Pray Like Jesus: Pray In The Closet

Pray in the Closet
The road to hell is marked with good intention…. (Saint Bernard of Clarivaux said this back in the 11th century)
I think about this every time Lent comes around. Lots of good intentions to read your Bible, pray for others, serve the community, fast, give generously to those in need, teach and learn, grow in spiritual depth and relationship. This year I could feel our need for Lent in my bones. It has been one of the longest lapses between 2016 lent and this year, due to the movability of Easter, based on the first full moon after the vernal equinox. 385 days since ashes last marked me as God’s and reminded me of my mortality. I am not sure about you, but we, the church need to return to God.
The prophet Joel calls our biblical ancestors and us to return to God. Joel calls us to return because the prophet knows two things about God’s people. First, they know God. They know that God has created them and made them. They know that God has whispered in their ears and urged them on in times of troubles. They know that God has walked with them by day in a pillar of cloud and by night in fire. They know that God has been known in the miraculous birth of all kinds of creatures and the protection from the storms. The prophet knows that God’s people of his day and today have known God. And at some point or another they have committed to God, given their lives and their hearts to be God’s people.
The other things that the prophet knows about the people who he is calling with the trumpet and those of who hear the faint trumpet sounds today is we need to be called back. We have wandered away. We have gotten comfortable in thinking that we can manage God. We think we have all the answers. We think we know the routines and the rhetoric. Instead of praying for someone, we tell them that our prayers will be with them. We intend to pray for them later, I often wonder, do we? Instead of reaching of with dinner after the death of someone’s loved one, we tell them we thought of doing something and ask them to tell us if they need anything, as if the onus is on the one is grief as opposed to the one offering care. We have had really good intentions that we have always meant to get around to, you and me.
The prophet Joel knows that the people need the day marked on the calendar – the trumpet sounding loudly and obnoxiously through the land in order for people to not just ignore and nod their heads. This also what Jesus knew when he was teaching the disciples and the crowds how to pray. They were primarily Jews, who had been to the Temple, who memorized the prayers, who knew prayers. But did they know how to pray? They still came to Jesus when their hearts were filled to the brim with grief over the daughter who was no longer breathing. They came to Jesus with the friend who was paralyzed. Did they know how to pray or just how to say prayers?
Jesus told them to pray in their rooms with the doors shut. Oh, how we introverts love this! No need to take public speaking courses and know all the right words. No need to be polished and perfected as we offer all of the 25 cent words. If this is what we think, we have missed Jesus’ point. Jesus calls us to pray our hearts. Jesus calls us to offer to God those things we do not even want to admit that live in our hearts. Jesus says go to the private place and depend only on God. Go to the private place and tell God your fear that when you hear about someone with dementia, you are terrified for your own mind. Go to the private place and share with God your deepest anxiety that losing your mother will mean that your siblings will no longer gather together. Go to the private place and yell about the justice deferred to your neighbors who are treated differently still because they represent different racial and ethnic backgrounds. Go to the private place and confess that you are not sure how God wants you to stand up in the middle of this horrific storm and praise God’s name, when all you want to do is stay in bed and watch reruns of I Love Lucy.
It was this last year that we heard the challenge to go to the War Room. War Room, the compelling movie that urges us all to be in focused and concentrated prayer for those we love and care for. The movie illustrates a particular woman, Miss Clara, who made space in her home dedicated to prayer. Who keeps a journal a book dedicated to prayer. Who uses both to structure her prayer life in intentional ways.
This is not just a nice movie to inspire us and help us feel good for a while. Listen to the trumpet blow! Listen to the prophets call us! Listen to the God of your heart!
Repent and turn around. Come back.
From the spiritual laziness, let us turn back to God.
I thought for a long time, it didn’t matter where I pray. And it is true, I can and do and will pray anywhere. However, I also have my chair. I have my space with my Bible and prayer journal, with my pen and blanket – where I pray. Every time, I look at it, I am called back to pray. Every time, I walk into my library, I hear the trumpets of pray calling me and holding me accountable to not just pray as I go, but also commit time to God in my prayer place.
I do not know where your place is. Maybe it is on the car on your way to work. Maybe it is the bathroom, the only place you can find brief respite from the kids. Maybe it is on the back porch looking into nature. Maybe it is your closet cleaned out with a small space for a chair and a journal. Wherever you find a place, let God hallow the space to a place of heart prayer. A place of private prayer.
Throughout Lent, we will learn multiple new techniques and ways to pray. We’ll talk about public prayer and intercessory prayer. Prayer that is familiar and probably that which makes you uncomfortable. For today, I stand in the line of prophets who call you back to prayer, back to prayer in private, heart filled and God dependent.
So, go the closet and pray when you cannot longer hold your disappointment over not getting the promotion you were looking for and were sure was coming to you next.
Go to the closet and pray when you hear of another sister who is preparing her family to walk the journey of breast cancer.
Go to the closet and pray when you hear that our country who proclaims shared values in welcome and grace is deporting and refusing immigrants and migrants.
Go to the closet and pray when you hear of another person whose life is tied up in the opioid addiction that is pervasive and attacking our loved ones.
Go to the closet and pray when you, yourself are spend and overwhelmed.
Go to your private prayer place – beg and confess, adore and thank, worry and wonder, and then listen.
Jesus reminds us that God who sees us in private, will reward us.
Listen to where God accompanies you and guides you into the glory of God’s way.
From God you have come and to God you will return.
This is the Gospel of our Lord Jesus Christ, thanks be to God, Amen.