First Presbyterian Church
Networthy
Sermon for 2-8-04
by Pastor Susan Barnes

The book of Isaiah was written while Assyria had control of the northern kingdom of Israel, and Judah lived as just a tributary. Isaiah accuses Judah of a poor relationship to God, evidenced by social injustice. He expects his hearers to place their confidence in God, and in God's words, which he, Isaiah speaks. I'll be reading from my translation, but you can follow along on page 635. Listen for the word of God as is it is found in Isaiah 6:1-8.

In the year that King Uzziah died, I saw Yahweh sitting on a throne, high and lofty; and the hem of his robe filled the temple. Seraphs were in attendance above him; each had six wings; with two they covered their faces, and with two they covered their feet, and with two they flew. And one called to another and said, “Holy, holy, holy is the Lord of hosts; the whole earth is full of God's glory.”

The pivots on the thresholds shook at the voices of those who called, and the house filled with smoke. And I said, “Woe is me, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips; yet my eyes have seen the King, Yahweh Sabaoth.”

Then one of the seraphs flew to me, holding a live coal that had been taken from the altar with a pair of tongs. The seraph touched my mouth with it and said, “Now that this has touched your lips, your guilt has departed and your sin is blotted out.”

Then I heard the voice of Yahweh saying, “Whom shall I send, and who is for us?”

And I said, “Here am I; send me!”

Choir anthem “Sanctus”

Psalm 138 is our unison reading, on page 577. The psalmist thanks God for deliverance, and prays for still more deliverance

Our pew Bibles translate the first verse as “before the gods I sing your praise.” The contemporary phrase “in your face” captures the meaning better—I sing your praise in their face—the psalmist disrespects the other gods by respecting Yahweh, and only Yahweh, the Lord. Listen for the word of God as we read it together in Psalm 138.

1 Of David. I give you thanks, O LORD, with my whole heart; before the gods I sing your praise; 2 I bow down toward your holy temple and give thanks to your name for your steadfast love and your faithfulness; for you have exalted your name and your word above everything. 3 On the day I called, you answered me, you increased my strength of soul. 4 All the kings of the earth shall praise you, O LORD, for they have heard the words of your mouth. 5 They shall sing of the ways of the LORD, for great is the glory of the LORD. 6 For though the LORD is high, he regards the lowly; but the haughty he perceives from far away. 7 Though I walk in the midst of trouble, you preserve me against the wrath of my enemies; you stretch out your hand, and your right hand delivers me.8 The LORD will fulfill his purpose for me; your steadfast love, O LORD, endures forever. Do not forsake the work of your hands.

This ends our reading from the psalm. Our gospel reading is found on page 62. Jesus healed Simon's mother-in-law and many others. He cast out demons, and has been proclaiming the good news in the synagogues of Judea . Listen for the word of God as is it is found in Luke 5:1-11.

Once while Jesus was standing beside the lake of Gennesaret , and the crowd was pressing in on him to hear the word of God, he saw two boats there at the shore of the lake; the fishermen had gone out of them and were washing their nets. He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.”

Simon answered, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!”

For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken; and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.

This ends our reading from the word of God.

Let us pray: Most holy God, your majesty is exceeded only by your love; grant us, in this our worship of you, penitence in the presence of your holiness, reverence at the thought of your majesty, and confidence in the knowledge of your love; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.

A month or two ago, I got a letter from Jim Monroe, asking questions about prayer, and suggesting the answers might make a good sermon. So here it is.

During group prayers, like at Rotary, many assume a certain stance, head bowed, hands in front of body, one hand grasping the wrist of the other. I look around and ask myself, if I am not complying with this particular stance, am I not participating in prayer? What if I put my hands in my pockets? How important is any physical activity prior to, during, and ending a prayer?

Bowing our heads when we pray is a sign of humility before God. That stance is a sign to the community that we are ready to pray with others now. When I lead prayer, I stand still to demonstrate that now is the time for us to quiet our voices, still our bodies, and listen for God.

But when I'm not leading a prayer, when I'm one of many praying, I don't always bow my head. If everyone else's eyes are closed, I lift my face to the light whether it is the sun, or just a fluorescent bulb. I want to feel God's light on my face. To me, lifting my head up while my eyes are closed is a sign of my openness God, longing for the spirit of God to ‘fall afresh on me.' After a few seconds, I am ready to bow my head with the others. My six-year-old, observing this one day, was surprised, and whispered urgently to me, and tugged on my arm. To a six-year-old, if you're not bowing my head, you're not praying. I expect there are others in the Rotary club who may feel the same.

When we pray in groups, we have the responsibility not to be distracting; my six-year-old found it distracting when I prayed with my head uplifted. But praying in a group, I find it freeing. Lately, during the Lord's prayer at Ministerial Association, or at session, or in people's home, or in church, I have found myself just listening, or saying just a few of the words. It is as if I am carried along the current of other people's words, and I can rest and float along their prayers, without tiring myself out. I hear the rhythm of the words, and ride along, listening, and glad to be in the presence of God with other Christians.

I remember when I was a child, I tried kneeling to pray. It felt unnatural to me. So I mostly prayed when “I lay me down to sleep.” I have worshiped at churches with kneelers in the pews, and I have not felt uncomfortable doing that when everyone else was.

Prayer walking is praying in rhythm with your walking. And there are breath prayers, where you synchronize the words of your prayer with your breath. Different physical activity influences the kinds of prayers we pray.

