In the apocalyptic scene of Revelation 8, the prayers of God’s people rise up to God. The church of the first century and the church of today is to be a people of prayer. In this sermon, Shawna Boren calls us into a fresh understanding of what prayer is and invites us into a fresh experience of relating to God through it.
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Praying with Hope
• Shawna Boren
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In the focus Scripture, we see an angel with a golden censer offering the prayers of the saints on the altar. The smoke of the incense rising symbolizes the prayers of the saints flowing up to God. These prayers provoked a heavenly commotion of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake. In this picture, heaven and earth are linked, the will of God in heaven is connected to the action of God on earth by the prayers of God’s people.
James 5:13-16 shows us that our prayers matter; they make a difference in the world. Prayer is also all about relationship—the means for how we relate to God and how God relates to us. God is at work in the world and the way we get in on this work is to pray. Prayer is not merely a good thing to do. It’s the way that the Spirit draws us up into God’s action and pushes the Kingdom forward.
However, prayer is often less than robust in our modern-day experience. In fact, it’s more like an afterthought, something we do after we have exhausted all other options. We do all of the things that we know to do in order to get the outcomes that we want. Then, when that does not work, we turn to prayer. And we wonder why we don’t see God acting!
There are many reasons why we do not see God acting to bring justice in the world as we hope for. In Greg Boyd’s book Is God to Blame?, he identifies several variables that influence the results of prayer. These include things like God’s will, the faith of the person being prayed for and the faith of the person praying.
One specific factor that Shawna camps out on is the persistence of the person praying. To expound upon this, she explores the parable of the persistent widow from Luke 19:1-8. From this parable, we can surmise that Jesus is saying that we are to pray in a way that is so persistent that we are pestering God. We, like the widow, are to pray as if the only option is to go to the one who actually has the power to do what needs to be done. Instead of acting like prayer is a backup plan, we are to act like getting an answer from God is the only thing available to us.
Our prayers matter, as God loves to hear the longings of our hearts. The point of our life on earth is connection with the divine. We pray because we love and yearn to live in love. We pray because we are designed to relate to the Father. We pray because it’s what makes “thy kingdom come, thy will be done” a reality.
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The MuseCast: May 27
Focus Scripture:
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Revelation 8:2-5
And I saw the seven angels who stand before God, and seven trumpets were given to them. Another angel, who had a golden censer, came and stood at the altar. He was given much incense to offer, with the prayers of all God’s people, on the golden altar in front of the throne. The smoke of the incense, together with the prayers of God’s people, rose up before God from the angel’s hand. Then the angel took the censer, filled it with fire from the altar, and hurled it on the earth; and there came peals of thunder, rumblings, flashes of lightning and an earthquake.
For Further Reading:
Is God to Blame? by Greg Boyd
