Prayer

Yes, pastors have trouble praying, too. Sometimes I feel very connected to God and sometimes I wonder if he is listening (or even cares). I struggle with doubts and wonder “why bother?” when it comes to prayer, just as I suspect many of you do. Sometimes my prayer life is vibrant and alive and sometimes it feels like I just go through the motions.

What do I do when I have trouble praying? I go back to the tried and true and pray the Lord’s Prayer and the Psalms. I take great comfort of the words of St. Paul in Romans: “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. And he who searches hearts knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.” (Romans 8:26-27)
So, even when I have trouble praying or don’t feel like praying, the Holy Spirit is there to guide me and even offer up prayers on my behalf, and a prayer like the Lord’s Prayer helps move me out of my prayer doldrums and back on course. In fact, in my prayers today I cam across this wonderful meditation by an anonymous author:

I cannot pray Our, if my faith has no room for others and their need.
I cannot pray Father, if I do not demonstrate this relationship to God in my daily living.
I cannot pray who art in heaven, if all of my interests and pursuits are in earthly things.
I cannot pray hallowed be thy name, if I am not striving, with God’s help, to be holy.
I cannot pray thy kingdom come, if I am unwilling to accept God’s rule in my life.
I cannot pray thy will be done, if I am unwilling or resentful of having it in my life.
I cannot pray on earth as it is in Heaven, unless I am truly ready to give myself to God’s service here and now.
I cannot pray give us this day our daily bread, without expending honest effort for it, or if I would withhold from my neighbor the bread that I receive.
I cannot pray forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us, if I continue to harbor a grudge against anyone.
I cannot pray lead us not into temptation, if I deliberately choose to remain in a situation where I am likely to be tempted.
I cannot pray deliver us from evil, if I am not prepared to fight evil with my life and my prayer.
I cannot pray thine is the kingdom, if I am unwilling to obey the King.
I cannot pray thine is the power and the glory, if I am seeking power for myself and my own glory first.
I cannot pray forever and ever, if I am too anxious about each day’s affairs.
I cannot pray Amen, unless I honestly say, “Cost what it may, this is my prayer.”

So, keep on praying, even if you don’t feel like it. The Spirit will help you.

Ascension

An acquaintance introduced me to a new poem (new for me) from J.R.R. Tolkien, entitled Mythopoeia, part of which appears below. Thanks be to the Ascended one that brings us to the Blessed Land. May all our stories, myths, and legends point us to the Truth.



Blessed are the timid hearts that evil hate,

that quail in its shadow, and yet shut the gate;

that seek no parley, and in guarded room,

through small and bare, upon a clumsy loom

weave rissues gilded by the far-off day

hoped and believed in under Shadow's sway.



Blessed are the men of Noah's race that build

their little arks, though frail and poorly filled,

and steer through winds contrary towards a wraith,

a rumour of a harbour guessed by faith.



I would that I might with the minstrels sing

and stir the unseen with a throbbing string.

I would be with the mariners of the deep

that cut their slender planks on mountains steep

and voyage upon a vague and wandering quest,

for some have passed beyond the fabled West.

I would with the beleaguered fools be told,

that keep an inner fastness where their gold,

impure and scanty, yet they loyally bring

to mint in image blurred of distant king,

or in fantastic banners weave the sheen

heraldic emblems of a lord unseen....




In Paradise perchance the eye may stray

from gazing upon everlasting Day

to see the day-illumined, and renew

from mirrored truth the likeness of the True.

Then looking on the Blessed Land 'twill see

that all is as it is, and yet may free:

Salvation changes not, nor yet destroys,

garden not gardener, children not their toys.

Evil it will not see, for evil lies

not in God's picture but in crooked eyes,

not in the source but in the tuneless voice.

In Paradise they look no more awry;

and though they make anew, they make no lie.

Be sure they still will make, not been dead,

and poets shall have flames upon their head,

and harps whereon their faultless fingers fall:

there each shall choose for ever from the All.

Barbarians in the Gates

I came across an interesting, and ultimately sad, article. I spend the vast majority of my time trying to figure out how to attract folks to our place of business (the church). I never thought of Bach, the "Fifth Evangelist", in this context. It's a crazy mixed-up world we live in.



Theodore Dalrymple
When Hooligans Bach Down
Strike up Johann Sebastian and watch them scatter.
29 January 2009

Staying recently in a South Yorkshire town called Rotherham—described in one guidebook as “murky,” an inadequate word for the place—I was interested to read in the local newspaper how the proprietors of some stores are preventing hooligans from gathering outside to intimidate and rob customers. They play Bach over loudspeakers, and this disperses the youths in short order; they flee the way Count Dracula fled before holy water, garlic flowers, and crucifixes. The proprietors had previously tried a high-pitched noise generator whose mosquito-like whine only those younger than 20 could detect. This method, too, proved effective, but the owners abandoned it out of fear that it might damage the youths’ hearing and infringe upon their human rights, leading to claims for compensation.

