Category Archives: Prayer

Book Review: “Useful Wisdom: Letters to Young (and Not-So-Young) Ministers” by Anthony B. Robinson

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Book Review: “Useful Wisdom: Letters to Young (and Not-so-Young) Ministers” by Anthony B. Robinson, Cascade Books, 2020. (Link to the book at Wipf and Stock here.)

By Richard L. Floyd

This little book is well-titled, for it is both useful and wise. In the interest of transparency, let me say that I have known Tony Robinson as a friend and interlocutor for decades. During that time, I have admired his many writings, which are clearly and concisely written, and grow out of his pastoral experience and long years as a church consultant. Continue reading →

“Ask, Search, Knock” A Sermon on Luke 11:1-13

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One of his disciples said to Jesus, “Teach us to pray.” It is a simple request. Perhaps you are perfectly comfortable praying, but many church people are not. As the Presbyterian theologian Robert McAfee Brown wrote: “Prayer for many is like a foreign land. When we go there, we go as tourists. Like most tourists, we feel uncomfortable and out of place. Like most tourists, we therefore move on before too long and go somewhere else.”

The premise of this sermon is that we could all benefit from thinking about what prayer is and how to go about it, that we may stop feeling like tourists in a foreign land and more like pilgrims in the house of prayer. Continue reading →

My Top Ten Posts from 2016

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cropped-winter-11Once again as the old year passes and the new year beckons, it is my custom to look back at my most popular posts of the year. Some years a theme emerges, and this year it is the passing of old friends and mentors. Three of my professors from seminary died within a few weeks of each other early in the year, and my tributes to and remembrances of them were among the most popular posts.

Here in order are the most visited new posts from 2016:

A Prayer for Christmas (and for our time) from Karl Barth

A Tribute to Meredith Brook “Jerry” Handspicker 1932-2016

“Of Fig Trees and Second Chances” A Sermon on Luke 13:6-9

Remembering William L. Holladay

Let us not treat this wound too lightly. Reconciliation requires repentance

Mike Maguire and Me: Recollections from Long Ago

“Rich in Things and Poor in Soul” A Sermon on Luke 12:13-21

A tribute to Max L. Stackhouse

“Holy Weeping’ A Sermon on Romans 12:19 and Revelation 21:1-4

“Known knowns, known unknowns,” and the New Testament

As in previous years certain posts have had real staying power. Many of these are sermons that desperate preachers found on search engines. For example, my sermon for the Third Sunday of Advent was the number one entry if you Googled “Sermon for the Third Sunday of Advent.” Consequently, I saw extraordinary spikes in traffic the week before.

So here are my all-time top ten posts since I started “When I Survey . . .” in 2009:

Why did Jesus refer to Herod as “That fox” in Luke 13:32”?

“Rejoice! Rejoice!” A Sermon for the Third Sunday of Advent

“Prayer for a Retired Pastor“

God Gives the Growth,” A Retirement Sermon

“The Lord Will Provide:” A Sermon on Genesis 22

“There is nothing to be afraid of!” A Sermon on Psalm 27:1-2

An Ordination Sermon: The Secret Sauce of Ministry. A Recipe in Two Parts

“God With Us” A Sermon for the Fourth Sunday of Advent

“Behind Locked Doors” A Sermon on John 20:24

“The Message of the Cross” A Sermon on 1 Corinthians 1:23-25

Another milestone for this blog is that it reached 100 followers this year. So I thank you all for your interest and support. Come back and visit now and again in 2017.

A Prayer for Christmas (and for our time) from Karl Barth

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streamThe Swiss theologian Karl Barth, who many (among them me) consider the greatest Christian theologian of the Twentieth Century, never stopped being a pastor among the people. In his years as Professor in Basel, he frequently preached to the prisoners at the local prison. Those sermons and prayers are available in a fine little collection called “Deliverance to the Captives.”

Here is a prayer from Christmas, 1958, which to me, has a sad but profound resonance with our own time:

We remember before thee all darkness and suffering of our time; the manifold errors and misunderstandings whereby we human beings afflict one another; the harsh reality which so many must face without the benefit of comfort; the great dangers that hang over the world which does not know how to counter them. We remember the sick and the mentally ill, the needy, the refugees, the oppressed and the exploited, the children who have no good parents or no parents at all. We remember all those who are called on to help as much as men can help, the officials of our country and of all other countries, the judges and civil servants, the teachers and educators, the writers of books and newspapers, the doctors and nurses in the hospitals, the preachers of thy word in the various churches and congregations nearby and afar. We remember them all when we implore thee to let the light of Christmas shine brightly . . . so that they and we ourselves may be helped. We ask all this in the name of the Savior in whom thou hast already hearkened to our supplications and wilt do so again and again. Amen. (p. 143)

