Pray: For Everyone - 1st Timothy 2:1-7

 

A 4-year-old boy was asked to give the meal blessing before dinner. The family members bowed their heads in expectation. He began his prayer, thanking God for all his friends, naming them one by one.

Then he thanked God for Mommy, Daddy, brother, sister, Grandma, Grandpa, and all his aunts and uncles. Then he began to thank God for the food. He gave thanks for the turkey, the dressing, the fruit salad, the cranberry sauce, the pies, the cakes, even the Cool Whip.

Then he paused, and everyone waited-- and waited. After a long silence, the young fellow looked up at his mother and asked, "If I thank God for the broccoli, won't he know that I'm lying?"

Today we conclude our August series on prayer.  As we’ve taken this prayer journey, we’ve spent a good bit of time talking about how prayer is more about allowing God to change us through this time of conversation than about our trying to twist God’s arm to change His mind about something that is going on in our lives.

As we examined what it means to pray without ceasing, we discovered that to be in constant conversation with God, to be constantly aware of His presence with us, it shapes and changes our attitudes and actions—moving us from self-focused and self-centered to being God-centered and God-focused.

By praying in Jesus’ Name, we realize that Jesus didn’t give us a magic phrase so that God would give us everything we wanted, but taught us, as we pray, to seek and submit to God’s will in what we pray for, rather than our own.

When we are left speechless in our prayer life, confronted by tragedies and evils that silence us because we don’t know how to respond, we come to be thankful that God has promised to fill us with His Spirit, and put His Words of prayer within us, so that our hearts and minds move from our outrage and begin to sync with the Will of God.

Last week we reflected on the call to pray with humility, remembering that we are to come before God’s throne humbly rather than with a sense of arrogance, realizing that as we approach God, we stand equally unworthy before His Holiness as everyone around us.  We are all completely depending upon God’s grace to even be able to approach God in prayer.

So as we focus so much upon how prayer is about God changing and shaping us, it might come across as that the sole focus of our prayers should be us, “God, make me the person You would have me be. In Jesus Name.  Amen” and leave it at that—that there is no room, or even any place to pray for those in the world around us.  That could not be farther from the truth, as this morning’s reading reveals to us: “First of all, then,” Paul writes Timothy, “I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings be made for everyone….”

We are called to pray for others…we called to humbly come before God’s throne remembering them in prayer, giving thanks for them, and asking God to bless them.  We think, hey, that’s easy, “I pray for my spouse, my children, my parents, my grandparents, my nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles, friends, and even the little old lady down the street whose house was broken into last week.”

Paul, though, pushes us to pray beyond simply those that we love and readily come to mind, but for everyone, and in case we think it is just everyone we have everyday contact with, he reminds us that everyone also includes the kings and all who are in high position.  That would translate to praying for the President and Congress, the governor, the mayor and all who national, state, and local leaders.  Some may be thinking, “pray for them, no way, I can’t stand them, I don’t like what they are doing, and I want to see them out of there.”  Well, refusing to pray for them, first of all marks us with a sense of arrogance that we noted last week we are called to avoid in prayer, and second of all, puts us in direct conflict with the Word and direction of God.

Now before any of us say, “that’s all find and good, I’ll include them in my prayer life,” let me share with you how not to pray for our leaders.  This was an email sent to me this week—actually as I was in the midst of composing the sermon, by someone that I would suggest has a more Republican leaning:

In Church Sunday, I heard a sweet elderly lady in the pew next to me saying a prayer.  It was just so innocent and sincere that I just had to share it with you:

“Dear Lord, The last year has been very tough.  You have taken my favorite Actor—James Garner, my favorite Actress—Lauren Bacall, my favorite Comedian—Robin Williams, and finally, my favorite Author—Tom Clancy.  I just wanted you to know that my favorite Politicians are: Barack Obama, Joe Biden, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid.  Amen.”

Again, let me reiterate, that is not a way that we are called to pray for our leaders.  We are not called to pray, either directly, or in this case, indirectly, for their demise or destruction.  That is not what Paul meant when he said to pray for everyone, including our government leaders.

We have to remember that as Paul wrote this, encouraging Christians to pray for the king and all in high positions, he was not enjoying life under King David or King Josiah, or any of Israel and Judah’s God-centered kings.  He was writing while God’s people were under the rule of the Roman Empire in a time where the Romans were either indifferent or hostile to those of Jewish or Christian faith.  Even the local rulers, such as the puppet king in Jerusalem, operated only under the approval of Rome.  Yet Paul calls the people to pray for these leaders—not for their overthrow, but with thanksgiving and humble intercession (part of that humility reminding Christians now and then that we are no better before God than those with political ideologies different from our own).  Paul calls us to pray for their good that all may come to live a life that is centered in godliness and dignity.  We are to give thanks for our leaders, whether we agree or disagree with them, and pray that God may use them in some way to make His Kingdom, His ultimate rule, visible “on earth as it is in Heaven.”

Paul reminds us why our prayers for everyone, including those we don’t agree with, including those that persecute us, including those that we might even call our enemies, are to be prayers of thanksgiving, of humble intercession for God to bless them.  Paul says that “This is right and is acceptable in the sight of God our Savior who desires everyone to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth.  For there is one God; there is also one mediator between God and humankind, Christ Jesus, himself human, who gave himself a ransom for all….”

Paul reminds us that we are to pray for everyone because God desires that everyone might be saved…that Jesus Christ gave His life not just for a select few, but for everyone.  Christ didn’t just die for us—He died for everyone—God didn’t send His Son because he only loved Israel, or only loved the United States, but because He loved the entire world—“Indeed, God did not send the Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him.”

Consider, my brothers and sisters, what this really means.  God’s desire is that all might be saved…Christ died for all…for everyone….  That means that those people we are traditionally thankful for—God desires that our parents, grandparents, children, spouses, nieces, nephews, aunts, uncles, friends, and neighbors might come to salvation…Christ died for each of them.  It also means that God desires that, Barack Obama, Pat McCrory, Jesse Jackson, Rush Limbaugh, Boko Haram militants, ISIS leaders, our former best friend that stabbed us in the back, our ex-boyfriend who cheated on us, the drug dealer that sold our child the drugs they overdosed on, and anyone else that may have wronged us or caused unspeakable evil in the world, that each of these come to salvation through Jesus Christ who died for each of them.  As we think on that, my friends, as we realize those are among the folks that we are called to pray for, and as we enter into prayer, praying for their forgiveness, praying that they may come into a repentant relationship with God, pray that they may become our brothers and sisters in Christ as they surrender their lives, either a new or for the first time, to God’s sovereignty, it begins to shape and change our view and understanding of who they are.  We begin to feel our harden hearts softened by God as we move towards the time when all may live quiet and peaceable lives in godliness and dignity as we begin to see the Kingdom of God erupt around us as the day draw nears when “every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is God.” And as we do this, while it may feel in the beginning like the child giving thanks for the broccoli, we will find God changing our hearts, so that we are not lying, but becoming filled with the full nature of Christ, a heart full of compassion for all.   In the Name of the Father and Son and Holy Spirit!  Amen.