He was praying in a certain place, and after he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, „Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.“<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a02<\/sup> He said to them, „When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a03<\/sup> Give us each day our daily bread.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a04<\/sup> And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us. And do not bring us to the time of trial.“<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a05<\/sup> And he said to them, „Suppose one of you has a friend, and you go to him at midnight and say to him, ‚Friend, lend me three loaves of bread;<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a06<\/sup> for a friend of mine has arrived, and I have nothing to set before him.‘<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a07<\/sup> And he answers from within, ‚Do not bother me; the door has already been locked, and my children are with me in bed; I cannot get up and give you anything.‘<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a08<\/sup> I tell you, even though he will not get up and give him anything because he is his friend, at least because of his persistence he will get up and give him whatever he needs.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a09<\/sup> „So I say to you, Ask, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a010<\/sup> For everyone who asks receives, and everyone who searches finds, and for everyone who knocks, the door will be opened.<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a011<\/sup> Is there anyone among you who, if your child asks for a fish, will give a snake instead of a fish?<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a012<\/sup> Or if the child asks for an egg, will give a scorpion?<\/em><\/p>\n \u00a013<\/sup> If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will the heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask him!“ <\/em>(Luk 11:1-13 NRSV)<\/p>\n Brothers and sisters in Christ, grace and peace to you from God the Father and our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Amen.<\/p>\n A few weeks ago, we heard as our second reading the beginning of the letter to the church at Colossae.\u00a0\u00a0 The author of that letter wrote: \u201cIn our prayers for you we always thank God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.\u201d(Colossians 1:3)\u00a0 Again it is written: \u201cWe have not ceased praying for you and asking that you may be filled with the knowledge of God\u2019s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding.\u201d (Colossians 1:9)\u00a0 We all know that prayer is a central part of our life together with God.\u00a0 It is a central pillar of our faith, and something we do on a daily basis as we walk with God.\u00a0 In our Gospel today, we hear the disciples tell Jesus \u201cLord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.\u201d\u00a0 What follows is Luke\u2019s version of what we now call The Lord\u2019s Prayer.\u00a0 But their request brings about some interesting things to ponder.\u00a0 Is there a wrong way to pray?\u00a0 Is there a correct way to pray?\u00a0 And most of all\u2026what is God\u2019s role in prayer?<\/p>\n On those first questions\u2026is there a wrong way to pray?\u00a0 To quote my seminary professor who taught us Greek:\u00a0 \u201cYes, but no.\u201d\u00a0 When we pray, we believe that God is always open to hear us.\u00a0 We believe that the Spirit intercedes for us and carries our prayers to the waiting ears of God.\u00a0 There truly is nothing we can\u2019t say to God.\u00a0 However, we don\u2019t pray to God in a way that is contrary to our faith.\u00a0 We don\u2019t pray to a female deity, or take the Lord\u2019s name in vain, or curse God.\u00a0 Do some people do that?\u00a0 Surely so, but it isn\u2019t right.\u00a0 Our faith tells us it isn\u2019t right.\u00a0 And therefore it isn\u2019t something we do.\u00a0 We have enough problems in our lives simply because we are sinners.\u00a0 We don\u2019t need to add to it on purpose.\u00a0 Instead, we have this example from Jesus that begins with a reminder that God and his name are holy.\u00a0 Holiness means set apart, above any of us, and therefore holiness demands our respect.\u00a0 This is how we pray.\u00a0 This is how Jesus taught the disciples, the very people that walked with him in ministry for several years.\u00a0 If we begin prayer in the realm of holiness, there is no wrong way to pray to God.\u00a0 A prayer began in holiness is a prayer that joins the prayers of the church and the saints in light.\u00a0 It is a prayer that puts our selfishness and sinfulness aside because it is an acknowledgement that God and God alone has the answer for what we pray for.<\/p>\n The answer to prayer is God\u2019s role\u2026but it may not be an \u201canswer\u201d as we expect.\u00a0 We can pray to God that we would win the lottery, heal some disease that doctors can\u2019t cure, or grant that war and bad stuff doesn\u2019t happen.\u00a0 We know that these kinds of prayer don\u2019t always come with the answers we want.\u00a0 We have to discern if the prayer we are asking is a prayer grounded in holiness.\u00a0 The answer we seek may eventually come, and it may not be in the way we want or expect.\u00a0 That too is how we wrestle with our faith and our interactions with God.\u00a0 However, a prayer wrapped in holiness is a prayer where we can and do ask that God be present in those situations and to send his Spirit to be in those situations.\u00a0 This is the type of prayer that Jesus seems to say that God wants from us.\u00a0 Jesus says \u201cAsk, and it will be given you; search, and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.\u201d\u00a0 (Luke 11:9) Jesus says that after teaching that prayer begins with holiness.\u00a0 We know God wants us to be in conversation with him through prayer.\u00a0 He wants us to come to him as children come to their Father.\u00a0 And when we do, we know that it is a conversation that is holy.\u00a0 A prayer that is Spirit filled and carried to the Father.\u00a0 God\u2019s role in prayer is hearing us and answering us in a way that only God can do.\u00a0 This is why prayer is holy and powerful.\u00a0 This is why we have faith in prayer and in God.\u00a0 It is why prayer is so important to the church, and to us as Christians.\u00a0 Like the author of Colossians, may we not cease praying for the knowledge of God\u2019s will in all spiritual wisdom and understanding as we go forward in life.\u00a0 For we know that God is listening, eager to be in relationship with us all the days of our life.\u00a0 In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit.\u00a0 Amen.<\/p>\n The Rev. Dr. Judson F Merrell, STS<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Pentecost 7C | July 24, 2022 | Luke 11:1-13 | Judson F Merrell | He was praying in a certain place, and after he had finished, one of his disciples said to him, „Lord, teach us to pray, as John taught his disciples.“ \u00a02 He said to them, „When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":12514,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[38,157,853,108,110,235,607,3,109],"tags":[],"beitragende":[],"predigtform":[],"predigtreihe":[],"bibelstelle":[],"class_list":["post-12509","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-lukas","category-beitragende","category-bibel","category-current","category-engl","category-judson-f-merrell","category-kapitel-11-chapter-11-lukas","category-nt","category-predigten"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12509","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=12509"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12509\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12515,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12509\/revisions\/12515"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12514"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12509"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12509"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12509"},{"taxonomy":"beitragende","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/beitragende?post=12509"},{"taxonomy":"predigtform","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtform?post=12509"},{"taxonomy":"predigtreihe","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/predigtreihe?post=12509"},{"taxonomy":"bibelstelle","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theologie.uzh.ch\/apps\/gpi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/bibelstelle?post=12509"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\n