Wising up! Praying for wisdom

 [Note: Our rural church, Lake Como Community of Hope in Lake Como, Florida, is non-denominational with several retired pastors of varied church backgrounds gracing our pulpit each week. Every now and then, however, scheduling conflicts or unexpected personal concerns leave us without a pastor to lead that day’s worship service. Since Sunday August 17 was such a day, I read the recommended Bible readings from the Revised Common Lectionary, used by many Christian denominations then presented the following “Bible Talk,” based on the reoccurring theme of wisdom.]

1 Kings 3:3-14
Psalm 111
Ephesians 5:15-20
John 6:51-58

With COVID again on the rise, we’re wise to wear masks in public, but Lord willing, we will all have unveiled faces soon! Meanwhile, let’s keep praying for the Lord’s healing presence in our lives. In fact, let’s pray right now:

Lord God, heavenly Father, thank You for bringing us together in prayer, worship, and fellowship with You and with each other. In many ways, Lord, these are troubled times, but we trust You to protect, heal, and guide us, our families, and our church. We praise You and thank You for being with us as we come into Your presence and Your Word in Jesus’ Name.

As you probably noticed, the big theme in the Bible readings this morning is wisdom. So, truth time: Are you wise?

Do you want to be wise?

Have you ever asked God to give you a gift of wisdom? If not, ask! If so, you have it! Believe it. Claim it. It’s yours.

Hearing Solomon’s prayer again this morning, I remember the first time I heard that Bible story in 1 Kings. Solomon was wise enough to ask for wisdom, and the request pleased God so much, He gave the king gifts of wisdom, understanding, and discernment – unsurpassed until Jesus came.

But God also promised to honor Solomon with riches and a long life. And the truth is: that’s what I wanted. I probably wasn’t as interested in having wisdom as having more money than my 50-cent allowance allowed!

Despite my questionable motivations, wisdom is ageless. I first saw wisdom in my children when they were too young for an allowance of any kind! For example, my daughter was about 5 when she came home from Sunday School, puzzled. The teacher had been talking about people in other countries who didn’t know about God and/or did not believe in Him. My daughter looked at me sadly and asked, “But wouldn’t we believe that too if we lived in another country?”

Most likely, yes. And that brings us to a message about wisdom in verse 10 of Psalm 111. i.e., Knowing God, believing in God, and, especially, being in awe of God is the beginning of wisdom.

Wisdom keeps us out of trouble! As we’re reminded by today’s Epistle reading in Ephesians 5, we’re to live – not as unwise people – but as wise. This can require head knowledge, but mostly it requires the ability to know how and when to apply knowledge in a wise and timely manner.

Ephesians 5 goes on to point out the need to be filled with the Spirit as we sing scripturally-sound songs, regularly read God’s Word, and faithfully give thanks to God the Father for everything – everything – in Jesus’ Name.

Christ lives in us and redeems us from humanity’s Fall from Grace in the Beginning of Time. Before that one act of disobedience brought spiritual death and troubles to everyone in the world, Adam and Eve had wisdom! They walked with God. They heard God speak. They had fellowship with Him – until opting for Knowledge over the Wisdom they already possessed.

Remember? They disobeyed God when they ate from the forbidden fruit of the Tree of KNOWLEDGE of Good and Evil. From that moment on, they no longer had the innocence still apparent in today’s young children, but they could not turn back. No one could – until Jesus came along!

Jesus redeems the times. Jesus renews our fellowship with God and breathes new life into us – the life of the Holy Spirit. Jesus gives us peace with God, peace with other people, and peace with ourselves.

As the Wisdom of God with us on earth and beyond, the Lord knows what we need. He alone has full KNOWLEDGE of the good and no-so-good thoughts, acts, and traits in us. He alone can rescue us from ourselves.

The Gospel reading in John reassures us that Jesus gave Himself for the life of the world to be transformed into life with God. But that’s only the beginning. To live out our time on earth more fully and faithfully – and joyfully – we need Wisdom to guide us. And all we have to do is ask!

As we read, study, and talk about the Bible, we can see that God has made promise after promise to us, individually, and to the church Body of Christ throughout the world. Our part is to believe, respond, claim those promises, and ask for whatever we lack, knowing God will provide. And why wouldn’t He? We are His ambassadors – representatives of Christ in the world. Surely, the Almighty God, Creator of the Universe, and Heavenly Father of All does not want us to speak for Him foolishly nor would He want us to act unkindly – unwisely – toward anyone else.

God has not only given us wisdom for the asking, but He’s also given us power to use that gift as we’re enabled and guided by His Holy Spirit.

What a powerful purpose we’ve been given – to help others and, indeed, to influence the whole world as we spread the Good News of forgiveness and salvation in the Resurrected Christ! Even Solomon didn’t have that. The young king had hope of a long life on earth because God Himself said he would. But to us, God promises an even longer life – one that never ends!

