But not as a substitute for avoiding truth, humility, confession and repentance before the Lord our God
We are hearing many calls to prayer by Episcopalians for their church, the Episcopal Church of the USA, especially as its General Convention on June 13 draws near. This should be in principle a good thing, but possibly it may become a means of avoidance and denial of the real truth, and thereby contribute to the problem that prayer to the Father is intended to address.
One thing is clear to the careful reader of the Bible wherever he lives in space and time. God’s covenant people are called daily to engage in praise and thanksgiving, confession and petition, intercession and supplication. And when the people of God in any place and time face a crisis (and there were many in Old Testament times and not a few in New Testament times), then they are specifically called to humility before God and to petitionary and intercessory prayer to the Lord our God, looking to him for the relief of the crisis and for a good resolution to the problems – see such calls as Psalm 122:6-7; 123:2; 130:1-8; 2 Chronicles 7:14; Jeremiah 6:16; Ephesians 6:18 & Jude 20. Humble,sustained intercessory prayer, especially in times of difficulty, is clearly the vocation of the people of God.
Yet with the vocation to intercession and petition, there inevitably comes temptation, and this varies according to local place and circumstance. At this time in the U.S.A., temptations are particularly powerful(because the world, the flesh and the devil use commonly held cultural, social and political assumptions in and by which to present their “case”)and often hardly discernible, except by those whose hearts are truly in communion with the Father through the Son and with the Holy Spirit, and who engage in self-examination before the light of heaven.
Here are some of the temptations that godly persons think they see – obviously there are others and many variations of the ones here presented:
1. To think that if we pray fervently and often then we can avoid facing the whole truth – as we ought to know it – about the rebellion against God’s ordinances, laws and will in which the church [ECUSA] of which we are members is engaged. In other words, we can pretend that the only real problem is the recent same-sex agenda, avoid the deep roots and innovations that lie beneath and around this hot issue, and keep this (as it were iceberg below the surface) from our self-examination and prayer.
2. To think of those whom we judge to be primarily responsible for the present “crisis” as the guilty ones and ourselves as the innocent ones [that is, they are the “revisionists” and we are the “orthodox”], and thus not to see that before God, the Holy and Righteous One, and before the Lord Jesus Christ the Perfect One, all of us are sinners and, furthermore, as part of the Anglican Way and local church-body we are sharing in its rebellion and its pride, even if we do not actively advocate its cherished agenda.
3. To approach prayer politically, on the model of the way that political parties approach making their position and policy known, and trashing their opponents. Before the holy and all-knowing Lord God, all of us, whatever name we give ourselves and whatever cause we support, are only at our very best guilty sinners, and only in Christ is there available for us a robe of righteousness, pardon and cleansing. In intercession, our only plea is the blood of Jesus, the Saviour and Lord; we cannot appear before God triumphally or as the Pharisee,saying, “I am not as other men are…”.
4. To think in contractual terms, that we can co-operate with the Lord our God by doing our part and then he will do his: that is, we can raise lots of dollars, employ the best communication teams, devise the best political strategy and ask for help from abroad, and then God will see our resolve and sincerity, bless and multiply our efforts, for we are right after all! Often the Psalmist tells us not to put our trust in princes or any of the devices of men.
5. To rely on our feelings and assume that because we feel good about ourselves and we feel the so-called “revisionists” are the problem, thereby to assume that God is on our side and will support our cause , which is – according to our feelings – obviously his!
6. To pretend, along with the leadership of the Episcopal Church, that ECUSA in all its parts including “the orthodox” is really only in a temporary state of upheaval, and is not in an advanced state of apostasy and dysfunctionality. That is, to engage in communal “denial” before God and with our fellow members and thus pray, as it were, only about on the surface matters.
7. To assume that some kinds of “sin” are worse than others, e.g., that sodomy is worse than adultery, that same-sex blessings are worse than blessing serial monogamy, that ordaining active homosexual persons is worse than affirming Unitarianism and denying that the One God is the Blessed, Holy and Undivided Trinity of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.
8. To think that because we have left the ECUSA and are in the Continuum or the AMIA or another jurisdiction that the problems of the ECUSA are not ours; the truth is that we are all in the same family and even if only cousins the pain of one part is the pain of all and must be addressed in compassionate care and intercession.
9. To feel that we know as well as God what are the real and deep problems of the ECUSA and further what are the ways out of them into genuine dynamic faithfulness in worship, doctrine, discipline, mission and devotion.
The point is that intercessory prayer, if it is to be genuinely fervent and truthful prayer to the Father in the Name of the Son and with the Holy Spirit, has to arise from hearts that are wholly open to God’s truth, are clothed with humility and repentance and recognize that mercy is not what they or anyone involved deserve. The example of the tax collector not the Pharisee in the Temple as described by Jesus is surely the model here.
Above all, the precious vocation of Prayer addressed to the Blessed and Holy Trinity, must not be used as a substitute for not recognizing the depth of rebellion and sin and for escaping putting right what can be put right (at whatever the cost). That is, we cannot continue in intercessory, fervent and truthful prayer to the Father in the Name of the Son and with the Holy Spirit, if we are not as we proceed ready to recognize and put away from us such errors, immoralities, and sins of both omission and commission as the light of God’s Spirit and Word brings to our minds and hearts.
Be holy for I am holy, says the LORD. & Be perfect as my heavenly Father is perfect, says the Lord Jesus. Imitate me as I imitate the Lord Jesus, says the apostle.
And says St Paul, “Pray without ceasing!” and begin now.
Let us hear of days of prayer and fasting being arranged all over the nation and within the ECUSA and Anglican bodies outside the ECUSA. Let the angels hear fervent, effectual and truth intercessions arising from the being-renewed, being-cleansed and being-sanctified Anglican family.
April 25 (St Mark the Evangelist Day) 2006, of which the petition in the Collect in the classic BCP is, “Give us grace that, being not like children carried away with every blast of vain doctrine, we may be established in the truth of thy holy Gospel…”
drpetertoon@yahoo.com do visit www.anglicansatprayer.org
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