"Praying: Thanks"

    In ministry, you get to hear a lot of different prayer requests and a lot of different prayers prayed. While it is true that there is no wrong way to pray, there is one particular type of prayer that makes me more uneasy then the rest - the prayer of bargaining. The prayer that tells God what to provide in order to receive that person's thanksgiving and praise. 
  I think this type of prayer doesn't sit comfortably with me, because it assumes that God should give us exactly what we want when we want it, when maybe this is the absolute last thing that we need. It also presupposes, not God's goodness and our overflowing blessings, but our need. Sometimes when people start to pray in this manner, I wish I could just stop them and reframe the question not as what they want, but into what they have already been given. Or in the words for yesterday's sermon, "What are you most grateful for these days?"
    What are you most grateful for these days? Powerful words that linger in the air and in our hearts. Words that invite us first and foremost to give our praise where it is due. What about you, what are you most grateful for these days?

"Praying: Help"

  Confession time - I have a really hard time asking for help. Even when I desperately need it. I'm actually known for scaling the shelves in grocery stores in order to get something off of the top shelf instead of simply asking the person next to me. And while the old joke goes that men won't stop and ask for directions, neither will I. I was once lost in Buffalo, NY for six hours - six hours - on the verge of tears but I still refused to ask how to get on the right road back home.
   But as I've got older I've realized that my lack of asking other people for help can actually seep, or flood, into my spiritual life. If I can't ask other people to help me with small things, how willing am I actually going to be to ask for God's help with big things?
   At its root, I don't know what stops me from asking other people for help when I need it. Pride? Disillusionment? My guess is whatever stops me from asking people for help, is the same thing that keeps me from bringing all of my needs and requests before God. That feeling that this particular request doesn't matter to God in the scheme of things or I can handle that need on my own. In my head I know God wants me to bring all of my requests before the Throne of Grace, but something in my heart stops me from doing it. Its an every waged spiritual struggle for me, but I know I have to trust God and set myself aside, and bring my heart before that Throne.
     Do you struggle with giving your needs to God? What blocks you from asking God for help in all circumstances?

“In Covenant”

     I don't know if there is anything I dislike more than a broken promise. It is one of the reasons I am so careful in giving my word and making promises, because I don't want to promise something I cannot honor or live into.
     Perhaps one of the reasons I am hurt so deeply by broken promises is because I see them abounding in the world we live in. Broken promises made to children, who are not cared for as they should be. Broken marital vows resulting in divorce. Broken words of trust given to friends, that lead to fractured relationships. As a pastor I see day in and day out the result of broken covenants.
    But on the other hand I also see the abiding covenant of God in our lives through Jesus Christ - the way of the new covenant. I cannot help but think of this covenant every time I come to the table to celebrate communion - one of the signs of the new covenant, the bread and the cup.
   Our churches are entering into new covenants with each other starting this week, based off of the covenant that God made with us through the body and the blood. They boil down to saying that we put Christ at the center of our relationships with one another - not our personal preferences. We uphold what it means to be the Church - even when that may mean stepping back and praying for the wisdom of the Holy Spirit. I am extremely proud of PPRC for taking the initiative to craft these covenants, and I hope that as we live into them together over the next year, we strive to keep the promises that we make to God and one another.

"Who Shall Seek Him?"

   I'm not so sure that I would have been amongst those traveling to see the Christ Child based on a star and a prophesy. Maybe I doubt myself too much, and I would have went, but a larger part of me thinks that I would have made excuses as to why I needed to stay behind.
   We live in a world that has a lot of excuses as to why we don't seek to follow Jesus. Sure, we may believe in Jesus, because that is easy, but to actually follow him? That's a whole other story. And even for those who do seek him, we come with expectations crafted from trying to fit Jesus into our own image or little boxes, instead of embracing him as the Son of God. And all too often when our expectations are not met, we become dismayed instead of capturing the joy that can only come from encountering Christ.
   My prayer this Epiphany is that we set aside our expectations and allow God to meet us as we are, where we are, as God is. I want to be transformed by a God who is bigger than my expectations and a Messiah who doesn't beckon us to believe in him so much as to follow him. What is your prayer this Epiphany?