Prayer as invitation to love
Ash Wednesday | Matthew 6:1-6, 16-21
Jesus is preaching to crowds his most famous sermon. It began with Beatitudes that pushed the hearers’ expectations about blessing. From reward for success to something offered to those most in need of it.
Jesus offered twists on familiar concepts. Pushing people from a vengeful interpretation of the law, an-eye-for-an-eye, to one that demands greater resistance to the very idea of retaliating.
He twists their expectations about resistance to empire and relationships and power.
So then he turns his attention to public piety.
The Pain of Jesus’s Preaching
I have a personal rule about the Sermon on the Mount. Which is this: if you read it and don’t feel convicted by it at any point, then you’re reading it wrong. It’s supposed to make us uncomfortable. Because Jesus is changing comforting expectations.
So what is Jesus after in this section from chapter 6 of Matthew?
In one way, we might read it like a call to privacy and secrecy. Which is an easy gloss for an individualistic faith. So…just pray and give in private.
It also has this shaming of hypocrisy element. Those long-winded prayers people offer to prove how good they are.
But there’s a problem here.
If Jesus doesn’t like public piety and long-winded praying, then what do we do with the synagogue? And what do we do with going to church? Even wearing wedding rings? Our religious clothing? Crosses on the wall?
Do you see the either/or happening here?
That we start to envision this as a false choice between private prayer and public prayer. Private almsgiving and public almsgiving. It starts to sound like Jesus is super individualistic.
Yeah…he’s not.
Jesus is talking about empty prayers. And performative giving. He isn’t contrasting private versus public. He’s actually contrasting private generosity versus performative and selfish generosity. For the one, their heart is in it. And for the other, it’s popularity, publicity, power…
This isn’t a rule that all donations be anonymous. It is about the spirit of giving. Being generous because God loves generosity. Not people doing it to get their name on a thing.
Praying
A moment ago, I read a little more than is included in the lectionary because its absence, I think is a mistake.
Jesus is telling his followers not to be selfish, performative pray-ers of prayers. But then we tend to skip the part where he teaches them how to pray. Which I think is a missed opportunity.
He says the words don’t really matter. Even as we try to impress each other with them.
This idea Jesus is wrestling with reminds me of a personal experience. We read Hamlet in 11th grade and our teacher had us pick parts and somebody suggested I take the part of Polonius. And I was like “sure.” And they said “It’s not a compliment.”
The character is a famous windbag. It’s even possible Shakespeare had this passage in mind when he wrote the part!
Now, I’m looking back and realizing how rude that kid was. How embarrassed I am now for that kid then. But I wasn’t that hurt by it because I said something like “I don’t think you get him.”
But I wasn’t really insulted because I don’t say things my heart isn’t in. It just takes me a few words to say it.
The problem is the lack of heart—the authenticity, generosity, faith, not the volume of speech. It is the desire to be loved rather than the joy of creating and communicating.
So how does Jesus tell us to pray?
That’s the funny part. It’s mostly just feels. Because God knows what’s on your heart. You don’t even have to say anything.
But then he offers words for when we do pray. And these words guide those feels. This is why he gives us the prayer we know as The Lord’s Prayer or Our Father. This is the substance of our prayer:
- God: Your name is hallowed.
- May your Kin-dom come here, your will be done here till earth is the same as heaven.
- Feed us our daily bread and forgive our debts just as we have forgiven the debts of others.
- Do not bring us to the time of trial, but rescue us from the evil one.
Jesus invites us to shape our lives according to the ethos of this prayer. Living and being as heaven’s people, with enough for everyone and with no debts to one another, and protected from the abuse and selfishness that characterizes evil.
This is what Jesus is trying to get across in this part of his sermon. Not to isolate ourselves in a private faith or secretive behaviors—which, let’s be honest could also describe those hypocrites!
Jesus condemns using faith as a commodity! Something to exploit or consume. Something to hoard or think you need the right words for.
It is something we share. It is relationship. With God and one another.
So praying is as simple as sitting with God as you sit with a friend who doesn’t need your words. Just your presence.
And prayer orders our life in this same way. To match the vision God has for us all.
This is what we do in Lent!
We pray! And we read scripture. And we think about the way we order our lives; comparing God’s dream for humanity with what we’re doing.
And we take this time to work through that. Knowing it is not easy. Or comfortable. And we could be wrong.
But that’s OK. Because God forgives. And so, we turn ourselves around, seek that forgiveness, and we come back.
And we all seek to be that beloved community here and now. And open our hearts to welcome and to one another’s return.
The seed that gets this generosity going is this regular reminder that we are merely dust. Carbon. And one day, we’ll die. That carbon will return to the earth.
The reminder of our own late humbling may humble us now.
But!
We remember, too that death cannot restrain new life. Our lives enrich the soil for those who come after us like our soil was enriched for us.
Our present love for one another, for our neighborhood, and our world is an embodied prayer of hope. These acts of discipline remind us of our common purpose and open us to relationships of Christlike love.
So may our prayers and study this season bring us joy in our humility. In our hope. And in our earnest desire to live like Children of God.