St Columba Presbyterian Church:

JULY 25, 2010

SERMON.

Let us pray,

Gracious God, you have placed within the hearts of all your children a longing for your Word, a hunger for your Truth. Come to us in our reflection on Scripture this day; feed us, inspire us, confront and challenge us, that we may have all the resources to be faithful servants of your grace, and courageous witnesses for your Kingdom; through Jesus Christ our Lord, in whose name we pray.

Amen.

"BEING PERSISTENT IN A PERPETUAL STORY!"

How long should a sermon be?

It's a subject that causes much discussion and debate, and it is probably the most frequent criticism of us preachers; he preaches too long, thirty-five to forty minutes, I can't sit still that long anymore. And then there are those who believe that thirty-five to forty minutes should be the bare minimum. My sermons are usually somewhere around fifteen minutes, by the way!

Your response to the question will, to some extent, be determined by the time, place, and culture in which you were raised. If you are from traditional, conservative, European roots for example, then you will likely be used to long sermons; forty, fifty minutes, even an hour! Hey, attention spans were much longer in those times.

When I was in theological college, sharing in seminars on the craft of

preparing, writing, and presenting, a sermon; the moment inevitably came when we put our Director of Studies on the spot, and asked him how long a sermon should be. A canny, gentle, soul, with a dry, dead-pan, sense of humour, he looked around the table at each one of us and, with a twinkle in his eye, said, 'If you haven't struck oil after 15 minutes, stop boring!'.

In an age much less politically-correct than ours, it was apparently once suggested that the length of a sermon should be like the length of a woman's dress: long enough to cover the subject, short enough to keep one interested!

One of the things you hopefully learn quite quickly when you take up preaching as a profession, is that you don't have to tell it all at once; as my good friend and colleague Bob Sparks would say, 'you don't have to offer the whole counsel of God in one serving.'. I read recently of a new preacher who was greeted by a woman as she left his first service. "Good sermon." she said, "in fact it was two, maybe three, good sermons.". "Did I preach too long?" he asked. "Let's just say you missed one or town good stopping places." she replied.

And then if the sermon is too short, there is, of course, always the issue of whether or not you were given "value for money"; an issue emphasised by the fact that, nowadays, in many churches the Offering comes right after the sermon!

It is, indeed, a subject that can give rise to much debate and discussion.

In reality, there is probably no good answer to that question of how long a sermon should be. For if you step back, and look at it objectively for a moment, each sermon is only one, minute, part of a vast, eternal, on-going story; a story that has been, and will continue to be, taught and interpreted, all down the ages.

Our opening hymn this morning connected us to that story; "The God of Abraham praise, Who reigns enthroned above, Ancient of everlasting days, And God of love.". The God of 'Abraham' praise; Abraham one of the first great patriarchs of ancient Israel, from the beginnings of the Old Testament story. It reminds us of the thousands upon thousands of years, generation after generation, of worship and service, that have been offered to God, in various forms, down the ages. Our lives, the forty years of the life and witness of this Church Family which we will celebrate in September; vital and necessary as all of that has been, they are but the blink of an eye, in the continually unfolding story of God's everlasting love. What matters in all of that is not the length of any one sermon, but that our relationship with God, and His call to us as His people, is still explored and considered, reflected upon and celebrated. It's part of being persistent in a perpetual story.

"Master, teach us to pray...", Jesus is asked by one of His disciples one day. We read about this in our lesson from the beginning of chapter 11 of Luke's Gospel this morning; St. Luke chapter 11, verses 1 to 13. The words Jesus offers in response are words we know well. We recite a version of them, together in worship, Sunday, after Sunday, after Sunday; as again, countless generations before us have done. Jesus then answers that request in two ways; teaching what our prayers should always encompass, and, how it is that we should go about praying. For learning to pray, is much more than just learning a prayer.

Luke's version of what we call "The Lord's Prayer", is much shorter than the one in Matthew, which is the basis of what we recite in worship. Luke goes for simple, short, sweet, and to the point. We are to call God "Father", the source word here is actually the word "Abba", which would be better translated "Dad". This is a word that speaks of closeness, of love and care, of trust and reliance. God, and our dependence on Him, is acknowledged before anything else. The prayer then goes on to cover all of life; present need, what we must have for each day; past sin or misjudgment, we seek forgiveness in the same measure as we reflect that forgiveness to others; and future challenge or temptation, anything that might divert us from following God's way. It's a pattern which shows what should always be included in our prayers, whether in times of public worship or private devotion. It's about coming to God simply, talking to Him as we would our own father, sharing His concern for the world, and telling Him our own needs.

