"Thoughts and Prayers": The Relationship of Prayer and Action

A Facebook friend posted this picture earlier today. It's a "campaign contribution" from a frustrated constituent to a member of Congress whose only response to yet another school shooting in the United States is "thoughts and prayers."

I too grow frustrated with the seeming unwillingness of Congress to act on a host of important matters.

Inertia born of a corrupted congressional apportionment process, the influence of interest group money, and spinelessness of legislators fearful they won't be re-elected is an ongoing reality in America.

And it's true that public figures send out hollow assurances of "thoughts and prayers" after mass shootings, terrorist acts, and other tragedies.

But I confess to wincing every time I read or hear someone say, "Prayer doesn't solve anything. It's time for action."

Actually, a slew of research done at top universities, including Harvard, shows that prayer, in fact, can solve lots of things. Two books I recommend to skeptics, both written by medical doctors and incorporating findings from rigorous scientific studies, are Healing Words: The Power of Prayer and the Practice of Medicine by Larry Dossey and The Faith Factor: Proof of the Healing Power of Prayer by Dale Matthews and Connie Clark.

These books affirm what has been my experience after forty-two years as a Christian and thirty-three years as a pastor: Prayer can make a difference, both in the lives of those for whom prayer is offered and, importantly, in the lives of those who pray.

But prayer only makes a difference if those who pray do so with an openness to acting on what they pray about, an openness to God inciting them to action.

As a Christian, I'm taught to pray in Jesus' name. For example, Jesus says in John 16:24: "Until now you have not asked for anything in my name. Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete."

But praying in Jesus' name isn't a secret formula. To pray in Jesus' name must mean several things:

• It means that I acknowledge that I can only approach God the Father through Jesus. God's holiness and perfection are such that I have no right to speak with God except through God the Son, Jesus, Whose death and resurrection for sinners like me tear down the wall between God and all who repent and believe in Christ. Jesus says: “I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." (John 14:6)
• It means that I'm asking God to answer my prayer petitions in ways that are consistent with the character of Jesus and will of God. Jesus teaches His disciples, including those living in 2018, to pray, "Your will be done." And in the garden of Gethsemane where He would be arrested and taken to be condemned and crucified, Jesus, knowing all that awaited Him, prayed, "Father, if you are willing, take this cup [of suffering and death] from me; yet not my will, but yours be done." (Luke 22:42)

Intrinsic to this second element of prayer is the willingness to be called by God to have our own agendas changed, to be called by God to act.

True prayer is surrender. It's something you actually do and something God may use to tell you what to do.

But that happens only if you're really praying. Only if your prayer is an actual conversation with God in which you take the time to listen to what God tells you in His Word, the Bible, and in your spirit as you listen for His still small voice as you pray.

In fact, it's difficult not to suspect that all the sweet-sounding assurances of "thoughts and prayers" are nothing more than idle words, like saying, "I'll be there in spirit." As Pastor Rick Warren points out, people who say that they'll be somewhere in spirit are really saying, "I won't be there," no matter how high-minded they may want to sound.

The capacity of prayer in Jesus' name to result in action struck me again today during my quiet time with God. The list of daily Bible readings I use appointed Acts 16-18. As always, I asked God to show me the truth He wanted me to see as I read the Bible. I was struck by these verses from Acts 16:

Paul and his companions traveled throughout the region of Phrygia and Galatia, having been kept by the Holy Spirit from preaching the word in the province of Asia. When they came to the border of Mysia, they tried to enter Bithynia, but the Spirit of Jesus would not allow them to. So they passed by Mysia and went down to Troas. During the night Paul had a vision of a man of Macedonia standing and begging him, “Come over to Macedonia and help us.” After Paul had seen the vision, we got ready at once to leave for Macedonia, concluding that God had called us to preach the gospel to them. (Acts 16:6-10)

The apostle Paul and his ministry team were dialed into God through their reading of God's Word in the Old Testament (the New Testament didn't yet exist), their relationship with God through the risen Jesus, and their times in prayer in Jesus' name.

These verses tell us that at first, they felt prevented from taking the good news of new life for all who repent and believe in Jesus into Asia (by which the New Testament writers meant Asia Minor, which is now largely composed of Turkey). They were prevented not by soldiers, but by God. It wasn't time for them to go into Asia yet. How did they know not to act? Because God impressed that view on them as they read God's Word and prayed.

