Mountainview International Church

Welcome to Mountainview this morning. If you were with us last week you will know that we are back, continuing our look at the Sermon on the Mount. We noted last week we’ve reached the point in the Sermon on the Mount where Jesus focuses in on what was considered by the Jews to be the heart of faith namely; giving to the poor, prayer and fasting. Because they were considered to be signs of great piety, the trinity of holiness so to speak, their public expression had gained great importance. We used the analogy last week of a Christmas-light competition. They had become determined put on the best show in town. Jesus says to his listeners, to us, “Turn off the show. Practice your giving, prayer and fasting for God and not for the sake of those around you!”

Last week we focused in on giving, and in particular giving to the poor. Belinda Coombes shared the music stand with me and did a great job. Many of us were challenged by her passion to help the poor and needy in our area through Proyecto Bernabé.

Today we are going to look at the next of the Jewish big three…prayer. Bettina, who leads the Prayer Ministry at Mountainview, is going to be helping with the speaking as well as leading us in a time of prayer as a community. I have asked Bettina to come and read the passage for us in Spanish.

Prayer (Matt 6:5-14 NIV)

And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him. This, then, is how you should pray:

Our Father in heaven, hallowed be your name, your kingdom come, your will be done on earth as it is in heaven. Give us today our daily bread. Forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors. And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one. For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you

Gerard Kelly in his book Humanifesto about the Sermon on the Mount writes:

Prayer, like giving, is not about public performance but private perseverance. It is an inner journey, along roads on which God alone is our guide.

As Bettina and I talked about the message we spoke about this “inner journey”. We have decided to focus in on just one line where Jesus says:

When you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen.

I want to take a few minutes and look at the idea that the closed room of prayer is a place of silence and solitude. Then Bettina will come and speak to us about the idea that the closed room of prayer is a secret place within our hearts where we have an intimate, ongoing, communion with God. Instead of the Mountainview half–hour sermon the plan is to keep the talk slightly shorter this morning and devote more time to practicing prayer.

Prayer: A Place of Silence and Solitude

I recently came across an article on the BBC website entitled, Noise Annoys. It spoke of the growing noise levels in our world. Research suggests that there is a connection between the wealth of a society and the levels of noise within it. A project at Sheffield Hallam University tracked the levels of noise in UK for a number of years. For example it is rising - in Sheffield city centre, by 3 decibels in 10 years. We live in a very noisy world. But it’s more than just auditory noise. I was thinking this week that maybe we need to broaden the word “noise” to include all the sensory distractions that we are bombarded with each day. Maybe we should include:

1. Visual noise: The media in particular supplies us with a rich diet of imagery. Flashing images! Disturbing images, (probably necessary images) of a disaster half way round the world, like the hurricane in Burma or the earthquake this week in China! I don’t know about you, but I find sometimes my mind is so full of images that it is hard to sleep.

2. Sexual noise: Our world is full of sexual imagery. We use sex to sell almost everything. Consciously or unconsciously the imagery is adding noise to our lives.

3. Productivity noise: We have become units of productivity. In the name of bigger profits many companies are asking their workers to produce more in less time. We spend a lot of time thinking about how we can get more out of our limited time.

4. Email noise: Many of us here are bombarded with emails each day. In fact we are all bombarded with emails. I know we all gets lots of emails because Mountainview sends many of them out!

5. Taste noise: Have you ever thought about how our taste buds are bombarded by a choice of flavours never before experienced in the history of the world? Dave and I were just in A Coruña and we were taken to a restaurant with a mega selection of sauces to put on pasta. They all sounded sooooo good! It was difficult to choose!

Now I am not saying that noise in itself is bad. But I just want us to recognise that in its various shapes and forms we live in a VERY noisy world.

On top of the increase in noise, the article, Noise Annoys, spoke of how, on the other hand, there is a great aversion to silence in our world. A female composer recently wrote a piece of music that included 25 seconds of silence. Conductors were worried at how the musicians would cope, or if the audience would be thrown into a panic at the silence. We recently saw a though provoking video by Rob Bell at Jason and Becca’s small group called “Noise”. The video includes an extended cut to black and silence. Umpteen people, missing the point greatly, have written in to complain that their DVD does not work properly. Alastair John Campbell who served as Director of Communications and Strategy for the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1997 to 2003 argued that 24-hour news loathes a vacuum and that if he did not fill it, an editor or producer would.

Let’s be honest, even though we’d all agree that our world is noisy and we need more stillness many of us, most of us, are terrified by silence.

But into silence and solitude with God is where Christ calls us to go.

It’s interesting that if you do a study of God speaking to people in the bible it often happens at night (the is less noise at night) and it often happens when they are alone – like in the desert away from the “noise” of the world. God says to Abraham go out of your tent and look at the stars. God speaks to Jacob in a dream. God whispers Samuel’s name in the black of night. When God speaks to Elijah, in I Kings 19, He was not heard through the wind, the earthquake or the fire, but through the still small voice. Some translators have argued that a better translation would be to say that Elijah heard God in the “utter silence”. The bible suggests that silence is necessary to perceive and understand the voice of God.

