STILL PRAYING AFTER ALL THESE YEARS

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“He’s Still Praying After All These Years” Easter 7/A/05-08-05 John 17:1-11, 20 (The “High Priestly Prayer” of Jesus) “Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name – the name which you gave me –so that they may be one, even as we are one…My prayer is not for them alone. I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them may be one…” vs. 11, 20 The story goes that Clint and Ebb, two central Texas farmers and life-long Baptists, are sitting on Clint’s front porch one afternoon, kicking back, talking about everything and about nothing. Next to Clint’s house is a Lutheran Church. The Lutheran’s are having a special worship service. As the music of the liturgy wafts over him, Clint wonders if this is the right time to finally confess his long-held admiration for Lutheran worship and the darker secret of his desire to leave the Baptist Church and join them. He loved the formality of the Lutherans – the vestments worn by the pastors and worship assistants; the chanting; the liturgy – those ancient words that haven’t changed significantly in hundreds of years despite the demise of the King James English and feminism. “This is the Feast of victory for our God …” the Lutherans sing, and Clint’s heart soars. Is it time to come clean? Is it safe to tell Ebb? Will he be sympathetic? Meanwhile, Ebb, totally oblivious to the Lutherans, is engrossed in the orchestra of grasshopper sounds ...

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• Publié par: Vawyor
• Nombre de lectures: 30
• Langue: English

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“He’s Still Praying After All These Years”

Easter 7/A/05-08-05

John 17:1-11, 20

(The “High Priestly Prayer” of Jesus)

“Holy Father, protect them by the power of your name – the name which you gave

me –so that they may be one, even as we are one…My prayer is not for them alone.

I pray also for those who will believe in me through their message, that all of them

may be one…”

vs. 11, 20

The story goes that Clint and Ebb, two central Texas farmers and life-long

Baptists, are sitting on Clint’s front porch one afternoon, kicking back, talking

about everything and about nothing. Next to Clint’s house is a Lutheran Church.

The Lutheran’s are having a special worship service.

As the music of the liturgy

wafts over him, Clint wonders if this is the right time to finally confess his long-

held admiration for Lutheran worship and the darker secret of his desire to leave

the Baptist Church and join them. He loved the formality of the Lutherans – the

vestments worn by the pastors and worship assistants; the chanting; the liturgy –

those ancient words that haven’t changed significantly in hundreds of years despite

the demise of the King James English and feminism.

“This is the Feast of victory

for our God …”

the Lutherans sing, and Clint’s heart soars. Is it time to come

clean? Is it safe to tell Ebb? Will he be sympathetic?

Meanwhile, Ebb, totally oblivious to the Lutherans, is engrossed in the orchestra of

grasshopper sounds coming from the cornfield on the opposite side of the house.

“Isn’t that just about the most beautiful sound you’ve ever heard?” Ebb asks.

Clint’s heart leaps – maybe this

is

the time.

“To tell you the truth, I’ve thought so

for a long, long time, Ebb.”

“You know,” Ebb continues, “I’ll bet that’s the music

God listens to – so natural, so pure, so …”

“So exalted,” Clint picks up, “so

absolutely glorious.”

“Yep,” Ebb says, “… and to think they do that just by

rubbing their hind legs together!”

What?

Does it surprise you that someone would actually “lust” after our way of

worshipping?

It does happen you know. There was the guy who visited the old

church on Garfield, (and it will be important to this story that we had in the old

sanctuary those boards with the hymn numbers posted on them.) It was his first

experience with liturgical worship. He left that day, all smiles, telling me, “This

Lutheran “gig” is all right.

You get your exercise (up and down, up and down),

you get a little wine, and you’ve got the lottery numbers posted right up front!”

You wonder sometimes if guys like Clint and Ebb,

any

two or more Christians,

any

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two or more Christian denominations will ever “get on the same sheet of music”

and express the oneness that Jesus prayed for.

It’s not easy to explain, is it – the

great differences and divisions in the Christian family?

It’s not always easy to

explain your own distinctive difference as a Lutheran to someone else, is it?

It

happens frequently that one of you will say to me, “My friend and I were talking

religion. She asked me how Lutherans were different than what she is. I didn’t

know what to say.”

And even if we know what to say, we just don’t want to have

that conversation, do we? It’s more than a little embarrassing that the people of

Jesus Christ are so divided.

Is the answer to get rid of denominations?

Some experts in church growth suggest

removing denominational names from church signage.

Call yourself “Grace

Church” rather than “Grace Lutheran Church”.

To be sure, in our context just

having the name “Lutheran” on our signs will keep a good many cars from turning

into this parking lot.

But “First Church”? Doesn’t do it for me. Sounds a little

presumptuous.

Get rid of denominations?

Well, mainline denominations are doing a pretty good

job of getting rid of themselves. We are all aware that mainline denominations are

rapidly losing members, many of whom are drifting to non-denominational

evangelical churches. William Willoman, Dean of the Duke University Divinity

School, says that the last person to join a mainline denomination did so somewhere

around 1958.

He isn’t suggesting that nobody has joined a mainline church since

then. He is stressing that over the last 40+ years people have not been joining

churches because of denominational labels.