(Photo: R.L.Floyd, 2016)

Continue reading →

December “Sadness and Silences”

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An important writing mentor of mine was my friend and colleague the late Arnold Kenseth. Here are a reflection and a prayer of his for Advent. For more about this remarkable writer, poet and minister see my  post “Arnold Kenseth: A New England Poet of the Sacred.” Continue reading →

Preparing for Christmas with a prayer from Karl Barth

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On this Fourth Sunday of Advent my pastor picked this prayer from Karl Barth as part of the prayers of the people for this morning. Barth wrote it in the middle of the last century, but it struck me as eerily contemporary. It helped me sort out some of what I need to do to prepare for Christmas, and so in that spirit, I share it with you:

Lord, our God and Father, give to many, to all, and to us as well, that we may celebrate Christmas like this: that in complete thankfulness, utter humility and then complete joy and confidence we may come to the One whom you have sent, and in whom you yourself have come to us. Clean out the many things in us that now that the hour has come have become impossible for us, can no longer belong to us, may, must, and will fall away from us, by virtue of your Son, our Lord and Savior, entering into our midst and creating order.

Have mercy on all of those who either do not yet or do not fully know you and your kingdom, who perhaps once knew everything and have either forgotten, misunderstood or even denied it! Have mercy on all of humankind, who today are once again especially plagued, threatened and haunted by so much foolishness. Enlighten the thoughts of those in both the East and the West, the South and the North who are in power and who, as appears to be the case, are today in complete confusion and despair. Give the rulers and representatives of the people, the judges, teachers, and bureaucrats, give even the media in our homeland the insight and sobriety that are necessary for their responsible work. Place the right, necessary and helpful words on the lips of those who have to preach during this Christmas Season, and open then also the ears and hearts of those who hear them. Comfort and encourage those who are sick, both in body and spirit, in hospitals, as well as prisoners, and those who are distressed, abandoned or despairing. Help them with what alone can truly help them and all of us: the clarity of your Word and the quiet work of your Holy Spirit.

We thank you that we are permitted to know that we do not pray and will never pray to you in vain. We thank you that you have let your light rise, that it shines in the darkness, and that the darkness will not overcome it. We thank you that you are our God and that we may be called your people, through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.”

(Photo: R. L. Floyd, 2015)

“Praying from the depths”

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Out of the depths“Out of the depths I cry to you, O Lord!” — Psalm 130: 1

In the prayer book I grew up with each Psalm had a Latin title, which was always the first line of that Psalm. The only one that I distinctly recall was “De Profundis,” the Latin title of Psalm 130, which begins, “Out of the depths.”

I’m not sure what it was about that title that was so intriguing to me. Perhaps it reminded me of the English word “profound.” I know now that “profound” is derived from the Latin “profundus” which means literally “at the bottom.”

As I have lived out my life through the decades there have been some difficult, even desperate, times when I have cried out to God from somewhere pretty close to the bottom. We have phrases that describe such times. We say someone has “hit bottom” or is “bottoming out.”

But it is not only in these desperate times that we can pray from the depths. We can always pray from the very deepest part of our selves, from the very “bottom of our hearts.” Sometimes we are able to find the words, other times our silent prayers are, as Paul described them, “sighs too deep for words” (Romans 8:26). Either way, our God, who is Lord of the depths as well as the heights, hears our prayers.

Prayer:

O God, your love fills the world, help us to fathom the depth of the love you have for us in Jesus Christ.

(This is my Daily Devotional for June 11, 2015. To see the original go here. To subscribe (for free) to this daily e-mail service go here.)

A Prayer for the Common Good on The Fifth Sunday in Lent

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O Lord, by all your dealings with us, whether of joy or pain, of light or darkness, let us be brought ever closer to you. Let us not value your grace simply because it makes us happy, or because it makes us sad, because it gives us or denies us what we want, but because all that you send us bring us to you. Let us realize that in knowing your perfection, we may be sure in every disappointment that you are still loving us, that in every darkness you are still enlightening us, and that in every bump in our journey’s road you are giving us life, just as in death you gave life to your Son, our savior Jesus Christ.

O Lord, our whole world is in the midst of struggle about our future, and there is great fear and uncertainty among us. We worry about war and peace, about terror and trouble, about the environment and the economy. Calm us down and let us speak to each other as those who have a common stake in our life together, as neighbors rather than as adversaries

Keep us from rancor and strife, from rumors and accusations. Let us seek the truth as best we can know it, and the common good above our own particular interests. Deliver us from the need to build ourselves up by cutting others down.  Let us listen more than we talk, and think before we speak, and realize that we are all in this together,

O Lord, you alone can control the days that are gone and the deeds that are done; remove from our burdened memory the weight of past years, that being set free both from the comfort of complacency and the paralysis of remorse, we may reach forth to those things which lie before us, and press towards the mark for the prize of the high calling of God in Jesus Christ. Amen.