Once again, the "Spirit of Jesus" prevented them going into Bithynia.

But that night, in a dream, God seemed to tell Paul that he and his team were to go to Macedonia.

When Paul shared his vision with the others, they all appear to agree that this was what God wanted them to do.

In other words, when Paul and the others prayerfully lived in community with God through Christ, they were given their marching orders. Action was born in humble prayer.

Prayer is not the opposite of action. Prayer is useful action's motive force.

When we act without a vibrant prayer relationship with God through Christ, our action is futile.

When we fail to act after we've prayed and God has impressed us with the action we need to take, the fault is not with God or prayer, but with us.

So, of course, we should be praying for the victims of gun violence.

But we should also pray asking God what it is He would have us to do in the face of this scourge on our country. And then, for the sake of Christ and all for whom He died and rose, we should act.

[This photograph was taken by Joel Auerbach of the Associated Press. If it's a copyright infringement for me to use it here, I ask to be notified and I will take it down. It is a powerful symbol of the ongoing tragedy of school shootings in America.]

[I'm the pastor of Living Water Lutheran Church in Centerville, Ohio.]

How You Can Keep Anger from Controlling Your Life

Anger isn't always wrong. This is important for Christians to know.

But, as a way of life, it's destructive to our health and to our relationships with others. Proverbs 29:22 says, "One given to anger stirs up strife, and the hothead causes much transgression."

It's no doubt because of the destructiveness of anger that Ephesians 4:26-27 says, "Be angry but do not sin; do not let the sun go down on your anger and do not make room for the devil." In other words, get your anger with others resolved or give up the anger. Unresolved anger turns into hate, which is a synonym for "grudge."

We should also shy away from associating with constantly angry people. In Proverbs 22:24, a passage cited by Pastor Rick Warren on Twitter this evening, we're told, "Make no friends with those given to anger, and do not associate with hotheads."

I think that this is even good Biblical advice to us when considering whether to watch, listen to, or read angry political pundits. Stay away from them as readily as you would stay away from constantly angry people in daily life. Associate long with such people and you become an angry person too: After all, computers aren't the only thinking machines for which it's true to say, "Garbage in, garbage out."

Pray for chronically angry people, asking God to give them new attitudes.

Treat them with love and respect.

But don't associate with them.

So, what if you find yourself drifting into a chronic attitude of angry hatefulness toward other people or toward life?

The nineteenth century geologist and Christian evangelist Henry Drummond wrote a remarkable booklet about love called The Greatest Thing in the World, and said that when we find an angry temper gaining a foothold in our lives:

...it is not enough to deal with the [outward expressions of anger]. We must go to the source and change the inmost nature, and the angry humors will die away themselves. Souls are made sweet not by taking the acid fluids out but by putting something in--a great new love, a new spirit, the Spirit of Christ...The Spirit of Christ interpenetrating our spirit, sweetens, purifies, transforms all. This only can eradicate what is wrong, work a chemical change, renovate, reinvigorate, and rehabilitate the inner [person]. Will power does not change [people]. Christ does.

He goes on to quote the prescription found in Philipians 2:5: "Let the same mind be in you that was in Christ Jesus..."

When anger threatens to take center stage in our own characters, we must ask God to get rid of the "I-Me-Mine" thinking that causes us to adopt anger and hatred as our default position and to instead replace it with with Jesus-thinking. (Philippians 2:5-11 explains what Jesus-thinking is like.)

If you'll be patient in praying that, enforcing it by daily reading God's Word and by getting involved in a local church where you can undertake acts of kindness in Jesus' Name and pray, worship, and study with other believers, anger will be put in its proper perspective in your life.

The Spirit of Christ will displace your anger and Jesus will take first place in your life, where He belongs.

A Church That Doesn't Do Funerals?

I agree with Rick Warren, the pastor of a megachurch in Orange County, California, that "the church that doesn't want to grow is telling people to go to hell."

We have a commission from Christ to "make disciples," helping others to know and follow Jesus into eternity with us. Depending on what the Holy Spirit does in the hearts and wills of those with whom we share Jesus (and a lot of other factors we may never know about), obeying Jesus' commission may bring numerical growth to our individual congregations. And it would be foolish and faithless for congregations to turn away people just because they didn't want the hassle or the grief of growth.

