Sixth Sunday of Easter – John 16:23b-30

We are all Israelites when it comes to God. We do more grumbling against Him than we do thanking Him. We grumble about our family, our marriage, and our children. We grumble about our congregation, our pastor, and those who sit next to you in the pews. Nothing would get done around here if it wasn’t for me! If only that preacher of ours would do something about all these empty pews! When is that door going to get fixed? When will the church building be cool enough or warm enough! Grumble, grumble, grumble!

Saint James warns us that if we don’t bridle our tongues, we’re going to be in trouble. To grumble is to say to God, “I don’t like the life you have given me. I don’t want all the trials you send me. I want new friends. I want new family. I could do with some new people at church to grouse about.” Grumbling is a symptom of a larger problem: unbelief.

How does God deal with grumbling? He tells the Israelites, “Okay, if you think things are bad now, let’s see you deal with poisonous snakes.” Many Israelites died. Knowing what happened to the Israelites when they grumbled, how is your grumbling these days? Instead of grumbling, take your concerns to the Lord in prayer. He has a ready ear that waits to hear your concerns and answer them according to His gracious will.

Left to our own devices, we would never dare approach God in prayer. We daily sin much and deserve nothing but punishment. So why bother praying? Because Jesus asks us to pray in His name. You are in Christ by virtue of your baptism. All that the Father in heaven has is yours. As a child is not afraid, or should not be afraid, to talk to His Father, you are not afraid to talk to your heavenly Father. Jesus took away every barrier between you and Him in His suffering and death. Why, then, are you so timid? Ask away! The sky’s the limit. You will receive a fair hearing. Jesus prays for you and with you. That is what it means to pray in Christ’s name.

Now that you have no reason to be afraid to pray, for whom or for what could you pray? How about praying for yourself? That’s not an arrogant thing to do. How about praying for strong faith? When it comes to spiritual possessions, God will give whatever you ask…maybe even more than you ask. You could ask for the Word not to be bound but to have free course in this congregation, in your family, and even among your friends and family members who do not believe the Good News of forgiveness and life in Jesus Christ. All those items merely scratch the surface of what you could ask our Father in heaven.

What about earthly possessions? There’s the thing that trips up many people, even those who are fervent in prayer. So often we expect God to give us everything we desire and then some. If we’re bold to ask for spiritual possessions and receive them, then we start getting bold in asking for earthly possessions and expect God to give them to us. We get to the point where we expect God to deliver our petitions in our time and not His time. So we wait. And wait. And wait. Nothing happens. In fact, the opposite might happen. Perhaps even something totally different than what we prayed for could happen.

What happened? God went deaf? No. God has decided to stop listening to us? No. You forgot that when it comes to earthly possessions, you pray as Jesus taught you to pray: Thy will be done. No wonder you grumble against God when you don’t get what you want. Consider Christ’s words in the Sermon on the Mount. Which one of you, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, will give him a serpent? If you then, who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!

When you ask for earthly things, our Father in heaven gives you what you need. That is not necessarily what you want. It will be good for you, but you probably won’t see it that way. That’s what is behind Jesus’ words in the Sermon on the Mount. You often ask for the right thing that is actually the wrong thing. You ask for a stone, but the Father gives you bread. How much better is bread for you than a stone? Why not step outside the church building today, pick up a stone, and try to eat it. Your congregation won’t be paying your dental bill, let alone your physician’s bill to have your stomach pumped.

God the Father has something much better for you than a stone. He has something edible. He has something nourishing. You want something that you think is good. God has something for you far better. Aha! Gotcha, pastor! Suffering is bad for me! I asked God for relief and He gave me more suffering! How do you weasel your way out of that one?

Suffering draws you closer to God. There is a time for everything under heaven. Perhaps this time is your time to suffer. God doesn’t want to push you away. He wants you closer to Him. Times of suffering is when Christians cling to their Lord closer than before. You bear the cross in patience believing that Jesus first bore the cross for you. Your suffering could end at death. Your suffering could end tomorrow. Whenever suffering ends, you have the joy of everlasting life because of Jesus, Who suffered for you.