(Photo: R. L. Floyd)

“Walking the Walk:” Prayer as Action.

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P.T. Forsyth (1848-1921) is so quotable that you can practically open any of his books at random and find nuggets of truth and grace, which is pretty much what I have done today.

This one is on prayer.  For Forsyth prayer was not at all passive, but powerfully active. Here is one of his thoughts about what today we might call “walking the walk as well as talking the talk.” It is a perfect thought for Lent:

A prayer is also a promise. Every true prayer carries with it a vow. If it do not, it is not in earnest. It is not of a piece with life. Can we pray in earnest if we do not in the act commit ourselves to do our best to bring about the answer? Can we escape some kind of hypocrisy? This is especially so with intercession. What is the value of praying for the poor if all the rest of our time and interest is given only to becoming rich . . .

If we pray for our child that he may have God’s blessing, we are really promising that nothing shall be lacking on our part to be a divine blessing to him. And if we have no kind of religious relation to him (as plenty of Christian parents have none), our prayer is quite unreal, and its failure should not be a surprise.

To pray for God’s kingdom is also to engage ourselves to service and sacrifice for it. To begin our prayer with a petition for the hallowing of God’s name and to have no real and prime place for holiness in our life or faith is not sincere.

The prayer of the vindictive for forgiveness is mockery, like the prayer for daily bread from a wheat-cornerer. No such man could say the Lord’s Prayer but to his judgement.

What would happen to the Church if the Lord’s Prayer became a test for membership as thoroughly as the Creeds have been? The Lord’s Prayer is also a vow to the Lord. . .

Great worship of God is also a great engagement of ourselves, a great committal of our action. To begin the day with prayer is but a formality unless it go on in prayer, unless for the rest of it we pray in deed what we began in word. (“The Soul of Prayer,” p 27-28)

(Photo:  R. L. Floyd, Living Water 2,  Pittsfield State Forest, March 2010)

P. T. Forsyth on “The Sin of Prayerlessness”

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Prayer often does not comes easily for me.  Like many theologs I frequently would rather talk about God than to God.  There have been times when I was too full of guilt, or shame, or whatever, to have the kind of self-scrutiny that honest prayer requires.  I confess that some of these long periods of prayerlessness have been during times when I was writing lofty theological ideas.  Sometimes I know I am just avoiding God because He just seems too much for me, which is, of course, a lie.  I am reminded of Abraham Heschel’s insight that “if it seems that God is silent in our time, it is because we are avoiding him.”

But prayer is essential to faith.  P.T. Forsyth once said that “prayer is to religion what research is to science.”  Recently Kevin Davis, whose blog, “After Existentialism, Light,” is well worth a visit, posted one of my favorite quotes about prayer from Forsyth.

This Forsyth quote always judges me, but also somehow lifts me up. It also has about it the ring of truth from a man who knew what prayer was about. In this Lenten Season of self-examination and repentance it is just what I need. Perhaps you, too?

The worst sin is prayerlessness. Overt sin, or crime, or the glaring inconsistencies which often surprise us in Christian people are the effect of this, or its punishment. We are left by God for lack of seeking Him. The history of the saints shows often that their lapses were the fruit and nemesis of slackness or neglect in prayer. Their life, at seasons, also tended to become inhuman by their spiritual solitude. They left men, and were left by men, because they did not in their contemplation find God; they found but the thought or the atmosphere of God. Only living prayer keeps loneliness humane. It is the great producer of sympathy. Trusting the God of Christ, and transacting with Him, we come into tune with men. Our egoism retires before the coming of God, and into the clearance there comes with our Father our brother. . . .

Not to want to pray, then, is the sin behind sin. And it ends in not being able to pray. That is its punishment — spiritual dumbness, or at least aphasia, and starvation. We do not take our spiritual food, and so we falter, dwindle, and die. “In the sweat of your brow ye shall eat your bread.”(“The Soul of Prayer,” in A Sense of the Holy, p. 137)

If you don’t know this little book on prayer, which is a reprint of three of Forsyth’s sermons, you should, for it is one of the best around. It is a favorite of Eugene Peterson, who wrote a foreword to one of the newest editions.

(Photo: R. L. Floyd.  Living Water.  Churchill Trail, Pittsfield State Forest,  3/2010)