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Sunday, May 1, 2016

Easter 6



John 16:23-30 - Rogate Sunday - May 1, 2016
Scattered Prayers
If there is something important that you don’t know, but that you need to know, you should ask someone, right?  More specifically, you should ask someone who knows the answer.  It won’t do any good just to think about it until you suddenly come to know what you previously did not.  That’s simply not how it works; that’s not how knowledge is gained.  To ask a question is to make a request for information from someone who has it.  It’s to pray for knowledge, so to speak.   And that is why to seek instruction from God is really the highest form of prayer.  In fact, one cannot pray at all unless he first learns from God who God is, and why it is that He listens to our prayers.  This is how God’s name is hallowed. 

…when the word of God is taught in its truth and purity, and we as the children of God lead holy lives according to it …—
This is how his kingdom comes. 
… when God gives us His Holy Spirit so that by His grace we believe his holy word and lead godly lives here in time and hereafter in eternity …—
All prayers that we pray as Christians are rooted in this fundamental request: that God continue to reveal Himself to us as our gracious Father through Jesus Christ His Son.  And that’s what God wants to do.  So we ask Him to.  That’s why we attach to every prayer, “Thy will be done.” 
God’s good and gracious will is done when He breaks and hinders every evil plan and purpose of the devil, the world, and our sinful flesh which do not want us to hallow God’s name or let His kingdom come, and when He strengthens and keeps us steadfast in His word and faith until we die. 
Today is Rogate Sunday.  Rogate means “ask” – as in “make a petition.”  And so today we consider what it means to pray, what it means to petition God and ask Him for things.  Prayer seems like an easy thing.  But the mere fact that we do not pray as we ought is evidence enough that it is no simple task.  Prayer is an act of faith.  And as we know, faith in God is not something that we conjure up by ourselves.  “The natural man does not receive the things of the Spirit of God, for they are foolishness to him; nor can he know them, because they are spiritually discerned” (1 Corinthians 2:14).  Based upon this and other such words of Scripture, we confess in the Small Catechism that “[we ]cannot by our own reason or strength believe in Jesus Christ [our] Lord or come to Him, but the Holy Spirit has called [us] by the Gospel …” 
Just as we by ourselves are not able to believe, so we by ourselves are not able to pray.  You cannot make a resolution that you will believe more firmly apart from making the resolution that you will hear the word of God more faithfully.  So likewise, if you want to become better at praying, consider the promise of the Gospel upon which every prayer is prayed.  As the hymn puts it so well:
By the light His Word doth lend you,
Prayer will joy and comfort send you.
The power of prayer is found in the power and reliability of God’s word.  We do not pray a prayer in order to come to faith.  That is a common and dangerous false doctrine.  Rather, we come to faith by the power of God’s word alone.  And so, relying on this lamp unto our feet, we are bold to pray with confidence that we are heard.  To know how to pray is to know that God hears you, and to know why. 
But do you not pray like you want to?  Do you fall asleep at night worrying about problems you have, or maybe longing for things that you otherwise want, instead of making your requests known to God?  Do you eat your food without thinking about who it is that gave it to you?  Or maybe you think you do pray as you ought – since you sort of do – at the designated time you say your prayers for the day.  But then do you complain about those whose manners annoy you instead of praying for patience to deal with them?  Do you act superior to those who have fallen into sin, making light of their self-inflicted destruction instead of praying for their repentance?  Or perhaps you pray for their repentance, but then leave it at that, forgetting also to pray for the boldness and wisdom to speak those difficult words of admonishment that need to be said – especially to those whose relationships are precious to you.  
but he who teaches or lives contrary to what God’s word teaches profanes the name of God among us. Protect us from this, Heavenly Father. —
Do you lament the state of our decrepit culture into which our children and grandchildren are being born?  So you should.  But do you not also pray for stable government, wise rulers, faithful pastors, and for the evangelical mission of the Church?  Is this too much to ask of God?  Is this not what we need?  But do you drift off during more difficult portions of the sermon or Scripture lessons, or do you pray for understanding?  Do you find further instruction in God’s word too time-consuming, or do you pray for piety?  
These are not merely the requests that comprise our daily petitions.  These are the desires of a Christian heart that God Himself implants and that God wants to fulfill.  That is why he tells us to ask for them.  For this reason the Apostle tells us to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thessalonians 5:17), or as David teaches us, “Delight yourself also in the Lord, and He shall give you the desires of your heart” (Psalm 37:4).  St. James tells us to “be doers of the word and not hearers only” (James 1:22).  Before this can refer to great works of holiness, it must first begin with the humble work of prayer?  What a good work prayer is! 
The deficiencies we find in our lives of prayer (like with any good work) are nothing more and nothing less than the weakness of our faith.  The reason we don’t pray like we should is because we don’t believe like we should.  This is cause for each one of us to repent.  What is unbelief, after all, other than impenitence?  That is why we need to know where to flee in time of trouble.  When conscience attacks – when what you know to be right and wrong from God’s word also reveals to you that you have not been the Christian that you want to be and that God called you to be – when your sin confronts you, and you find that you have failed to ask God to lead you out of temptation (otherwise He would have given you a way of escape, you know) – then, dear Christian, what more, what less do you need than to hear the promise of your Lord Jesus that He has borne all your sins and that God your Maker still abides with you as your gracious Father in heaven? 
