Feb 16 ~ To Pray is to Find Solid Ground, and then Send Out Roots

Click the graphic above to view a recording of Sunday's Sermon

Sermon, by Pastor Joel

February 16, 2025

Jeremiah 17:5-10

Psalm 1

1 Corinthians 15:12-20

Luke 6:17-26

The context of this sermon is

100% written by a human

In 1998, a Harvard cardiologist named Herb Benson came up with what was billed as the largest experiment ever to settle this evergreen question once and for all: does prayer really work? It was called the “Study of the Therapeutic Effects of Intercessory Prayer.” 

In casual language, it was known as the “Great Prayer Experiment,” and Dr. Benson’s idea was to test the power of prayer with 1,800 heart patients who had received bypass surgery.  There would be three groups.  One third of the patients would have no one pray for them.  Two thirds of the group would receive prayers from Christian congregations—half of the patients in this group knew about the prayers, and the half in the other set did not. 

The surgeries went ahead, and the researcher tracked which patients had complications. The study found that there was no difference in complications between those who received prayers and those who didn’t. But in a surprising twist, the patient group who knew about the prayers did experience a small but significant increase over than those who did not know. Researchers suggested this was because the patients expected the prayers to work and were perhaps less vigilant during their recovery. 

But once Dr. Benson published his results, his study did not, in fact, settle the questions once and for all. The debate about whether praying for someone – and even yourself – can change outcomes continues to this day, with some studies showing positive effects and others showing none.

Why bring this study up, you might ask? Given the February we have had so far, with a long winter ahead, our economy under threat, the world being destabilized by a president careless with soundbites, and all the other problems we face, do we really need to resolve this particular one? 

I guess it’s because prayer  -and the power of it – has been on my mind. This morning, we hear “The Beatitudes,” those graceful and warm blessings spoken by Jesus, and perhaps we find ourselves in them. “The Beatitudes” are essentially a prayer, spoken by Jesus, as a promise that we will survive the pain we feel and come through, and that we will not be alone while we do it. We hear the same phrase in our first lesson – “Blessed are those,” we are told, “who trust in the Lord.” How do we deliberate and understand that trust? We contemplate and pray to God. And what is our gospel acclamation but a  prayer of inquiry. We sing: “Lord, to whom shall we go?” This prayer is powerful in that we sing it in unity. We are asking the question, not to reveal an answer, but to reinforce the answer we already know.

Yet the question of whether we are heard bedevils all of us. We speak to God and wonder who is listening. We pray for the health and well-being of another and wonder if it will make any difference. We hear politicians say after a needless tragedy such as a school shooting, that their “prayers” are with the victims, and this seems so self-serving and pointless that we avoid talking about prayer much ourselves. 

During my reading this week, I came across the famous essay by C.S. Lewis, written in 1959, nearly four decades before Dr. Benson’s experiment. It is called “The Efficacy of Prayer,” and it is the theologian’s answer to this question: Does prayer work? 

One point that Lewis argues off the top is, what would we need to do to prove that prayer worked? Prayer is a request, a petition to God, he says, which means the option of granting it is voluntary and may or may not happen. 

Lewis argued that even if all the patients in an experiment like Dr. Benson’s who received prayer had suffered no complication, that would not prove prayer, but magic: it would mean that certain humans were able to compel something to happen. 

What’s more, he argued, once you are praying to prove something or to see what happens, you are in fact no longer praying. Can it still be prayer, he suggests, when you are hoping for some patients to heal and others not? Or if you say the words, hoping to win a kind of contest? 

And if our prayers are answered, he then asked, what then? Are we to believe that some people are just more important to God than others because their prayers are answered, while other prayers are not? Are we to command God at our will? And why is prayer even the deciding factor? Why would the rain from the skies, the strength of our bodies, the sweat of our own labour – all derived from God – be as much responsible for our fine harvest as the prayer we spoke to make the grain grow? 

And so prayer is not a machine. It is not magic. It is not advice offered to God.  If our prayers are answered, Lewis is suggesting, it is not for us to ask why, or to think we have performed in such a way so pleasing to God as to be lifted above everyone else. A prayer is a request our human heart and mind forms; the mysteries of God and the universe surpass anything a single prayer can contain. 

Lewis signs off then, which is somewhat disappointing, for he cuts short what must be the conclusion: what then, is the point of prayer? Why pray at all? And this is where I would come back to the beautiful language of “The Beatitudes” in which Jesus prays on behalf of us all that our pain and suffering will be relieved. It is a prayer of many layers. There is compassion in the words: a recognition that suffering is real, and that Jesus stands with us through it. There is promise and hope that we will recover. There is also clarification -- a processing of a wider idea: those words make clear that all people matter to God, and should therefore matter to us, and that we, who may be rich and laughing, should not judge the poor or the hungry, for someday we may be them and they us. Even then, we will be cared for. And the prayer lands with a clarifying of mission: If those who are hungry will be fed, as God’s people, should we not feed?  If we believe that those who stand up for justice even if they fail, are valued by God, should we not take risks for justice?  