That's why I've never been among those Christians who disdain  megachurches just for being big. That's silly! (As silly as those who attend big churches who disdain smaller churches.)

But, according to one blogger, Richard Hunter, at least one megachurch is more mega than it is church. He writes:

Last week my nephew was in a motorcycle accident that left him brain-dead. My brother and his family had been attending a mega-church known for large, inspiring worship services, great music and autonomy for attendees. The family contacted the church to ask a pastor to come and plan a funeral with them. The church office replied that they did not do weddings and funerals...

I was particularly shocked to learn of a church that refuses to do funerals!

Death is where the rubber hits the road for Christian faith. If our proclamation that Jesus Christ has conquered sin and death and offers resurrection victory to all who repent for sin and believe in Christ isn't true when believers die, then it isn't true.

The truth that Jesus is Lord and is risen from the dead and the comfort it brings needs to be remembered and shared with family members and friends when death hits. The Church, in fact, is never more the Church than it is at funerals in which Christ is confidently and lovingly proclaimed!

Churches that pass on the chance to share the Gospel--the Good News--of Jesus Christ during a funeral are missing out on a tremendous opportunity to be Christ's open arms of love to people who need Christ.

Frankly, I wonder if a church that refuses to do weddings or funerals is really a church any longer. Isn't it just more of an arena where preaching and performances happen than it is a church body in which "if one member suffers, all suffer together...if one member is honored, all rejoice together..." (1 Corinthians 12:25)?

I hope that the no-weddings-or-funerals policy isn't widespread among megachurches.

As it turns out, the funeral for Hunter's nephew happened at the Methodist church of which his brother's family had been members for fifteen years. Two pastors from the Methodist congregation worked with the family in planning for the funeral and brought comfort to the grieving. Hunter writes:

Next time you are tempted to give up your local church and go get lost in one of the mega-churches, remember that one day you will need a personal touch...

Read the whole thing.

Changing Relationships for the Better

So practical...and, from my experience, so true.

Getting to love obscurity...so that you can live with purpose

My colleague, Pastor Glen VanderKloot of Faith Lutheran Church in Springfield, Illinois, sends out daily emailed inspirations. Today's is a gem, especially for those of us who may, at times too crave the limelight, which I suppose is all of us, at different times and in different ways. It all reminds me of the opening words of Rick Warren's book, The Purpose-Driven Life: "It's not about you." The more fully we absorb the truth of that statement, the more likely that God can really use us to bring life and hope to the world. Here's today's edition of OnLine with Faith:

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

 A THOUGHT FOR THE DAY

God only really uses me when I am little in my own eyes
and really humble at His feet.

The fact is, when a man gets to the place where he
really loves obscurity, where he does not care to preach,
and where he would rather sit in the back seat than on
the platform, then God can lift him up and use him,
and not very much before.

    Frank Bartleman quoted in The Fire that Could Not Die
   
Scripture 
James 4:10  New Century Version

Humble yourself in the Lord's presence,
and he will honor you.


Prayer
Lord,  help me to be willing to take a back seat,
and humble myself in your presence.  Amen
   
*************************************************

Clarification: About Rick Warren

When it was announced that Rick Warren had been chosen to give the invocation at Barack Obama's presidential inauguration ceremonies on January 20, my first reaction was disappointment. My first pick was a colleague, admittedly a fantasy choice, but one based on the fact that he had prayed at a major Obama event before.

But I mentioned in that post that I liked Rick Warren.

In the intervening days, it's become clear that a lot of people don't like Rick Warren and for many different reasons.

I disagree with Warren on some things.

But for the past twenty years, I've been able to be a fan of Warren without being a fan of everything he says or does. Why?

1. He's a shrewd, insightful analyst of culture and human nature. Back in the early 90s, I listened to many of his sermons on tape. Theologically, there are often things I wish weren't missing in Warren's preaching; but there's also a lot of substance.

2. He's a brilliant communicator. Like the best communicators, Warren has an enviable capacity for distilling big ideas and truths in memorable phrases.

