Good Morning Friends,
Someday I think I would like to do a study of the external storms of the Bible and how people survived them. It could even be a book with chapters on Noah and the Flood, the Passover, the Parting of the Red Sea, Jonah And His Storm At Sea, Jesus Asleep in the Boat During A Storm and finally Paul And A Shipwreck. So too, today’s topic could fill a book. But it is more about our internal struggle to communicate with God in a way that builds a relationship, it is about our struggle to include others in the dance. Thankfully we are given a format for weathering this internal storm even if our emotions and histories are clouding our thinking. It tells us that we should think clearly before we engage God in prayer, especially so if we think our heightened emotions are more important than God’s plan. We need to have the right attitude perhaps. So today we explore our need to live life as a prayer, sometimes on our knees and sometimes as a dance with Jesus, the Holy Spirit, and the Father. And I wonder about the relationship between the external and the internal when it comes to our salvation. So, Will We Pray As We Would Dance To The Rhythm Of Grace Through Life’s Storms?
Scripture: Then after fourteen years I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas, taking Titus along with me. I went up in response to a revelation. Then I laid before them (though only in a private meeting with the acknowledged leaders) the gospel that I proclaim among the Gentiles, in order to make sure that I was not running, or had not run, in vain. On the contrary, when they saw that I had been entrusted with the gospel for the uncircumcised, just as Peter had been entrusted with the gospel for the circumcised (for he who worked through Peter making him an apostle to the circumcised also worked through me in sending me to the Gentiles), and when James and Cephas and John, who were acknowledged pillars, recognized the grace that had been given to me, they gave to Barnabas and me the right hand of fellowship, agreeing that we should go to the Gentiles and they to the circumcised. They asked only one thing, that we remember the poor, which was actually what I was eager to do. But when Cephas came to Antioch, I opposed him to his face, because he stood self-condemned; for until certain people came from James, he used to eat with the Gentiles. But after they came, he drew back and kept himself separate for fear of the circumcision faction. And the other Jews joined him in this hypocrisy, so that even Barnabas was led astray by their hypocrisy. But when I saw that they were not acting consistently with the truth of the gospel, I said to Cephas before them all, “If you, though a Jew, live like a Gentile and not like a Jew, how can you compel the Gentiles to live like Jews?”
Galatians 2:1-2, 7-14 (NRSV)
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.” He said to them, “When you pray, say: Father, hallowed be your name. Your kingdom come. Give us each day our daily bread. And forgive us our sins, for we ourselves forgive everyone indebted to us. And do not bring us to the time of trial.”
Luke 11:1-4 (NRSV)
a time to weep, and a time to laugh; a time to mourn, and a time to dance;
Ecclesiastes 3:4 (NRSV)
Again I will build you, and you shall be built, O virgin Israel! Again you shall take your tambourines, and go forth in the dance of the merrymakers.
Jeremiah 31:4 (NRSV)
Message: Today we explore prayer as a personal response to a revelation about God’s mercy as we consider Paul’s revelation about grace being extended to the Gentiles and the dynamic of social change. The thing is that our problem with prayer is similar to Peter’s initial rejection of Gentiles. The issue is about mercy and God’s sovereignty. And it was a problem for the disciples too that finally reaches a head in the conflict between Peter and Paul regarding the topic of the Gospel and why there are four synoptic Gospels with one unifying message. Obviously, Peter was no match for Paul in this conversation. Peter was limited in education and cultural training. Still Peter had the advantage of his daily companionship with Christ, having been present at all the major events of his Savior’s life. So, when they met it was as iron sharpening iron, two strong men, both leaders hoping to cut out hypocrisy as they test each other as to their real character, motives, and purposes. Now Peter for the most part was preaching the Gospel to Jews who knew about the law and the hope of a Messiah. Paul was preaching to Gentiles, in fact pagans, who had never heard any of that. Still, they all knew they were sinners and were attracted to the idea that Jesus died in their place, for their sins, to redeem them and give them a relationship with God. But the Jews still followed the law had a problem because they were prejudice against Gentiles and thought that if they were to become Christians, they too would have to follow all the Jewish laws. The pivotal issue was about uncircumcised Gentiles and rightly so for it was a real stumbling block for adult males seeking the Christian faith to follow this right of inclusion. That is why it seems in a first reading of today’s passage from Galatians that there were two Gospels being preach, but that is not exactly a correct conclusion. There is only one salvation, and it is by grace. A person is not justified by works of the law but through faith in Jesus Christ to teach us how to live. It is rather remarkable that the disciples, when they asked about how to pray, would receive an answer that addressed some of these same elements of our human nature. You see the Lord’s prayer is a prayer about being a child of God. It is about becoming humbled by a request for daily bread and the learning about mercy by extending it to others as a way of receiving it in return. This is all about grace and our willingness to not only receive it but also extend it to others.
And So, It should not surprise us that the most offered prayer is, “Lord have mercy.” So, in prayer and evangelism, we must trust Jesus for His Kingdom to come. That is what Paul and Peter were working through. So, we to this day with each challenge we face, with each breath of life we take, with each prayer we offer, and with each step we take in relationship with the Spirit, the Father and the Son are to dance with them to the rhythm of Grace that allows God’s Kingdom to rule even if we need to get on our knees to regain our balance. You see, sometimes we get a little tipsy emotionally and this stalemates our efforts to pray and love and evangelize effectively. There will always be tension in the dance, but we best not fall but choose a more stable footing. Here we need to discover, that God is gracious and merciful and slow to anger and kind and has standards that should humble us if we take the Spirit’s guidance. We need to realize that our own ideas about salvation may be tainted by prejudice. Here we learn that to really learn how to pray well one must be moved by love. The message here friends is that Christ has set us free and the whole world free to join in the movement of the Spirit. The Christian life is not about working as hard as we can to live right but about believing differently allowing God to live in us and move us to the music of the Messiah. So as music is a universal language so too the freedom in Christ is for all people everywhere. Still, this is not easy for the world has many cultures and traditions and addictions that keep people from believing this and therein is the challenge that should prompt us to our knees in prayer that those we once rejected will join the dance.
Pray God fill our hearts with divine love and compassion, for one another and for the lost. Pray God unite us in Jesus’ love and in Jesus’ truth, so that through us, the world may recognize Jesus as their Savior. Pray we grow in grace to be more like Christ with each passing day. Pray God’s name be glorified though us. Pray in the abundant grace of Jesus and the unchanging love of God and the constant fellowship of the Holy Spirit that God would be merciful to us and prompt us to be more merciful to others. Pray therefor
we have the right attitude about prayer and witnessing and God’s will. Pray that God’s will be revealed to us when our reasoning is clouded. Pray we respond appropriately to this revelation of God’s mercy. Pray we understand the importance of inviting God into our earthly lives so the world might become more like heaven. Pray we listen. Pray we put away our anger and depression. Pray we offer requests to God for ourselves but also for others. Pray we avoid the judgement of God and repent. Pray we invoke the mercy of God for we are all sinners. Pray
we learn how to pray and live like Jesus in the power of a personal and creative relationship that acknowledges that we are children of God healed by grace. Pray therefor we experience a profound love that overflows out of us and into the lives of others. Pray we dance in the joy of the Gospel and are transformed.
Blessings,
John Lawson
Daily Devotionals 