There is surely something deeply emblematic about the use of one of the great glories of Western civilization, the music of Bach, to prevent the young inheritors of that civilization from committing crimes. The barbarians are well and truly within the gates. However, in these dark times it is best to look on the bright side. Our prime minister, Gordon Brown, has told us that we must expect crime to rise along with unemployment (which has already reached more than 13 percent of the labor force, if one takes into account those whom the government dishonestly counts as sick). If proprietors all over the country follow Rotherham’s lead, therefore, we may hear much more Bach, and less rock music, than we did previously. Hegel was right when he said that the owl of Minerva flies by night....

Happy Eastertide!

Wow. How do those daily bloggers do it?! I guess if one is a good writer it isn't difficult to post witty, thoughtful, interesting things. But, since I'm none of those things, I'll just wish you a Happy Easter and try to write more than once a quarter. :-)

Happy New Year?

I suppose I can still wish good will and blessings for the New Year, even though we are 17 days into it already!

I do pray that this year brings all of us happiness and peace.

Goof King Wenceslas Looked Out On the Feast of Stephen

St. Stephen, Deacon and Martyr
26 December

All that we know about Stephen the martyr is found in chapters 6 and 7 of the Book of Acts.

The early Christian congregations, like the Jewish synagogues, had a program of assistance for needy widows, and some of the Greek-speaking Jews in the Jerusalem congregation complained that their widows were being neglected. The apostles replied: "We cannot both preach and administer financial matters. Choose seven men from among yourselves, respected, Spirit-filled, and of sound judgement, and let them be in charge of the accounts, and we will devote ourselves to prayer and the ministry of the word." The people accordingly chose seven men, including Stephen, and the apostles laid their hands on them. They are traditionally considered to be the first deacons, although the Scriptures do not use the word to describe them. (The Scriptures do refer to officials called deacons in the local congregations, without being very specific about their duties; and a century or more later, we find the organized charities of each local congregation in the hands of its deacons.)

Stephen was an eloquent and fiery speaker, and a provocative one. His blunt declarations that the Temple service was no longer the means by which penitent sinners should seek reconciliation with God enraged the Temple leaders, who caused him to be stoned to death. As he died, he said, "Lord, do not hold this sin against them." One of those who saw the stoning and approved of it was Saul (or Paul) of Tarsus, who took an active part in the general persecution of Christians that followed the death of Stephen, but who was later led to become a Christian himself.

We remember Stephen on December 26, the day after Christmas. Hence the song

Good King Wenceslas looked out
On the feast of Stephen

describes an action of the king on the day after Christmas Day. The tune used with this song is older than the words and was previously used with a hymn often sung on the feasts of Stephen and other martyrs. It begins:
Christian friends, your voices raise.
Wake the day with gladness.
God himself to joy and praise
turns our human sadness:
Joy that martyrs won their crown,
opened heaven's bright portal,
when they laid the mortal down
for the life immortal.

Prayer

We give thee thanks, O Lord of glory, for the example of the first martyr Stephen, who looked up to heaven and prayed for his persecutors to thy Son Jesus Christ, who standeth at thy right hand: where he liveth and reigneth with thee and the Holy Spirit, one God, in glory everlasting.

Excerpts from a Christmas Sermon by Martin Luther

. ...behold how very ordinary and common things are to us that transpire on earth, and yet how high they are regarded in heaven. On earth it occurs in this wise: Here is a poor young woman, Mary of Nazareth, not highly esteemed, but of the humblest citizens of the village. No one is conscious of the great wonder she bears, she is silent, keeps her own counsel, and regards herself as the lowliest in the town. She starts out with her husband Joseph; very likely they had no servant, and he had to do the work of master and servant, and she that of mistress and maid, They were therefore obliged to leave their home unoccupied, or commend it to the care of others.

Now they evidently owned an ass, upon which Mary rode, although the Gospel does not mention it, and it is possible that she went on foot with Joseph. Imagine how she was despised at the inns and stopping places on the way, although worthy to ride in state in a chariot of gold.

There were, no doubt, many wives and daughters of prominent men at that time, who lived in fine apartments and great splendor, while the mother of God takes a journey in mid-winter under most trying circumstances. What distinctions there are in the world! It was more than a day's journey from Nazareth in Galilee to Bethlehem in the land of Judea. They had to journey either by or through Jerusalem, for Bethlehem is south of Jerusalem while Nazareth is north.

The Evangelist shows how, when they arrived at Bethlehem, they were the most insignificant and despised, so that they had to make way for others until they were obliged to take refuge in a stable, to share with the cattle, lodging, table, bedchamber and bed, while many a wicked man sat at the head in the hotels and was honored as lord. No one noticed or was conscious of what God was doing in that stable. He lets the large houses and costly apartments remain empty, lets their inhabitants eat, drink and be merry; but this comfort and treasure are hidden from them. 0 what a dark night this was for Bethlehem, that was not conscious of that glorious light! See how God shows that he utterly disregards what the world is, has or desires; and furthermore, that the world shows how little it knows or notices what God is, has and does.

See, this is the first picture with which Christ puts the world to shame and exposes all it does and knows. It shows that the world's greatest wisdom is foolishness, her best actions are wrong and her greatest treasures are misfortunes.