3. He's a fabulous leader. Warren understands the art and science of leadership.

Part of that can be attributed, probably, to the example he had in a father who was a pastor. Because pastors can't coerce those they lead, they, along with other not-for-profit sector leaders, are called upon to exercise leadership in its purest form. They must lead through persuasion and influence, hopefully undergirded by guidance sought from God through prayer. Pastors who try to coerce never amount to much as leaders. On the other hand, pastors who refuse to lead end up in the same boat. Warren no doubt observed both good and bad examples of leadership in his dad.

On top of that, Warren has been a student of leadership. One of his tutors, for example, was the leadership guru, the late Peter Drucker.

I've learned a lot about leadership from Warren. His monthly "Leadership Lifters" audiotapes back in the 90s, brought greater clarity to my thinking as a leader. Leaders in all fields would benefit from what Warren shared in them.

4. He understands the function, the purpose, of the Church. As the body of Jesus Christ in the world, the Church, especially the individual congregation, is commissioned to "make disciples" for Christ. The word disciple means student or follower. Belief in Christ isn't meant to be a stagnant, dusty idea stowed away in our brains, like a poem memorized for an elementary school play. The follower of Christ is meant to be a lifelong student of the Christ-way of life, following Christ to discover new ways to love God, love neighbor, share Christ with others, serve others in Jesus' Name, and to personally continue growing in our relationship with the God.

Warren explains this as well as anyone and has done so most memorably in two major books: The Purpose Driven Church (1995), in which he outlined a strategy by which churches can help people in the process of growing as disciples, and The Purpose Driven Life (2002), where he helps people answer, from a Christian perspective, what our purpose for living is.

As a Lutheran Christian, I have problems with some of what Warren has to say in these books. I don't think that we're driven, for one thing. I believe that we're called by a God Who, through the Holy Spirit, woos us, persuades us. This same God also frees us from the monkeys on our backs that often drive us. The Christian is liberated from the demands of sinful world in order to live as truly human beings.

I also, not surprisingly, disagree with Warren when it comes to his understanding of baptism. He sees it as a rite in which persons who have reached "the age of accountability" make a public commitment to follow Christ. Such commitments are great, of course; we Lutherans do the same thing in the Affirmation of Baptism (Confirmation, which usually happens around age 14) and in our weekly invitations to worshipers to confess their faith in such formulas as the Apostles' Creed and the Nicene Creed. But, I believe, these are only our responses to what Christ has already done for us, first from cross and empty tomb and secondly, in Baptism, which is God's act of claiming us as children of God. That's why we Lutherans--and most Christians in the world--present infants for Baptism. It isn't that children can't turn away from God or the covenant of Baptism. They do and God gives that freedom to the baptized. But God will never renege on the claim He made on us in the waters of Baptism.

Yet, I find more that I agree with in Warren's writings on discipleship than I find disagreeable. That's why in my former parish, we became involved in reading and digging into The Purpose Driven Life as a congregation.

5. Warren has done much good to combat poverty and AIDs around the world. His work in Africa shames those who like to talk about combating injustice and promoting peace. Warren has been engaged in those tough, demanding pursuits.

There are also other areas in which I disagree with Warren. I won't go into those here.

I think that President-elect Obama was right when, in defending his decision to invite Warren to give the invocation at the Inauguration:

"We're not going to agree on every single issue, but what we have to do is be able to create an atmosphere where we can disagree without being disagreeable, and then focus on those things that we hold in common."

Those who portray Warren as a demon for his positions on homosexuality or a sellout for praying for the new president in January aren't paying attention to the whole person. His positions--theological and political--aren't driven by hatred. Nor, in being part of the Obama inauguration, is he endorsing abortion as a form of birth control.

His critics could learn a little tolerance.

I was actually pulling for my buddy, Glen VanderKloot...

But Rick Warren will give the Invocation at Barack Obama's presidential inauguration. VanderKloot, the inspiring, humble, intelligent pastor of Faith Lutheran Church in Springfield, Illinois, whose daily emailed inspirations I often share with readers of my blog, gave the invocation at the big rally with Obama and his then-newly announced running mate, Joe Biden, held at the old Illinois State House on the Saturday before the Democratic National Convention. I had hoped that Mr. Obama would ask Pastor VanderKloot to perform the same duties on January 20. But I like Warren, too.