I thought about the importance of prayer this week because I know many of you are struggling now with feelings of anger about the state of our continent and the world, and frustration, and perhaps, even as we diligently buy Canadian, that the world feels as if it is slipping backwards in time, and we feel weary to start five steps behind all over again,

But this, I believe, is exactly the time when prayer works. Not to heal every complication or magically solve every problem. But because prayer is a journey we take with God, on our own time, in our own words, to our own destination. Sometimes, at the end, we find truth, sometimes comfort, at other times resolve, perhaps an answer – maybe all of them. And maybe we have to go back again with more questions.  

But hopefully, what prayer helps us do first is reach a place of compassion – where we clearly voice our pain and worries. We  reach a place of empathy for ourselves and for others. By listening to the response that comes forward  in that contemplative space, we have already found a promise: that we are strong enough to voice what is wrong, to send it out, and to look for an answer to return to us. And by thinking through what we have read in the newspaper, what we have heard from friends, what we have felt emotionally, we can begin to clarify what steps we need to take. This power of prayer that emerges out of a process of compassion, hope, and clarity, to take action in the world.

And is this not the definition of trust: that we gather all that we feel and think and know, and trust to begin a conversation with God, seeking compassion, hope, and clarity?

“Blessed are those who trust in God,” our lesson tells us this morning. “They shall be like a tree planted by water, sending out its roots by the stream.” 

When you feel unsettled this week, find your solid ground with prayer and reflection. In that quiet space, may we hear Jesus offering his blessings, along with his promise of presence.  And may we then send out our roots to be a unifying, thoughtful and generous presence of our own.

Amen.

Feb 9 ~ We are Defined by Our Choices

There is no recording of the sermon for this week.

Sermon, by Pastor Joel

February 9, 2025

Isaiah 6:1-8 [9-13]

Psalm 138

1 Corinthians 15:1-11

Luke 5:1-11

The context of this sermon is

100% written by a human

I am sure we all felt the mood suddenly change in Canada this week. After weeks of threatening 25-per-cent tariffs that would devastate the Canadian economy and harm his own country’s as well, President Trump announced he was going through with them on Saturday. On Monday, following a visit from our Prime Minister, he postponed them for a month.

But in Canada, the shift had already happened. Here, we felt the shock and betrayal of our closest friend attacking us for exaggerated and manufactured reasons about drugs and trade imbalances. This weekend, we learned that Trump talk of using economic aggression to make us the 51st state is no longer being laughed off as a joke by our government, but as a threat – after the President of the United State told our Prime Minister to take a look at a 1908 treaty that drew the lines of our two country’s borders.

We felt understandably insulted – responding with many of us cancelling trips to the United States. We have begun intentionally avoiding American products and prioritizing home-grown products. I know I have felt good asking in the pet store whether that bone I am getting for my dog was made in Canada, choosing Canadian condiments, and Canadian chocolate. When Erin sent me a video of that old beer commercial of the Canadian being mocked at a bar by Americans, and producing his attack beaver – I felt a swell of emotional patriotism.

Indeed, we have become angry and overtly patriotic in a way the world will see as out-of-character for our country. As I know from when my son Samson travelled – as the Globe and Mail pointed out in a story this weekend – he wore the Canadian flag, and announced his Canadian citizenship not so much as an act flag-waving patriotism in a foreign land, but to signal that he would be a respectful and considerate guest in the country.

Now, we are waving the flag, metaphorically and literally, as many of us haven’t since the convoy took over Ottawa several years ago. Our best friend has summarily cut ties over a small issue that we could have talked through, as our envied relationship should have demanded. Has that best friend forgotten all the support we showed after 911, on the ground in Afghanistan, during Hurricane Katrina and the forest fires in L.A. and picked a fight for the fun of it?

Who wouldn’t be angry? And we showed it – in our comments online, and at hockey games, where the booing of the national anthem continues.

As Canadians we long prided ourselves on our modest patriotism (hockey excepted) and our ability to openly discuss the flaws of Canada, while allowing the many, many brilliant aspects of our nation to speak for themselves. So this angry unity – this national call to arms – feels empowering. Many of us are wondering why we waited so long to let it out.

But in this moment of anger and outrage, we must also remember that we are not slaves to our emotions. Through of all this, we have a choice: our actions will decide who we are, as a country, and as citizens, in this moment.

This idea of choice comes up a lot in my sermons. But that’s because it is among the most powerful gifts that we receive from God. We are not commanded – despite those Ten Commandments – we are called as people of faith. We are not ordered to follow, we are asked to do so. The choice, every day and at every stage of our lives, is ours to make.

