The Sacred Echo
06/27/2010 - Echoes
This morning we begin a brand new teaching series. You haven't heard me say that in a long time after spending a year and a half in the gospel of Mark! It's a series on prayer and I'm excited about it. But it's more than a series on prayer. It has to do with how God leads and guides and shepherd's our lives if we invite him to.
It's about following Jesus which is what Jesus was always inviting people to do. "Come, follow me," he said to Peter and his brother Andrew while they were casting their nets into the Sea of Galilee. "Come, follow me and I will make you fishers of people."
Follow me! That's what Jesus wants us to do. He wants us to follow him. But what does it mean to follow Jesus? What does that look like for you and for me and what part does prayer play in all that?
Last year, I spoke over at the Lower Providence Presbyterian Church as part of their Good Friday worship gatherings. And as a sign of appreciation one of the pastors gave me a copy of a book calledThe Sacred Echo: Hearing God's Voice in Every Area of Your Life. The book was written by Margaret Feinberg and the title intrigued me and when I opened the front cover I was impressed by the comments and endorsements made by pastors and authors, activists and recovering sinners, people whose names I knew and have a lot of respect for.
So I decided to read the book and it got me thinking a lot about my own walk with Jesus and my own experience with prayer and God's guidance in my life over the years. And I could relate to a lot of the questions and struggles that Margaret wrestles with.
And so I've been looking for a chance to share some of that with you and thought that this summer would be a good time to do that. You don't need to buy the book or even read the book. The Scriptures will be our main textbook, but you can if you like. You can always pick up a copy on amazon.com for about $10.
It's been awhile since we've talked about what a day to day walk with Jesus looks like and I think this series will help us with that. But before we go any further let's meet Margaret Feinberg and listen to how she introduces her book.
Play 1:00 video
"Why is prayer so mysterious?" she says. That's her first question. And that's a good one. In fact, that's how I've titled this series, The Sacred Echo: Exploring the Mystery of Prayer.
There is a lot about prayer I don't understand. In many ways it is a mystery to me. But it's also an incredible privilege that we as God's children can jump up into our father's lap and speak to him anytime, anywhere, about anything that's on our mind. We're never alone. God is always only a prayer away. Yet why do some of our prayers get answered and others don't?
Each Wednesday morning we meet in the office here as a staff and we pray together. We pray for each other and our families. We pray for you and the Valley View community. And we pray for the needs of the world, global concerns like the oil spill in the gulf, and the earthquakes in Haiti and other places, and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, and the tensions in the Middle East and North Korea. We bring all these things to the Lord week after week, month after month, year after year.
And we celebrate when we can remove someone or something from the prayer list because that prayer was answered. But there are some names and situations that never seem to change. And often I wonder, "Why God? Why aren't you answering that prayer? Are we praying for the right things? Are our prayers not getting through? Or is there some lesson here that you're trying to teach us or trying to teach them that we don't know about and need to learn?" There are all kinds of questions that we can have about prayer and its effectiveness to change situations and circumstances.
And then there's the whole question about how God leads us today. Certainly the Scriptures are where we go first to hear God's voice and get God's guidance. It's the Scriptures that we open up every week for our teaching here at Valley View. But the Scriptures don't always deal with the individual questions that we have about things like the choice of a college or a career, for instance, or the choice of a mate, or the changing of a job or a career, or the making of a move.
So how do we hear God's voice and follow his lead on those decisions? How do we discern the promptings of the Holy Spirit that Jesus says dwells in every believer? Like Margaret asks in the video clip, "God, was that really you? Was that your voice or was that my own? I want to have a relationship with you where prayer is as natural as breathing." Don't we all? I hunger for that kind of intimacy with God.
And so this summer we want to explore together this whole concept of sacred echoes and what it means to listen to God's persistent voice in our life because it's been my experience too that when God wants to get my attention the same theme, idea, impression, or lesson keeps repeating itself again and again in surprising and unexpected ways. That's the sacred echo.
Now there's a premise behind this series and I'll give it to you right up front. And the premise is this ... that there is God who knows you and who loves you and who cares enough about you to be actively involved in your life. That's the premise behind this series. And I think that's the premise behind following Jesus. God knows us. God loves us. And God is actively involved in our lives. And prayer is one of the ways, perhaps the way, that we both talk to and listen to God.
