September 15, 2017 - A Simple Way to Pray 3

Listen here.

Welcome to Devotions for Worship where we meditate on the appointed Scripture readings for the upcoming Sunday. Thank you for being with me today.

I am Pastor Eric Tritten from Gloria Dei Lutheran Church in Hudson, OH.

On Fridays we explore some devotional thoughts, habits, and practices, by looking at what others have written on devotion. We’ve kicked off this series by looking at a great document written by Martin Luther called A Simple Way to Pray.

So far we’ve talked about how devotional habits can become cool and joyless, and we need God’s Word to warm and enliven us for this task of reading the Word and prayer. The Word is not only the focus of our devotion, the Holy Spirit also uses it to empower our devotional habits. We’ve also talked about the dangers of putting our times of Scripture reading and prayer off, although there are times where that might be necessary and even more important than our normal devotional habits.

Today we will hear how Luther began his times of prayer. Please notice that he speaks of bodily postures – I’ll comment more on that after we read this section of A Simple Way to Pray – and also see that Luther’s prayer flows from his interaction with God’s Word. 

So let’s read the next section of this letter that Luther wrote to his friend to learn how Luther taught him to pray. I’m going to be reading from the American Edition of Luther’s Works, vol. 43. This version of A Simple Way to Pray was translated by Carl Schindler, and the copyright belongs to Fortress Press. I am grateful that they have given me permission to share this with you.

A Simple Way to Pray – paragraphs 7-8 – I did not ask for permission to print A Simple Way to Pray, but there are many versions available on line. Here is a link to one of them. A Simple Way to Pray.

Luther began with God’s Word – and it seems that this was mostly done from memory. He recited the Commandments or the words of Christ – to become intent on the matter at hand. We remember that the Holy Spirt works through God’s Word to strengthen and enliven our faith, and it is faith that receives God’s promises and acts upon them.

He then speaks of kneeling or standing with hands folded and eyes toward heaven. Today we tend to teach people to fold their hands and bow their heads. In Haiti they teach the little boys to pray with their hands covering their faces. The point here isn’t really to take a particular posture, but to choose how you will settle yourself to prayer and not get distracted. Our posture should help us to be alert and to keep our mind on our task. This isn’t a matter of God’s law, but of pragmatism. From my own experience, if I pray while I’m laying in bed I will likely fall asleep while I pray. If I kneel at the kneeler in my office, I will be more alert and think of more things to pray about. Find what works best for you. For many of us, we learned to kneel beside our beds to pray. That can be a good and useful habit. For others sitting in a chair or standing is better. Again, find a posture that helps you engage in prayer, and use it over and over again to use your posture to let your mind and heart know what you are focusing on.

Luther comes a prayer from a place of humility – recognizing that his sin keeps him from God’s presence. However, he also holds strongly to God’s command and promise. This idea of command and promise mirrors two ways that God deals with us – through his Law and Gospel. We should know that God commands us to pray. He says we are to call upon him and not to other gods. If we, in our sins, are disincline to approach God we have this goad to push us in the right direction. At the same time, God issues us a loving invitation to pray. He urges us to come to him as our loving father. This is such a glorious invitation that we rejoice that we are able to come to him.

So which is it that moves us to pray – command or promise? It is both. Sometimes we need the command. Sometimes we rejoice to approach through the promise that God hears our prayers for Jesus’ sake. In both cases the command and the promise flow from God’s love and guide us to come to him so that, as we say in the Small Catechism, we “call upon him in every trouble, pray, praise and give thanks.”

Prayers –
O God, we thank you for your Word and for the gift of prayer. We pray that you would help us grow in our devotion to meditating on your Word and responding to you in prayer, and we ask that our devotion would be rooted in your love for us and our love for you. We put ourselves, our friends, our loved ones, and our enemies into your hands. Help us to walk with you all our days. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.

Memory Verse: Matthew 18:21-22 - Then Peter came up and said to him, "Lord, how often will my brother sin against me, and I forgive him? As many as seven times?" 22 Jesus said to him, "I do not say to you seven times, but seventy-seven times.  (Matt. 18:21-22 ESV)

Hey, remember that if you want to help those who have been hurt by Hurricane Harvey a great place to do so is LCMS World Relief and Human Care. If you go to www.lcms.org/disaster you can donate.


Thank you so much for using Devotions for Worship, I pray that our time together has blessed you and given you something to meditate on – some reminder of God’s grace to rattle around in your brain – for the rest of the day. 

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