for which I am grateful; I am thankful that God knows me and knows where I am. And God is my deliverer. The journey I am on is a journey of grace.

I share this experience, because I realize I am not alone in this, and I understand the danger of seeking knowledge and information as a way to secure ourselves. This danger is certainly found in the ways that technology can give the illusion of power and security. And the scientific method, while achieving much growth in empirical knowledge (and at the same time multiplying the questions and keeping us immersed in mystery), can, nevertheless, for some, be a means of “pinning things down” in order to gain a sense of security. When technology and science become a way of securing ourselves, our lives narrow to a very mean (as in “small”) self. On the other hand, when science is pursued for the sake of knowledge rather than security, as with all forms of knowing, it opens us up to wonder and mystery—and therefore to spirit. (Read the Journey of the Universe, by Brian Thomas Swimme and Mary Evelyn Tucker.)

But an attempt to secure ourselves by our knowledge may reach its most dangerous level in theology. The temptation to have our thoughts about God secure us is great. For many, the fall into this temptation is most obvious in fundamentalist thinking, where, for example, Bible quotes are provided as pat answers to all manner of life’s problems. However, the danger exists for any theological project. We are tempted to think our way to God, rather than reflect from our lived experience of God. The danger is that our theology becomes merely another ideology that keeps hidden the primary idols (false centers) that drive our lives and undermine our relationships. Theology replaces experience rather than reflecting it. Essentially, this is the cause of so many forms of Christianity revealing little or nothing of Christ.

Jesus speaks to this when he prays, “I thank you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and the intelligent and have revealed them to infants.” And when he says, “Let the little children come to me…for it is to such as these that the kingdom of God belongs.” And “Unless you change and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.”

Therefore: Leave aside all your thoughts, your intelligent and well-formulated answers. Become like an infant, not knowing, open to receive. Be silent. Be still. “Be still and know.” (Psalm 46) Wait. “Be still before the Lord, and wait patiently for him.” (Psalm 37) Release your thoughts and yield to Incomprehensible Mystery. Be open to the One you can never wrap your thoughts around. You have put your faith in your thoughts; now trust the Mystery. The One you cannot comprehend will bear you up and secure you. In silence and trust, the eyes of your heart will be opened, so that you become aware of both your great need for God and God’s gracious acceptance. In that awareness, you may find that you are discerning your next steps. Your next steps, as God gives them, are prior to and greater than your reflections. Knowing and doing God’s will are preeminent over any theology.

As a response to God, the steps you take grow your true self. This experience gives rise to reflections so that you are not merely repeating what you heard from others or read in the Bible, but rather you are witnessing from your own lived reality.

Furthermore, you find that you are not bound to any one formulation of reality, but you are free to find new ways to express your experience as you change and grow. You increasingly become open to the many ways God comes to us and the many ways others have expressed this reality. You discover that, in the words of C.S. Lewis, “God is the great iconoclast.”(A Grief Observed) God keeps breaking up our images of God (for new images) lest we make any one image that in which we place our trust, our security being in God alone.

Filed under: Faith, Grace, Prayer, SpiritualityTagged with: , , , , ,

Listen and Testify

“For this I was born, and for this I came into the world, to testify to the truth. Everyone who belongs to the truth listens to my voice.” (John 18:37)

Jesus testifies to the truth, and those who are committed to the truth listen to what he says. But before Jesus testifies to the truth, he listens to the truth: “I do nothing on my own, but I speak these things as the Father instructed me.” (John 8:28) So Jesus listens and then speaks.

And Jesus is our example for listening and speaking. He is our model for what it means to be truly human as God created us to be. We, like Jesus, are to listen to “the Father.” We are to live from the source of our being. And then we are to testify to what we receive. In a world of lies and deceit, we are to testify to the truth.

Of course, that means that we have to turn from lies and deceit to the truth. Above all, we have to turn from the fundamental lie of our human condition, the lie that denies our creatureliness, that would have us operate as if we were the source of our existence—as if we could come up with our identity apart from God.

Jesus calls us back to reality, to the source of our true selves that is never far away. God is near and the word of truth is near. It is, as Saint Paul reminds us, on our lips and in our hearts, when lips and hearts are surrendered to God, when we worship in spirit and in truth and are open to the Spirit of truth. And “when the Spirit of truth comes, he will guide you into all the truth; for he will not speak on his own, but will speak whatever he hears, and he will declare to you the things that are to come.” (John 16:13) The Spirit guides us into who we are to be and what we are to do.

In a world that is deceived about our essential selves and callings, we are sent to be witnesses. We are to testify to what we hear, we who are growing into listeners of the truth. In this way, we are light in the darkness. It is a high calling, being listeners and testifiers to the truth. It is a calling we receive in Christ. As we are conformed to the one who is the Listener and Testifier, we become listeners and testifiers.

Our world, our society, needs those who receive and declare truth, the truth of being human and being community—the truth that demands the commitment of our whole selves, the commitment to love and have compassion for one another, to live as one humanity in God, sharing in all of creation’s oneness with God.

Our societies and the world need the witness of those who receive the Spirit’s guidance for the situations of our time and for the unfolding future, people who hear what the Spirit is declaring in the present. The world needs to hear something other than that which comes from the political and moral ideologies of our time or from the entrenched ways of a false humanity that operates as if it were its own source of being.