The first mention of the word "pray" in the Scriptures is found inGenesis 20:7 where God says to a man named Abimelek, Now return the man's wife, for he is a prophet, and he will pray for you and you will live. But if you do not return her, you may be sure that you and all who belong to you will die.
The man's wife, in this passage, is Sarah, the wife of Abraham. And she had been taken from Abraham by a king named Abimelek. And because of that God had inflicted this man with a disease. But if he returned Sarah, Abraham would pray for Abimelek that he would be healed.
And so we read inGenesis 20:17, Then Abraham prayed to God, and God healed Abimelek, his wife and his female slaves so they could have children again.
That's the first mention of answered prayer in the Scriptures. It's a prayer for healing and God answered it. The next mention of answered prayer is for a wife in Genesis 24 and God answers that and then for children in Genesis 25 and God answers that. These are things that we still pray for today.
From the very beginning of the Christian story we see God interacting with people starting as soon as God creates them. In Genesis 1, God blesses the first man and woman and tells them to be fruitful and multiple, fill the earth and subdue it.
In Genesis 2, God walks with Adam and Eve in the garden in the cool of the day and converses with them. That's a wonderful picture of fellowship and intimacy. He interacts with Cain and Abel the children of Adam and Eve and their children. And then in Genesis 6 he calls a man named Noah to build an ark so he can rescue him and his family from judgment that will consume the earth in the form of a flood.
He dials Abraham's number in Genesis 12 and promises to make him into a great nation and establishes a covenant with him in Genesis 15. He interacts with Hagar, Sarah's servant, the mother of Ishmael and on and on it goes.
God didn't create humankind and then just check out. Even after sin entered the world and things got real ugly God continued to engage with his people, the people that he made and the people that he loves. He didn't go deaf. We see that all throughout the pages of Scripture from Genesis through Revelation.
God longs to have a relationship with his people. He longs to have a relationship with you and with me and communication is a big part of that relationship, as it is with any healthy relationship. And when it comes to walking with God and following Jesus, prayer is a big part of that communication.
Feinberg opens her book with the story of the prophet Elijah running away from his enemies in 1 Kings 19 and I'd like us to look at that passage as well. So if you have a Bible turn with me to 1 Kings 19.
To set the context we need to understand that in 1 Kings 18, just the chapter before, Elijah had had one of the best days of his life. He had won the Super Bowl! He had taken on the false prophets of Baal and challenged them to a contest to see whose God was real because the people of Israelwere wavering in their faith.
So before the contest Elijah says in 1 Kings 18:21,"How long will you waver between two opinions? If the Lord is God, follow him, but if Baal is God, follow him." But the people said nothing. They wanted to keep their options open, like so many people want to do today, but Elijah wanted them to make a commitment to follow the one true God. Just like Jesus wants us to make a commitment to follow him.
So he builds an altar on top of Mount Carmel and prepares a bull for sacrifice. He cuts it in pieces and arranges the wood, but he doesn't set it on fire. Instead, he has the 450 prophets of Baal do the same thing. They build an altar, arrange the wood, and prepare the sacrifice too.
And the contest is this. "You pray to your god and I'll pray to my God and whichever God answers by fire and ignites the sacrifice - that's the one true God." And the people buy in and say, "What you say is good."
So all day long the prophets of Baal are shouting and gyrating, jumping up and down and cutting themselves with swords and spears, prophesying and trying to get their god's attention. But there's no response, no one answers, no one pays attention because nobody's home. In fact, Elijah suggests in verse 27, "Perhaps your god is deep in thought, or busy, or traveling. Maybe he's sleeping and needs to be awakened."
Meanwhile, Elijah soaks his sacrifice with buckets of water to make it even harder to ignite and then prays this simple prayer in 1 Kings 18:36-37, Lord, the God of Abraham, Isaac and Israel, let it be known today that you are God in Israel and that I am your servant and have done all these things at your command. 37Answer me, Lord, answer me, so these people will know that you, Lord, are God, and that you are turning their hearts back again.
Then immediately fire comes down from heaven and burns up the sacrifice, consumes the wood, the stones, the dirt, and licks up the water all around the altar.
And 1 Kings 18:39 says, When all the people saw this, they fell prostrate and cried, "The Lord - he is God! The Lord - he is God!" It was an incredible, undeniable manifestation of God's presence, a dramatic answer to prayer. To this day it's one of the signature expressions of God's power in all of Israel's history. And Elijah was there to witness it. He had prayed the prayer that brought down fire from heaven. He had won the Super Bowl! Today if you go to the top of Mount Carmel in Israelthere's a statue of Elijah at the summit commemorating this spectacular event.