As Jesus prepares His disciples for His departure to the Father, He promises suffering will be turned into joy. He also promises that the Holy Spirit will convict the world of the message of Jesus Christ. Today Jesus adds that He has overcome the world. What is more, He encourages you to ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full. Covered in Christ’s blood, basking in His righteousness, you have the privilege to carry everything to God in prayer. He’s all ears. He wants to give you so many good things. What more is there to say but Amen. Gift received. Yes. Yes, for Jesus’ sake. Yes, indeed.

Sixth Sunday of Easter – John 16:23b-30

“Come, my soul, with every care,/Jesus loves to answer prayer;/He Himself has bid thee pray,/Therefore will not turn away.” Prayer is a blessed privilege of all children of God. Isaac prayed before Rebekah married him. Hannah prayed for a son, and nine months later along came Samuel. Daniel prayed three times a day. Paul and Silas, bound in jail, prayed and sang hymns.

These days, however, Christians often lack confidence for prayer. Even though our blessed Lord will not turn away from your prayer, you are timid. You throw up all sorts of objections. There are temptations that lure you away from prayer. Yet Jesus bids us to pray in today’s Gospel. He even takes it a step further: Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full. The joy is in the asking, not to mention the receiving.

There is joy in praying because God has commanded us to pray. “Joy” and “command” usually don’t go together. Who has joy in any command? Yet there is joy in prayer because Jesus promises that our prayers are heard. There can be no joy in prayer because of unworthiness. God is King. We are beggars. God is Lord of heaven and earth. We are dust and ashes, returning to dust and ashes when we die. It is better to hole up in a cave rather than seeking His face and pouring out the heart to Him.

Jesus says, Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full. Not only are you allowed to pray, you are also commanded to pray. Again, it’s hard to understand that joy and command go together. It shouldn’t be that hard. A child has something he or she wants to tell you. You tell them to tell you. That’s a command. Please tell me what it is you want to say. You have joy in commanding. The child has joy in telling you, even if what the child says isn’t joyful. At least the child was able to speak without fear of being silenced. The child suppresses unworthiness and pounces upon the opportunity.

If Jesus commanding us one time to pray isn’t enough, consider some other places in Scripture where prayer is commanded. Psalm 50: call upon me in the day of trouble; I will deliver you, and you shall glorify me. Psalm 27: you have said, “Seek my face.” My heart says to you, “Your face, Lord, do I seek.” The Sermon on the Mount: Pray then like this: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name.“ Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you. For everyone who asks receives, and the one who seeks finds, and to the one who knocks it will be opened. Saint Paul tells Saint Timothy: I desire then that in every place the men should pray, lifting holy hands without anger or quarreling. Again and again in His Word God asks us to pray. That gives us courage to pray.

Consider also the sinners, yet saints, who joyfully prayed. David was caught in adultery among other things, but with what joy he prayed. Since his first prayer in Damascus Saint Paul made his prayer with joy, as he tells the Philippian Christians. Command and joy do go together, for in God’s command we find the joy in asking as well as in the hearing.

As important as the command of God is to joyous prayer, there are other reasons to pray with great joy. By nature you are under God’s wrath. Solomon says in Proverbs, If one turns away his ear from hearing the law, even his prayer is an abomination. Yet Christ has reconciled us to God as He departs to His Father. The Father loves those who love Jesus. If the Father is well pleased with His Son, then He is also well pleased with you. You pray with confidence that the Father gives you a fair hearing for Jesus’ sake.

All the more does this give you gladness for prayer. Satan says your sins ought to frighten you to silence. Jesus takes away your sin and gives you His righteousness. You stand before the Father without spot or blemish. Ask away. Don’t be bashful. Pour out your heart to your Father in heaven. His ears are gracious to the voice of supplication.

Consider Abraham’s request that Sodom not be destroyed as God promised. He enters into a knock-down, drag-out negotiation for Sodom. What if there are fifty righteous people there? Will you destroy it? God says, No, I won’t destroy it. How about forty? No. Thirty? No. Twenty? Still no. Okay, how about ten? For the sake of ten I will not destroy it. We might get testy in a negotiation, especially when someone gets as picky as Abraham. Never once does God get angry at Abraham. He loves to hear Abraham ask, especially when it comes to sparing lives.