Gracious God, give us eyes to see and ears to hear. And then give us the courage to speak and to act in this time in which we live.

Filed under: Faith, Prayer, Spirit, Truth, WitnessTagged with: , ,

Hope In God

There are times in our lives when we become focused on what truly matters. We gain clarity. We realize that the One we have no control over bears us up. The One who cannot be penned in by our thoughts gives us thoughts and direction and identity.

When that happens, we know it is grace. It is a gift.

Sometimes it happens in the midst of breakdown and low feelings. We have been fighting a battle and losing. We simply do not have it together. We are poor in spirit. Our soul is cast down. And we are anxious about the state we are in. Yet we have moved closer to the reality we need. Our cast down condition is simply our longing for what truly matters, our longing for God.

In the words of Psalm 42:

As a deer longs for flowing streams,
so my soul longs for you, O God.
My soul thirsts for God,
for the living God.
When shall I come and behold
the face of God?

The psalmist asks why his soul is cast down:

Why are you cast down, O my soul,
and why are you disquieted within me?
Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,
my help and my God.

The being-cast-down is our soul knowing it can no longer live off what we have been feeding it. So the thing to do is not to fill that longing with more noise, turning up the volume of our lives, turning to more social media, buying another thing we do not need, finding another relationship—maybe ending the one we have now. Our soul longs for life and is being starved.

We must say to our soul, “Hope in God; for I shall again praise him,
my help and my God.”

In the midst of the numerous voices telling us what to do about our condition, how to solve the problem that is us, how to make things right, how to gain control, we must turn to hope in God. In the midst of the turmoil of voices in our body politic, in the midst of voices of anger, fearful voices; in the midst of voices of racism and fear of the other, of the refugee; in the midst of voices of greed and arrogance and war talk, we must hope in God, listening again for the “still small voice.” Otherwise, these voices, finding a hook in our fears and prejudices and controlling ways, will lead us into the darkness. Or we will react to these voices with fear and anger, without taking the action that brings light and change.

Turn from these other voices and claims upon our lives; wait and listen. Hope in God, for we shall again praise him, our help and our God.

“As a deer longs for flowing streams, so my soul longs for you, O God.”

Filed under: Faith, Prayer

Witness From Silence

We live in a time where there are mass migrations because of war, economic breakdown, and famine. Globally and in this nation, there has been growing economic inequality. Racism has been virulent and violent. Anti-immigrant sentiment has grown at a time when the needs of refugees have become desperate. Those who Scripture calls “children of light” must give witness in this global darkness. So, what makes that witness possible?

When we feel the darkness gathering around us, do as the prophet, Zephaniah, tells us, “Be silent before the Lord God.” When we experience the breakdown in our society, the incivility, the hate and anger, the hurt, be silent before the Lord God. When we experience these things in ourselves, the hurt and sin, the racism, the stinginess, the indifference to the pain of others and the ignoring of the plight of future generations, be silent before the Lord God.

We often have so very much to say. We carry within us, ways of thinking that are rationales for our hidden prejudices, disoriented desires and values, ways of judging others and ideologies formed from selves constructed from a false center. And we speak and act out of that which is within. So the word to us is: “Be silent before the Lord God.”

Before we can be light in the darkness, we have to be still and listen. We have to listen and be changed by what we hear. We have to attend to what is going on within us.

“Be silent before the Lord GOD!” In silence before God, we get in touch with ourselves. Before God, no longer talking, no longer explaining ourselves, we acknowledge our own brokenness, our own false selves. We acknowledge our need. We desperately need God. Only as we live from our source will we truly do justice, love mercy and walk humbly with our God.

In silence before God, we acknowledge that God can do for us what we have been unable to do for ourselves: Liberate us to have compassion and love for others, other others (those very different from ourselves, including those whose ideologies are repugnant to us). Deliver us from people-pleasing ways, so that we speak the truth in love. Free us from fear, so that we speak truth to those in power.

In this present darkness, we must be silent before the Lord God and awake to what is happening around us, so that we might have something to say. Let God reveal to us ourselves and reveal to us the work and witness God calls and empowers us to do. This orientation to the source of our lives does not exclude gaining an understanding of the context and time in which we live but provides spiritual roots to our knowledge.

In the early hours of the morning, or if we are night people, in the late hours, do as Jesus did, take time to pray. Pray out not only our own needs but listen for the still small voice. Reach out for God’s will. Wait on God to speak. In the quietness, surrender our wills to God’s will. Pray, “Your will be done,” and wait. Be awake to hear from God, to be prompted by the Spirit of God. Let God enlighten the eyes of our hearts and give us discernment. Let the Spirit pour out God’s love into our hearts.

Go walk in the woods or along a lake or among the hills and be open and aware, awake to the ways God speaks through God’s creation, speaks without words, through the beauty and delicateness and power. Let God release us from the troubles of our hearts and free us for the action God has prepared for us. God intends for us to be lights in the darkness.

The children of light live from the Light. As children of the day, bear witness in the present darkness. Silent, open, and listening, we become witnesses to what we receive. From silence and listening, justice and mercy pour forth.

Filed under: Faith, Prayer, Witness