It was one of the best days of his life and when we have a dramatic answer to prayer like that it can be one of the best days of our lives as well.
I'll never forget the night Jennifer picked me up from the airport after flying back from Africa in March of 2004 and telling me the story that while I was away God had answered years of prayer and provided the Sunnyside property and this facility as a gathering place for our church right in the center of the bulls eye that we had drawn on a map as our desired location. It was amazing and still gives me chills when I tell people about it. It's been one of the ways that I've sensed God's hand on this work. And in my mind I've gone back to it many times over the last few years for strength and encouragement.
Prayer is talking and listening to God. And sometimes when God answers a dramatic prayer like that it can take our breath away and energize us and keep us following Jesus for another leg of the journey. But unfortunately we don't live most of our lives on top of Mount Carmel. Like Elijah, 1 Kings 18 is often followed by 1 Kings 19 when God seems distant and strangely quiet.
In the next chapter we find Elijah running for his life from Queen Jezebel who is out to kill him for slaughtering the prophets of Baal. And we read in I Kings 19:3, Elijah was afraid and ran for his life. When he came to Beershebain Judah, he left his servant there, 4while he himself went a day's journey into the wilderness. He came to a broom bush, sat down under it and prayed that he might die. "I have had enough, LORD," he said. "Take my life; I am no better than my ancestors." 5Then he lay down under the tree and fell asleep.
Wow! Did you ever feel like that? "I've had it, Lord. I'm done. Take me home." I can relate. Elijah goes from the Super Bowl to the toilet bowl, from the mountain top to the desert, balled up in the fetal position, alone, and suicidal. Who said following God was easy? Some days we just want to quit, don't we?
After he's fed by an angel, he walks forty days and forty nights down to Mount Horeb also known as Mount Sinai, the mountain of God where Moses received the Ten Commandments. It's a significant place in Israel's history and there he crawls into a cave and pulls the covers over his head when the Lord shows up and says in verse 9, "What are you doing here, Elijah?"
And the pity party continues. Look at verse 10, He replied, "I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too."
Elijah says, "I'm the only one following God. Look at all I've done for you, Lord. I've been zealous for you and your work. Yet here I am alone. In a cave. Running for my life. Miles from no where." You've got to love Elijah's honesty with God. And prayer is the vehicle for that. Sometimes we use it to blow off steam. And we're in good company when we do.
And the LORD said, in verse 11, "Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the LORD, for the LORD is about to pass by." Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the LORD, but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12After the earthquake came a fire, but the LORD was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave.
Then a voice said to him, "What are you doing here, Elijah?"
It's the same question. And look how he responds in verse 14, He replied, "I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, torn down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too."
It's the same response! Word for word almost like it was rehearsed or scripted out. But then God changes his response in verse 15,The LORD said to him, "Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. 16Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. 17Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu.18Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel—all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him."
Elijah may have been done with God. But God was not done with Elijah. He still had work for him to do. But he would refresh and equip for that work first.
I love what Margaret Feinberg says about this incident. "Our outrageously generous God provides for this torn-up prophet physically with food, emotionally with friendship, relationally with a wingman named Elisha, and spiritually with encouragement. God whispers life back into Elijah.
"This story has always reminded me of just how much I need to be able to recognize God's whispers - those moments when he draws near and breathes words of life into my soul.
"Neither the wind, the earthquake, and the fire happened apart from God's knowledge or permission. In fact, God used these repeated demonstrations to prepare Elijah for an encounter with himself. And like an echo, God often uses repetitive events and themes in daily life to get my attention and draw me closer to himself.
"Now instead of just listening for God's whisper, I'm trying to recognize the sacred echoes - those moments when God speaks the same message to my heart again and again. I call them sacred echoes because I've noticed that throughout my relationships, daily life, and study, the same scripturally sound idea or phrase or word will keep reappearing until I can no longer avoid its presence."
It's easy to see God in the dramatic. But what I hope happens to us in this series is that we'll also begin to see God in the details, in the subtle yet persistent ways that he seeks to lead us and guide us and speak into our lives if we let him. So let's begin the adventure together as we learn to listen to sacred echoes and explore the mystery of prayer.