He will not throw your weaknesses and failures in your face so long as you lay them before His gracious face in true repentance.  He who says not to be unbelieving but believing also gives you what your faith needs to stand strong – and what your conscience needs to have peace.  And what promise could make this clearer – that God remains determined to regard you as His child and heir – than the promise of Jesus that whatever you ask the Father in His name He will surely give you?  What a wonderful absolution this is!  What could make it clearer that God does not condemn you than that He invites you to believe that you are His dear child, and that He is your dear Father? 
You need to know that for Jesus’ sake, God hears your prayer – your daily prayer, your random prayer, your consistent prayer, your desperate prayer, your prayer for strength when your spirit is weak, your prayer for mercy when your flesh proves too strong.  When Jesus teaches us to pray, He doesn’t teach us what words will win God over.  Instead, He teaches us that because of what He has done on earth to fulfill the law in our place, even as He retreated countless times to pray on our behalf – because of His work for us, our God not only receives our prayers, He receives us.  It is because of His love for us that He is so eager to hear and grant our every request.   See how faith and prayer are connected! 
Therefore Jesus teaches us where God’s love is found, as He says in the previous chapter, “As the Father loved Me, I also have loved you; abide in My love” (John 15:9).  What an outstanding thing to say: Jesus compares the Father’s eternal love for His eternal Son to the love that He Himself has for us.  To love like this is so profound!  Therefore, if you would like to know God’s love for you, and actually believe it, learn to know Christ’s love for you and where he proved it: “Greater love has no one than this, than to lay down one’s life for his friends” (John 15:13).  By teaching us where His Father’s love is found, Jesus teaches us and invites us to pray in His name.  And so doing, He teaches us to love God. 
“In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say to you that I shall pray the Father for you; for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me, and have believed that I came forth from God.”
Of course Jesus prays for us.  He intercedes for us at the right hand of the Father.  Jesus does not deny this.  It’s like we sing:
Lord, show before the Father’s throne
That Thou didst for my sins atone;
So shall I from my load be freed.
Thy Word I plead;
Keep me, O Lord, each hour of need.
Yes, Jesus prays for us.  No doubt!  But what Jesus is telling us is that through His blood, we do not need to look at His Father as a stern judge who still needs to be pacified.  He is our Father too.  Christ’s blood has reconciled Him to us once and for all.  We may therefore approach Him with all our requests like a child praying, “Abba, Daddy.”  As Jesus told the women who witnessed His resurrection first, but go to My brethren and say to them, ‘I am ascending to My Father and your Father, and to My God and your God’” (John 20:17). 
As our Father, it is true that we fear Him.  He is neither our fun uncle, nor our pushover 6th grade teacher.  He is our Father.  But in this filial fear, in this honor and humble regard we have toward Him, we learn what it truly means to love our Father – we know what it truly means to have a Father!   We learn His sternness when He permits us to have tribulation.  But we learn also His tenderness toward us in that He brings all sorrows to an end.  As Jesus said, “These things I have spoken to you, that in Me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation; but be of good cheer, I have overcome the world.” 
The disciples would soon scatter like sheep whose shepherd has been taken from them.  What gathered them together again was first of all their fear as they huddled together in fear for their own lives.  But as they gathered for fear, Jesus pronounced peace.  He who gave His life for His sheep had risen to remove all fear that they would lose theirs.  In Him they found their life even as they lost it.  In Him they had the knowledge that His Father is theirs and that He forgives them.  Here we find the basis for every prayer.  Here we find true fear, love, and trust in God. 
If our prayers are scattered – if we do not know what to ask for as we should – if we are afraid to presume that God should listen to us, or weary with his seeming denial – it is then that our chief prayer must remain that He speak plainly to us and teach us the gospel.  This is what you need above everything else you desire.  You need to know where your God gathers your prayers together and the prayers of all His saints.   He gathers your prayers where He gathers you.  He gathers you where He proclaims and delivers what His suffering and death have won.  He teaches you to call Him Father where He teaches you why and how He is your Father.  Your certainty concerning whether your prayers are heard is not found in the sincerity and regularity of your prayers – no more than in the strength and constancy of your faith.  Your certainty regarding your prayers is found in the certainty regarding your salvation.  Jesus takes your sins away.  What more do we need to pray?  While on the cross, His disciples scattered.  But He was not alone. His Father was with Him – with Him, accepting His offering for you, thus making all your prayers holy.   As surely as Christ was not alone, so neither are you.  He who raised Jesus from the dead remains with you in your tribulation, teaching you to pray and assuring you that he hears them for Jesus’ sake. 
In Jesus’ name.  Amen. 

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