Having set this pattern, Jesus then tell two stories, two parables, that show how we should go about praying. The stories are about persistence; about enduring, continuing obstinately, not being easily dissuaded, being firm, and unwavering. We are to be persistent when we pray, not in the sense of nagging God into submission; but in the sense of it being what we should, constantly and consistently, be about; the continual conversation of prayer, reflecting our continual relationship with God in Jesus Christ. The story of the grudging neighbour who eventually gets up to help out, contrasts with God's ready willingness to help alleviate all of our needs, which He actually knows better than we know them ourselves. If we ask, we will be given.

In God in Jesus Christ is all that we need. That is what Jesus' teaching on prayer reminds us, and that is also emphasised in Paul's words to the new church in Colossae which we also read today. Nothing needs to be added to, or taken away from, God's provision for us; our faith must be Christ-centred or it is nothing at all, we have all we need in Him. Sin is forgiven, evil is conquered; Christ represents not only the absolute fulness of God, but also the all-sufficient fullness of life, and salvation, for His people.

Prayer, then, is a vital part of that on-going relationship we enjoy with God. Our second hymn this morning, the one from "Sing!", reminded us of the gift of gratitude which we should always bring and offer to God for all of His blessings, and that sense of thanksgiving must also always be reflected in our prayer-life.

Prayer draws us into a very special dimension of our relationship in Jesus Christ. We have the words He taught us, and we have learned to recite them by rote, but there can be so much more to it all than that.

The hymn we sang just before the sermon, Joseph Scriven's much-loved "What a friend we have in Jesus," reminds us of the depth we should feel in that connection. A friend is someone we are close to, someone with whom we can readily share; someone who will listen, care, accept; someone who will advise, and judge, honestly and fairly; someone with whom we can be fully open, and at ease. We need to strive to sense that, as we share with God in prayer.

Probably the biggest challenge in our prayer relationship with God in Jesus, is when we don't seem to be getting an answer. Most of us are willing to concede that we may not get the answer we want; what we will get is the answer God thinks is best for us. But the truly difficult part, is when we don't seem to get an answer at all.

Those parables Jesus shared in our reading this morning remind us of the value of persistence, particularly when we don't think we are receiving an answer. Who wants to get up in the middle of the night, but the neighbour persists in his request, and his friend relents. Likewise, when we pray, we may not get an answer right away, but we should persist. As we have already acknowledged, we may not get what we want; but answers will become much clearer if we do not give God an agenda, or set Him a timetable. Instead, what we should give Him is ourselves, and invite Him to do with us what to Him seems best.

A clover blossom contains less than one-eighth of a grain of sugar. Seven thousand grains of sugar are needed to make a pound of clover-honey. And so a honey-bee, must visit over fifty-six thousand clover heads, to gather enough sugar to make that pound of honey. That's what it is to be patient; that's what it is to be persistent!

Our closing hymn this morning speaks, in one of its verses, of "the patience of unanswered prayer.". God will answer us, but sometimes we need to learn to wait.

Prayer is part of that perpetual; that continuous, uninterrupted, indeed eternal; story of God at work in our lives. Sadly we don't get the same opportunity to sing evening hymns as we once did. John Ellerton's great hymn "The day Thou gavest, Lord, is ended;", reflects on our perpetual, universal, relationship with God. "As o'er each continent and island The dawn lead on another day, The voice of prayer is never silent, Nor dies the strain of praise away.".

We are called to be persistent in prayer. It is part of that great, perpetual, story, of God's redeeming love for us in Jesus.

Let us pray,

Great and all-loving God, as Jesus has taught us, help us always to be persistent, confident, when we come to you in prayer. In all that we ever request, fill us with the first and best of your gifts, your Holy Spirit, which makes us your children, now and always. And this we ask, in Jesus' own name, who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, now and for evermore.

Amen.