That’s not the kind of power I thought I might get as a child, and, as you might have expected, I haven’t received the massive wealth I had once hoped to get!  But what a wealth of wisdom widely available to all who ask – wisdom:

• In the book of Proverbs (attributed to Solomon!)
• Wisdom in the Gospels – the Good News of Jesus Christ
• Wisdom in communal worship, fellowship, and Bible study
• Wisdom in praying for ourselves and one another – in praying for our church home and Christians around the world
• Wisdom in the gift of God that comes to those who ask!

Let’s ask now:

Dear Lord God – Master, Possessor, and Provider of All Power, All Wisdom, and all the Wealth of the earth and universe, we ask You now for the gift of discernment and the wisdom to lead the kind of life to which You have called us. We praise You, Lord, for forgiving us and lifting us into Your compelling love. And we thank You for giving us the power, authority, and every other provision we need to carry out the work You have given us to do in Jesus’ Holy Name.

 

©2021, Mary Harwell Sayler

 

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Kneeling on the promises of God

[The following article introduced the book, Kneeling on the Promises of God.]

As you have likely heard, the hymn “Standing on the Promises” encourages us to trust God and take Him at His word. But from the very beginning of time, the matter of believing God arose in the Garden of Eden with the doubt-producing question, “Does God really mean what He says?” That contagious thought gave mankind an excuse to disobey, and distrust gave birth to death!

Now, as then, wariness of God brings uncertainty and the ongoing scramble to find, “Who can I trust?” Sometimes we can’t even trust ourselves! So where do we turn? Do we place our hope and faith in money, power, politics, institutions, traditions, or trends?

The trouble with those options is that people change their minds. Money changes hands and value. Political leaders come and go. Institutions become something unlike their original selves, and trends are, well, trendy. Facts get disproven as new information comes to light. Even the ground beneath our feet trembles, and stars careen from the sky. Everything changes! But God does not change, and neither does God’s word.

Mysteriously and paradoxically, the Holy Spirit is invisible to us yet the most solid matter. So, too, are the promises God gives – promises so stabilizing, we can build our whole lives on them. Promises so truthful and trustworthy, they can become the basis of our most powerful prayers. But why should we believe those promises? Why should we place our faith in God?

According to the Bible, God is Love – forgiving, compassionate love that can always be trusted to do what’s best for us and our spiritual well-being. Nothing and no one is greater, kinder, holier, or more trustworthy than God.  Nothing and no one can offer us more power or purpose for our lives. Once we realize we can totally trust the Lord, we can build our marriages, families, churches, and occupations on the promises God gives.

We can build our prayer lives on those promises too. We can take God at His word, knowing He agrees with our prayer requests because He has already promised the very things we claim or ask Him to do. Therefore, to kneel on a promise God made means claiming that promise and praying it into our lives.

To put this belief into practice, the book Kneeling on the Promises of God includes heartfelt, conversational prayers following each Bible promise – promises found in a variety of translations but paraphrased into everyday English. These prayers are to give you an idea of how you, too, might kneel on the promises in God’s Word.

The hope is that relevant prayers will also come to you as you meditate on the scripture verses, and write down your prayers, claiming God’s promises in the space provided on the lower part of each page. But, before doing this:

Pre-pare with pre-prayer!

Pray for the prayers to pray.

Regardless of our denominational affiliations or cultural backgrounds, let’s agree to stand on the promises  of God throughout our lives and kneel on those promises as we claim God’s Word each day and night in prayer.

May God bless you and your prayer life in the Lord!

Mary Harwell Sayler

For actual prayers from the Bible, visit the Bible Prayers blog.

Making all things new

New Testament Reading: Acts 11:1-18

Psalm: 148, page 861

Second NT Reading: Revelation 21:1-6

Gospel: John 13:31-35

One of my favorite prayers is King David’s prayer in Psalm 19: “Let the words of my mouth and the meditations of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, o Lord, my strength and my redeemer.”

Isn’t that what we all need? Strength and redemption!

Peter thought so. As we learned in the New Testament scripture reading from Acts, the Jewish Christians called Peter on the carpet! He didn’t overreact or get all defensive and offended though. Instead, he responded by listening to what they had to say. Then he addressed their concerns by providing them with facts – new information they’d never heard of before and, most likely, never considered.

Step by step, Peter carefully described the vision God had given him – not once but three times – to show he no longer needed to be concerned about Kosher foods because everything edible was now to be included on the menu! This was a big deal! For many centuries, food choices, food preparations, and menus for meals had been a major obstacle between Jews and Gentiles. The differences were so huge, in fact, they could never come together for a meal.

Sharing food and eating together is what we do after church services every third Sunday because dining together is a great way to welcome people, show acceptance, and get to know one another better as we chat and laugh and grab a desert before they’re gone!

