Monday, February 11, 2013

Humble Congressional Prayers

From its inception, our nation has been a nation of believing people who do not expect our national unity to be reinforced by religious unity.  In the 18th century, this was a political experiment without precedent.  From our modern perspective, the fact that our population was almost universally Protestant Christian might lead us to believe that it was a simple proposition.  It was not.

Today our political experiment is much more complicated.  Our religious plurality is much  broader, including now Catholics, Jews, Muslims, Hindus, and a multitude of other faiths, not to mention those who claim no religious affiliation, the "Nones."

People of the Abrahamic faiths, certainly, believe that God is involved in the affairs of the world.  Within each of these religions, as we know, there are great differences in understanding of what God's will is for the world and for the men and women within and without these belief systems.  But as followers of Christ, we know from history that the affairs of men and women are affected, both for good and for ill, by people of faith, and people without faith, not to mention by "acts of nature," or "acts of God."

So what might it mean to be a nation of prayer?  And how might people of prayer pray then, for the president and for all those who would serve in political office?

We might start from a position of humility.  We are all creatures.  Though the strength of our faith, or our convictions, might lead us to believe we know what God's will is, or, dare I say, what we think it must be, God has shown throughout history that He is not manipulated by prayer.  Rather, He is mindful of our prayer, and faithful to those who put our trust in Him.  Oftentimes, the fruits of our prayers, or the hopes of our peoples, are not fulfilled in our own times, or in satisfaction of our own understanding.  Sometimes we lose, but God has not and does not abandon the human family.

The president, not to mention the men and women of Congress, do not need our prayers because they are people of strong faith themselves, or because of their righteous ways or political correctness or incorrectness.  They need our prayers because they are our brothers and sisters.  They are striving, as we are, to find and perhaps bring meaning to the work they do to benefit our nation.

Is it too much to believe that God has been a part of our American experiment from the beginning?  Is it too much to believe that God is a part still, working through us all to make America, and our world, a sacred reality?  Is it too much to believe that that is worth praying for?

I hope not.

(Rev. Patrick J.Conroy,Chaplain of the U.S. House of Representatives, Intercessors for America, Jan/Feb 2013, www.IFAPray.org)


What is the most pressing need of the evangelical church today if she is to make an impact on society?

"Now, therefore, you are no longer strangers and foreigners, but fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, having been built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone, in whom the whole building, being fitted together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are being built together for a dwelling place of God in the Spirit." Ephesians 2:19-22

From my perspective as an educator in the Christian world, I have a rather limited view of the problems that emerge in the church and the needs that are most pressing.  We have a sinful tendency to pick our own area of specialty and make that the most important one and say that's where we really need to have the energy focused or where the changes happen.  Like everybody else, that's where I am.

I happen to believe that the most urgent need right now among evangelical Christians, if they're ever going to make an impact in this world, is at the level of adult education.  For Christians to grow to maturity, they have to think like Christians.  To behave in the fullness of maturity as effective, principled disciples of Christ, they need to gain an indepth understanding of the Word of God.  The Bible, I think, echoes that sentiment again and again in the numerous passages that exhort us to be mature in our understanding.  At times the author of Hebrews heavily rebukes the Christian community by saying that they had spent too much time as babes in Christ; they were too content with milk and were not moving on to solid meat.  If we're going to make an impact in our cuture, we have to be spiritually mature.

Let me put it this way: Children don't make a lot of impact in the changing of a nation. They don't create the values and the structures of the nation in which we live.  I think that has a carryover spiritually.  We have to grow to adulthood as Christians before we're ever going to have any kind of significant impact on the culture.

According to the most comprehensive study/poll about religion ever conducted in the United States, we should be in the greatest revival this country has ever experienced.  About 65 million people in the United States claim to be born-again Christians.  And yet that same study shows little or no measurable impact by that group on the shaping of the social institutions and the structures of our nation.  How is it possible that a block of people that strong does not make its influence felt more significantly in the shaping of our nation?  My conclusion is that we haven't yet understood the biblical values ourselves and haven't come to that dpeth of understanding that provides maturity for leadership.

(R. C. Sproul, Now,That's a Good Question, 1996)

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