The people in the Bible pray in different postures. In Jim's letter, he said the “Phone rang about 7:30 in the morning, I was …getting ready to take my morning shower. Dr. Chuck Hoffmann started off the conversation with “Jimmy.” Only 1 close friend and a couple of relatives who knew me as a child ever call me that... Chuck went on to tell me that Martha was terminal, and there was just nothing more he could do. I go into the shower, and without any ritual began to hope that she could go quickly, without suffering any more ... Was I praying? I didn't do any of the pre-emptive activity to prayer. This was Friday morning, I called the boys, they took off from Seattle and were here that evening. Martha died early Saturday morning. Was God listening to me? Did my simple statement act as a prayer?”

Yes. I heard a theologian call those arrow prayers. No introduction, no adoration, confession, thanksgiving, supplication, just “Help.” Or “save me.” Or, in your case, “Save Martha.” Arrow prayers are heartfelt and sincere. Psalm 138 said, “On the day I called, you answered me, you increased my strength of soul.”

Arrow prayers fulfill an urgent need. Other kinds of prayers are helpful for an ongoing daily relationship with God.

“[Susan, my] mind gets active when I first get into bed, going over the activities past, present, or future. I have not assumed any special stance, or position, am I in prayer without really planning for it? Is God listening to my thoughts, and giving me guidance without some physical sign?”

Yes. Psalm 139 says, “ you discern my thoughts from far away. You search out my path and my lying down, and are acquainted with all my ways.”

Theologian Roberta Bondi defines prayer as a shared life with God. She describes an informal way of being with God as a ‘kitchen table prayer.' We do not have to always talk with people we are close to; a comfortable silence is part of our relationship. “Kitchen table prayer is time we spend with God that is like time we spend at the kitchen table with a spouse or a good friend with whom we share our lives in other ways already. When we pray like this we simply sit in silence. Sometimes it is peaceful, sometimes it is distracted, sometimes we even fall asleep, but it is always shared. …It is not listening; it does not need attentiveness; it is sitting in each other's loving presence, glad to be together, whatever else is going on.” (1)

Bondi recognized that prayer seems impossible for some of us. She lists “attitudes that seem unsuitable for prayer: you are angry, or sleepy, or feeling frivolous, or unable to concentrate. If you find yourself thinking in these terms, there is a good chance that you believe—perhaps unwittingly—you must be ‘worthy' of God, and that God is only interested in your ‘good' self. Think about it. If this is indeed what you believe, how could you ever love such a God? You will surely find prayer a dreadful burden.” We need to bring ourselves to our prayer just as we are– bored, sleep, distracted, mad, happy.

Sometimes who we are at the moment is people whose minds are wandering away from our prayer and onto all sorts of other things, such as what we will have for dinner tonight or our unpaid pile of bills. How can we pray then? Are we not insulting God and wasting our time? Ought we not just quit when we catch ourselves, and try again at a more suitable time? Or worse, perhaps we are people who cannot pray? This problem, too, we share with our desert ancestors, and the Abbas had a good answer to it.

‘A brother asked an old man and said, ‘My thoughts wander, and I am troubled.' He answered: “Go on sitting in your cell, and your thoughts will come back from their wandering. If a [donkey] is tethered, her foal skips and gambols all around her but always comes back to the mother.'

So it will be with the [person] who for God's sake sits patiently in his [or her ] cell. Though [the] thoughts wander for a time, they will come again.”' As the little donkey comes back to its mother, our minds too, will return to God in our prayer, and even if they do not, we are in God's presence just the same. If we are there exactly as we are, there will be times, probably a lot of times, when our minds will wander. It is always better to be in God's presence in the way we can be than not to be there at all.” (2)

The prophet Isaiah was convinced he was a sinner, a man of unclean lips; who was he to have the honor of seeing God? How could he, Isaiah, bear the word of God? One of God's attendants, a seraph, brings a coal to cleanse Isaiah's lips; Isaiah then felt clean enough to bear God's words, and was able to answer God, “Here am I, send me.”

Sometimes we don't feel up to the task of bearing God's words to others; we can't even live the word adequately ourselves. The first hymn we sang this morning was, “Would I have answered when you called?” ‘Would the old familiar round have held me by its claim and kept the spark within my heart from bursting into flame?” It's important to be aware of our motives and our moods. I'm not talking about the relentless self-doubt some of us experience when we are depressed, but the honest humble gentle probing that comes when we pray “Forgive us our debts” and “lead us not into temptation.” What moves and tempts us? What do we need to ask forgiveness for? What do we need to be saved from? Self-examination is a part of prayer.

When we arrived here this morning, we said in the call to worship, “we are created and sustained by the power of God's love, we have come together because of God.” We said it with confidence. I think many of us meant it.

In our gospel lesson Jesus said “ Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” A theology professor responded to it by saying, “Here is a truth to cherish always: we don't mend, tend, or haul the net; rather, by God's grace we become the net. God does the mending, the daily washing and the morning-by-morning encouragement and direction of would-be catchers who have fished all night and come home empty.” (3)

The psalmist said, “You delivered me” and also, “please deliver me.” We can live as God's people, even while we pray to become God's people. Amen.

(1) Bondi, Roberta C. To Pray is to Love, p. 69.

(2) Bondi, Roberta C. To Pray is to Love, p.58-59.

(3) Niedner Jr., Frederick, “Amateurs and rookies,” Christian Century, January 24, 2001 , p. 9.