Consider also the thief on the cross next to Jesus. Unlike Abraham’s reverse auction, the thief has one simple petition: Jesus, remember me when you come into your kingdom. It sounds to our ears like an easy way out of a difficult situation, especially when you are dying. Jesus takes seriously his request. The asking brought the thief joy, for His Savior lay next to him. The answer brought even more joy: Today, you will be with me in paradise. The thief is remembered. There is joy all the way around, for Christ has died and the thief in Christ’s peace-making death.

Despite the command of God to pray, in spite of our blessed sonship with god, we would soon quit praying if we weren’t heard. The Lord will hear. The Lord will answer. He says, Truly, truly, I say to you, whatever you ask of the Father in my name, he will give it to you. Until now you have asked nothing in my name. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

So you ask. Nothing happens. You ask again. Nothing happens. You keep asking, just like Jesus tells you in His Word. Nothing happens. So you quit praying because He wouldn’t hear you. Jesus hears you. He answers you, too. The answer you expect and the answer He gives aren’t necessarily the same thing. Yet the answer you get is the answer you desire.

How can this be? You asked for one thing and got another thing that God says is better for you. Consider what lies at the heart of your asking. A little boy asks his mother for a knife. The boy is not afraid to ask for something that mom knows is going to hurt him and perhaps someone else. So the boy doesn’t get the knife. What the boy gets instead is what he actually wanted: something to play. The intent of his heart is to play. The knife would be the instrument of play. So mom makes sure he doesn’t get the instrument, but he does get the joy of playing. Perhaps mom is nice enough to buy him something better than a knife.

Put anything else there besides a knife. You have joy in asking. Jesus has joy in hearing and answering. The answer you get may make you pout for a moment. Yet the answer you get is your heart’s desire. You pray for healing on behalf of someone. The person is healed…by death. You’re angry about the death. You’ll soon be glad that suffering is over. You’ll also soon see that death is swallowed up in Christ’s victory over death and sin. No matter what you ask, He will give it to you. You might not get exactly what you asked, but you will receive something that will gladden your heart.

Our Lord commands prayer. He is gracious to you in Christ in both the hearing and the answering. You pray in faith that what you pray will be heard. Nothing is too big or too heavy. He is not too small or too meager that He can’t hear you or give you what you desire. Come, dear Christian. Come before the Father’s throne of grace with confidence because of Jesus. Ask for all your earthly and spiritual needs. The Father is all ears and full of grace. There’s joy in both the asking and in the receiving. Ask, and you will receive, that your joy may be full.

Public Prayers Belong to the Church’s Witness

The demands of serving a public responsibility, for example in worship leadership, will not allow us to display our prejudices or opinions in the public prayers of the church. Personal opinion and witness is altogether fitting and proper in the context of the sermon – provided it still remains within the rubric…of belonging to the church’s witness….

In the public prayers of the liturgy the mood is much more discreet, much more unassuming and restrained. The prayers you pray aloud as worship leader are to be endorsed and appropriated by all worshipers, remember – even by those who do not share your views. You are serving as their voice in prayer – that is the public role and responsibility every pastor assumes. If you are uncomfortable with that kind of advocacy, you’ll want to spend some time rethinking your vocational choice. The pastor – indeed the Christian! – is called upon to represent all people, even those we may not prefer to represent. We have the example of Christ in that!

Rev. Paul F. Bosch, “The Sermon As Part of the Liturgy”, p. 27-28

Why I Don’t Re-Write Collects

O God, You make the minds of Your faithful to be of one will. Grant that we may love what You have commanded and desire what You promise, that among the many changes of this world our hearts may be fixed where true joys are found; through Jesus Christ, Your Son, our Lord, who lives and reigns with You and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and forever.

Or as the Anglicans put it:

O Almighty God, who alone canst order the unruly wills and affections of sinful men; Grant unto thy people, that they may love the thing which thou commandest, and desire that which thou dost promise; that so, among the sundry and manifold changes of the world, our hearts may surely there be fixed, where true joys are to be found; through Jesus Christ, our Lord.