Jews and Gentiles had never been able to do this, and so misunderstandings, snide remarks, and hostility had resulted over the years. Now, with Peter’s message, the Jewish Christians heard him saying that God had changed the dietary rules.

As often happens when we’re learning something new, we need to hear the same thing three times before it begins to sink in. God knows this about us, of course, so Peter received the same message from God again and again! Three times Peter received the same vision about the Jewish diet being made new – and much more inclusive of food choices! If Gentiles could eat it, so could he!

The Jewish Christians, however, were not convinced. So Peter told them how the Holy Spirit had fallen on the Gentiles, just as it had on them! What a shock this was! The people fell silent, which is an appropriate response to an “Oh? or Aha” moment!

This episode in Acts 11 teaches the importance of clearly communicating a viewpoint, especially if it’s unlike what people expect to hear – a view that makes all things new as perspectives begin to change and our embrace widens to include ideas and people unlike ourselves.

As this new information began to sink in, the Jewish Christians realized God was making all things new – for the Gentiles and for themselves. Once Peter had carefully explained to them why he’d dined with pagans, the early Christians realized that God had included in His plan of redemption the very people they’d thought were hopeless and beyond saving! They believed it! And they began praising God for including – not just more food in their diet but more people empowered by the Holy Spirit.

We, too, can praise the Lord whenever God brings us into the company of people who have different ways of doing things – people who don’t fit in at first. We, too, can give praise for God’s extended family, which brings to mind this poem from my book Praise:

Praise Christ our Body

Who holds us together

in cell and membrane,

tissue and blood,

tendon and tears.

Praise Christ Whose Body

embraces

each part of us –

an ear, an eye, a knee,

a scalp, a head of hair

with each curl counted.

Praise Christ Who gave

His body and

welcomes each one of us –

into the Body of Christ,

the Church –

to work, to play,

and pray together,

to love and forgive,

to worship as One Being

the Lord we adore.

Everyone needs saving! We could make a long list of things that come to mind – and perhaps we should as those very areas of aggravation or concern are usually the ones in most need of prayer and praise. Our own need to change some things is also nothing new!

After the fall in the Garden of Eden, the whole world fell prey to pain, suffering, and death. Everything God created had been placed under our care, but as care-less care-takers, we often left the air, land, water, living plants, and animals to fend for themselves! Then, along came the poet who wrote Psalm 148, which we read in the scriptures today, and heard its overriding theme of praise – praise that includes every created thing! Similar to the way Peter welcomed Gentiles into the family of Christ, the psalmist long before him had welcomed all creation into a new relationship with God and humankind.

Now we might think we have nothing in common with angels or the moon and stars or sea monsters or fire and snow and storms. We might think we have nothing in common with flying birds or wild animals, and yet, this psalms shows we’re connected with God and one another – not through missing links but through our ability to praise God and, indeed, the biblical instructions that we ALL need to praise. We are all connected through the earth itself as I hope this next poem shows:

Praise Our Playful God –

Who created us

from dirt and earth-mud –

like a Holy Child

molding

modeling clay,

loving the results,

but wanting more:

Wanting joy

to mobilize us,

wanting love

to propel us,

wanting us

to respond to Him.

Even if we don’t feel like it, praising God is a way we show our trust in the Lord. Praising God – regardless of what’s happening – is a way we submit to God’s will. And, even if stars fall and fires sweep through town and snow covers the roads or the temperature outside gives us a sunburn in ten minutes or less, praising God shows we know that God knows what He’s doing.

So? What is He doing?

God is making all things new!

Praising God shows we believe that. It reconnects us with goodness and beauty and the wonder of each moment. Praise also gives us a new perspective toward ourselves, other people, and life in general. How? Praise frees us from judgmental attitudes and makes us ready to love.

In the Gospel reading for this Bible Talk, John reported the newness we have in Christ as we follow His new instructions. Even though He was about to be crucified, Jesus said, “I give you a new commandment” – that is, a new perspective, a new viewpoint, a new way of seeing the possibilities for renewal found in all creation. Jesus said, “Love one another. Just as I have loved you, you also should love one another.”

Instead of just following the Golden Rule and treating others as we want them to treat us, Jesus instructs us – no, He commands us – to love one another as He would. Then, He goes on to say, “In this way, everyone will know you’re My followers – if you have love for one another.”

May this poem of praise also be our prayer:

Praise You God, Our Tutor –

for instructing us in the love life

You want us to live,

for training us through

Christ Jesus and Your Word,

for coaching us with the help

of Holy Spirit and the counsel

of good friends who have

suffered through the ache

of daily living and have

come to know You well –

who have consistently come to ask,

“Lord, what’s the loving thing to do?”

Amen!

Mary Harwell Sayler, ©2019, poems from Praise!

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