Thomas Carlyle was a Scottish essayist, satirist, and historian, whose work was hugely influential during the Victorian era, and he wrote this about silence:

Under all speech that is good for anything there lies a silence that is better. Silence is deep as Eternity; speech is shallow as time.

Personally I find this a great challenge. I tend to be an activist and creating a place of peace and solitude in my life where I can be silent before God does not come easily. If I look deep into my soul I have to admit that there is a part of me that defines success by what I do. When I was in A Coruña visiting a pastor-friend called Rob Reed. It was amazing how simply leaving the “noise” of ministry in Madrid enabled me to get some renewed perspective on some issues I am facing. In the quieter-ness of A Coruña I was more able to hear the voice of God.

Riekje and I have a friend in the UK who finds it difficult to be alone at home. She’s always out - shopping and visiting friends. She comes back late at night and watches TV till she falls asleep. She avoids silence and solitude because it awakens ghosts of loneliness.

As I was preparing my message this week I found a quote that spoke to me about my busy search for significance and to our friend and her fear of loneliness. Dallas Willard writes:

The cure for too-much-to-do is solitude and silence, for there you will find that you are safely more than what you do. And the cure for loneliness is solitude and silence, for there you will discover in how many ways you are never alone.

To the driven! To the lonely! To us all! Jesus would say, “Create a place of peace and solitude where you can meet personally with the living God”. Maybe only so we can hear Him tell us how much He loves us and that He is Ok with who we are.

I believe that the topic of hearing the voice of God is so significant that in September and October we will look at the topic in depth. I’d like to hand over to Bettina who will speak to us about the heart being the secret place in which we meet God.

Bettina

So He Himself often withdrew into the wilderness and prayed. Luke 5:16

But you, when you pray, go into your room and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly. Matt.6:6

Prayer is so much more than mere speaking w God. It is a full communication that is so intimate, more intimate than we can imagine. It is the true language of our heart. When I say our heart, I mean the most private and innermost part of ourselves.

We need to be conscious that prayer is not about asking, it’s not a single event that happens and is over with, as in one’s morning or evening prayers, over and done with…but it’s about a constant abiding in Christ. It’s the coming before God as we are. I’ve come to understand that prayer is everything!

It’s the opening of ourselves- our hearts, our souls, our minds to Someone who is LIKE a Father, LIKE a mother, like a counselor, a teacher, a healer, etc…and all the Biblical names and references for who God is. When I say “like” I mean that we as human beings cannot even fathom what one personality of God is even like because it’s so beyond our understanding. Prayer is the opening, abiding and the constant surrender of ourselves to Jesus in deep, intimate and often secret relationship.

Prayer comes from the heart – it starts in and flows within the heart. It’s a love relationship, and I repeat, a relationship of love.

As a child, I would think about this mystery relationship of love. I grew up as a Catholic but I was never part of a church nor did I have a background in the Bible. I did, however, from an early age begin to sense God’s leading and guiding me. And I remember sensing deeply inside of myself God’s love. Often I would think to myself, where did this love come from? Who loved first, me or Christ? One day as an adult I came across the answer in the Bible in 1 John 4:19…”we love because he first loved us.”

Prayer with God really is a flow of communication in the spirit; of your heart and God’s heart as you and he communicate. It’s this communication which is very practical and realistic. How? Because it’s communication and listening with and to Someone who is deeply and passionately in love with you, and he guides our relationship with him and speaks with us, he responds to us, he guides us. I’ll give you an example.

I began to personally experience God as the living, real God as a child. In churches I had been to, I was exposed to boring and just bad prayer times. Despite these confusing prayer experiences I had, I also began to go through what I see now as God taking me and gently and kindly teaching me about the freedom and beauty of real prayer when I was in nature. I have childhood memories of my family and I going to the countryside or when in Italy at my uncle’s farm that as I walked and played in nature by myself that I would spontaneously begin to pray. I felt the reality of the joy and the presence of a God I was coming to know.

Througout these years, I’ve begun to understand that with God, it’s a relationship, not a practice, but a personal relationship and personal reality.

There are many types of prayers (give a few examples). The type of prayer I would like us to concentrate on following with a practical and experiential time are on Jesus’ words in Matt 6:6 of going into the stillness and quietness of our hearts.

In Matt 6:6 Jesus says “But you, when you pray, go into your room and when you have shut your door, pray to your Father who is in the secret place; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you openly.”

What I’m understanding that Jesus is saying about “in the secret place”- he’s talking not only about a secret physical place but also about the attitude of the heart – a secret place in the heart to be alone with Jesus in prayer. The question may be “where do we go to be all alone with God?” In the Greek, “into your room” means into a storeroom of great treasure. What Jesus is saying is that if your attitude of prayer is one of secrecy, then God who sees what we do in secret will give you his treasures, which is nothing less than himself. If we pray with the motive of encountering God, then this is what we’ll get.