People move from one place to the

next and do not necessarily gravitate to the label they grew up with.

There are lots

of reasons for this, but we don’t need to go into them here.

So, mainline denominations continue to decline and non-denominational,

fundamentalist churches are growing.

And, you can go into just about any major

city, and a number of smaller ones, and find a “mega-church” – no denominational

ties, thousands of members, larger than life leaders. Now, I would argue that these

churches are in fact denominational.

They are typically shaped by the teachings

and writings of their charismatic ministers.

It’s more accurate, I believe, to say

that these churches are small denominations defined by one minister and those who

follow him.

Two reasons given by the experts for why these congregations are on the grow are

particularly interesting to me:

1) Fundamentalism is finally developing a social

conscience. Once faulted, and rightly so, for being overly weighted in emphasis on

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getting people saved and into heaven and almost totally unconcerned for the poor,

we are seeing today a growing commitment among fundamentalists to work on

behalf of the poor in this country and around the world.

2) Fundamentalism has

“quietly abandoned legalisms that absolutely forbade wine drinking, dancing, and

smoking, and replaced the anti-intellectualism that once pervaded these churches

with a reasonable faith and intelligent spokespersons.”

(Tony Campolo,

Speaking My

Mind

, 2004)

I heard Billy Graham once say that it wasn’t real wine Jesus made at the

wedding at Cana, but “the best grape juice ever.”

Then the day came when his

doctor told him to have a little glass of wine at night – it would help him sleep

better – and, miracle of miracles, in his next sermon those six jars were filled with

wine again!

There are some mainline denominational churches that are growing – even some

Lutheran churches!

These tend to be churches that did not stay frozen in methods

and styles of worship and programming that were meaningful in the 1950’s, but

became obsolete when the world turned upside down in the 1960’s. The world has

never been the same since, and these churches understand that and seek to make

the adjustments necessary to speak the ancient truth of the Good News of Jesus

Christ in ways that are meaningful to modern ears.

These churches recognize the

“label dynamic” I spoke of earlier. They understand that in their congregations are

a variety of preferences when it comes to worship music, and they plan worship

accordingly. They have pastors who consistently and aggressively cast a vision for

their mission in their communities and world.

They have preachers who have the

ability to consistently stir people to action and elicit intense commitment. They are

congregations that emphasize transformed lives and do not merely socialize people

into the faith, i.e. they are not merely intent on getting people to understand that

“this is the way Lutherans do things” – you memorize the Apostles’ Creed, you

must drink an average of 2.7 cups of coffee during Sunday School, and you never,

never show up to a church dinner with just one dish – it’s always a main dish

and

a

side dish. They are congregations that understand that the only reason they exist is

to give their life away. Their time, their talent, their, treasure is all is given

sacrificially, after the pattern of their Lord who gave all that he had for them.

Lots of differences! It’s so confusing! And making matters even more confusing:

Welcome to the world of religious controversy!

Any of that around today? The

division over how to respond to homosexual persons in the Church could bring

about schism on a scale that will redefine the structure of American Christianity for

some time to come. Now, don’t despair. It’s not the first time there has been

controversy and division of this scale.

The Church, after all, survived the

invention of anesthesia. There was world wide objection

b

y the Church to its use.

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“Life is supposed to be hard, painful. Heaven is the only remedy.” In time the ban

was lifted, except for women in childbirth – “The Bible says women will have pain

in childbirth. (Genesis 3:16) The Word of the Lord!” Though there were many

Christians who thought it was the end of the world, the Church survived

integration. It has survived the ordination of women.

We will survive this juncture too, because, you see, Jesus is still praying. After all

these years and all these controversies he is still praying. And it is still his Church.

We might not survive in an immediate sense – may not look the same in a year as

we do now. But that will be

our

fault,

our

failure. It will be about our tendency to

demonize each other and to focus on everything but what was important to Jesus.

You know what Jesus said about homosexuality, don’t you?

NOTHING

. But he

did say a whole lot about feeding the hungry and clothing the naked and visiting

the imprisoned.

He did have a lot to say about the sin of self-indulgence, acquiring

all we ever dreamed of and losing our souls in the process.

He did say a lot about

being peacemakers and loving our enemies. He did have a lot to say about self-

righteousness, pointing out the speck of sawdust in someone else’s eye but paying

no attention to the plank in your own.

If you are going to get upset about

something and take a stand, wouldn’t you agree that it would be better to do so

over something that was important to Jesus?

We’ll never get everyone on the same sheet of music. Not in this life. This I

understand completely.

And I understand this:

Church pews are filled with people

who are subjectively aware of their brokenness, their sinfulness, and long for a

message of deliverance, a second chance.

I understand this:

People want a

connectedness with God that transforms them inwardly. I understand this:

When

broken people experience deliverance and a new beginning, when they experience

an inward transformation – they are outwardly energized.

They know their lives

count for something of far greater importance than gratifying the self.

And you

can’t stop their hearts from breaking over all those things that broke Jesus’ heart,

and you can’t hold them back from loving their neighbor in all those practical ways

that Jesus demonstrated.

Pray for us, Jesus. Pray for us until your kingdom comes among us and your will is

done on earth as it is in heaven.

Amen.