Saturday, September 17, 2016

“Praying for the Politicians” - September 18, 2016


I Timothy 2:1-7


When I think of “all who are in high positions” right now, I don’t tend to think of “a quiet and peaceable life,” let alone “godliness and dignity”.  I am not going to give you my reasons.  The sad part is that I don’t have to do that.  In fact, I find myself to some degree fighting my urge to spell those reasons out, in part because then I can just unload some of my frustrations about such matters and maybe – just maybe – feel better for however long it is until I turn on the radio in my car or open up the newsfeed on my computer and then it starts all over again.  In fact, I can feel the general blood pressure in this room rising right now as people call the latest offense to mind or quietly fume, “I thought church was one place I could get away from this stuff.”

Let me ask this, though: who needs our prayers most in a situation like this?  All too often the impulse is to pray about someone (which is really praying for ourselves) when we could be praying for that person (which would be about asking for their good).  Might it not be the politicians whose faults and failures are most clearly on display during an election whose needs are at the same time most public?

There is one sense in which it is easy to pray about them.  There’s a line in Fiddler on the Roof where someone runs up to the village rabbi and asks, “Rebbe, is there a proper blessing for the Tsar?” and the rabbi replies loudly, “Yes.  May God bless and keep the Tsar,” then in a low voice, “far away from us.”  There was at least one prayer offered during the convention season onstage, with the cameras rolling, in which the opposing party and its candidate were identified as “the enemy”.[1]  I have no doubt that prayers have been spoken in a similar vein on the other side. 

Is that what God wants?  To be treated as the referee in some sort of prayer smack-down, as if whoever can muster more voices will drown out the prayers of the other side and convince the Lord of their own choice’s rightness?  That isn’t prayer.  That degrades the practice of praying, and it betrays an immense spiritual immaturity on the part of human beings.  And we have all been there.  And we have all prayed that way.  We have just been fortunate enough not to have had national coverage.

There is that middle option that says if I don’t pray about the folks I don’t like, at least I can simply ignore them.  It’s part of the whole project of civility where we learn, “If you cannot say something nice about someone, then don’t say anything at all.”  That makes perfect sense in everyday conversation.  But prayer isn’t like everyday chit-chat.  Prayer is a matter of being open and honest with God, and every part of our lives enters into it, with nothing left out.

“First of all, then, I urge that supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings should be made for everyone…” [I Timothy 2:1]
Everyone?
“for everyone, for kings and all who are in high positions, so that we may lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity. 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.” [I Timothy 2:2-4]
            What, then, does it mean to pray for them?  It means to pray that they might have the wisdom and insight and all that it takes to work for the common good.  It means that they might be able to create, by what they do, conditions that allow people to

“lead a quiet and peaceable life in all godliness and dignity.” [I Timothy 2:2] 
It means that we pray for whatever it takes for them to do their jobs well.  In that sense we really are praying for ourselves, too, but also for everyone around us and for the social environment as a whole.

            We can disagree, or politicians can disagree with each other, and still have that goal of the common good in mind.  When that happens, there is actual debate about how to do it instead of name-calling and mudslinging.  Statistics and numbers are examined as measurements and indicators of fact instead of being twisted to support a predetermined position.  Once the battle has begun, though, it’s hard to keep such things in mind.  What politician will ever feel comfortable saying to an opponent, “You may have a point there,” or even, “I think you have part of that right”?  That takes grace, and by “grace” I mean the help of God.

            So here’s where the Church has fallen down on the job.  We have failed to remind politicians and rulers that they do not speak with the voice of God, but that the voice of God, if they listen, will speak to them.  They may not like what they hear, but there is no other voice even worth listening to, not even the polls.  We have failed to explain the difference between “pivoting” and repentance.  We have failed to pray that they might have the gift of humility, the kind of humility that was shown by a Savior who was called a king but chose to ride into Jerusalem not on a warhorse but on a donkey.  (No, that does not mean that Jesus was a Democrat.)  In doing that, we have failed them as people and failed our society.

            We have just passed the fifteenth anniversary of a terrible events that have come to be known by the date 9/11.  Many decisions had to be made in the days and weeks that followed, some of which were good and some of which were bad, and the consequences of it are felt in ways that anyone not born before that day will never understand.  The world feels far more serious, even grim.  One thing that came to the fore during that period, though, was the awareness that there were people who had weighty matters in their hands and that they really needed other people’s prayers upholding them as they tried to find a way through the minefield that is the international scene.  The prayers offered on their behalf and the prayers that they prayed for themselves were sincere and not motivated by ego or the lust for power. 

That is the kind of prayer that should be offered for our leaders, and for the leaders of all nations, at all times.  The 1928 Book of Common Prayer included one such prayer.  The language is old-fashioned, but the meaning is entirely appropriate almost a century later.  If you would, please join your hearts in prayer with me:

“Almighty God, who hast given us this good land for our heritage; We humbly beseech thee that we may always prove ourselves a people mindful of thy favour and glad to do thy will. Bless our land with honourable industry, sound learning, and pure manners. Save us from violence, discord, and confusion; from pride and arrogancy, and from every evil way. Defend our liberties, and fashion into one united people the multitudes brought hither out of many kindreds and tongues. Endue with the spirit of wisdom those to whom in thy Name we entrust the authority of government, that there may be justice and peace at home, and that, through obedience to thy law, we may show forth thy praise among the nations of the earth. In the time of prosperity, fill our hearts with thankfulness, and in the day of trouble, suffer not our trust in thee to fail; all which we ask through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.



[1] http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/republican-convention-benediction_us_578d53fae4b0c53d5cfa99c9

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