We hear that so plainly in our gospel this morning in the famous story of how Jesus met his early disciples, a group of fishermen. Jesus befriends them. He does not win them over with fear and negativity. He goes out on the water with them and fills their nets. In their moment of fear, he soothes a storm that threatens to sink their boat.

Jesus shows them who he is – by helping them, by protecting them and by teaching them. And then, in that fateful moment, he says: “Come, and I will make you fishers of people.” And we understand, because of who Jesus is and how he speaks the words from the gospel, that he does not mean: Come – or else. He means it as a question: Will you not come, and follow me, and do noble and kind deeds in the name of the gospel?

It is a big ask, no matter what, but we also know that the disciples have a choice. No one will drag them along behind Jesus. They will decide for themselves: remain by the sea, keep fishing, and continue their current lives comfortably. Or abandon all they know, and go with Jesus, into an uncertain future. We know what they chose – to take the risk. In doing so, they faced danger and gained wisdom and peace that comes from a life of meaning and purpose.

But the choice did not end there: they faced it every day. They often stumbled. When they were skeptical how Jesus was going to feed the 5,000, they made a choice. When they told Jesus to stop talking to poor women and tax collectors they made a choice. When they all but abandoned Jesus at the end, they made a choice.

And yet, they also made a choice to heal people with Jesus. To gather crowds for Jesus. To confront the powers that be with Jesus. They made a choice to be the companions of Jesus, and to follow him to Jerusalem. And when he was gone, they made a choice to believe and teach the gospel in his absence.

The point is not all our choices are good and pure and selfless. But if we are careful in making them, many of them, enough of them, will be.

And so, in this current situation - and really every tense or difficult situation – we choose. Faced with this existential and economic threat to our country, we may choose to do nothing – to remain with what we know just as the disciples might have done. Or we choose to unite, to buy Canadians goods, and push for more open trade across provincial borders. We choose to stand together and reflect on what it means to be Canadians.

Of course, we can also go to a hockey game and boo an anthem. We can choose, as has happened, to boo young American kids playing hockey in our country. And we can choose to respond with humour – by lining the hockey sticks along the border, as an act of quintessential Canadian pointed humour.

But we should be careful – for our choices, however imperfect, define us. On the one side of choice, the disciples appear selfish and undermining, judgmental and cowardly. On the other side of choice, they appear welcoming, selfless, brave, and loyal.

In each one of us, all these qualities may be true at one time of another as well. But who are we in the end, when we look back at the sum of our choices? Did we let anger and betrayal rule our days? Or were we guided by reason and unity?

That is a personal decision – one hopefully guided by the gospel. In this case, we have the benefit of being able to take individual action that will collectively make a difference. That alone should ease our frustration.

What’s more we have one another– we can be in it together. We can channel our anger into positive action. And hope that moments like this will clarify our own priorities and values.

Let me ask you this: How do you feel when you hear the crowds booing ‘The Star-Spangled Banner’ at Canadian hockey games? And how do you feel when you hear that American fans cheered “Oh, Canada!” in San Jose. Is it insults hurled across the border, or homegrown pride for our country that lifts your spirits? Is the boos or the cheers?

I know the answer for myself. I know that when I hear my fellow Canadians rallying together, I feel calm, collected and part of a community. I know I feel less alone.

On that day on the shore, Jesus reached out his hand and said, “Come, and I will make you fishers of people.” And the disciples made a choice that shaped their lives. May it guide us in these stressful weeks to come.

Amen.

Feb 2 ~ What if They had Opened Their Hearts and Listened?

A recording of the sermon is available by clicking above

Sermon, by Pastor Joel

February 2, 2025

Jeremiah 1:4-10

Psalm 71:1-6

1 Corinthians 13:1-13

Luke 4:21-30

The context of this sermon is

100% written by a human

A person is not without honour except in their own home. This is the famous line that emerged from our gospel this morning. And who among us doesn’t know the truth of it in one way or another? It speaks to the way that going home, either at the end of the day, or at Christmas for a short stay, places us among people who know us, in some ways better than we know ourselves. They know what makes us happy. They know who we used to be, and who we are away from the expectations of the outside world. If we are lucky, those memories bring laughter, and changes are accepted and embraced. If we’re less lucky, the home crowd knows where to poke the wounds that hurt us most. They might feel threatened or judged by the way we have changed and lash out. Just like the people did when Jesus returned to his hometown, preaching the gospel.

“Isn’t this Joseph, the carpenter’s son?” they ask one another. The gospel of Jesus doesn’t only fall flat, it riles them up. “Who the heck does this guy think he is to preach to us?” we can imagine them huffing to one another. “We knew him when he was in diapers.” They feel judged and criticized. “Was his home not good enough for him?” someone might have said. “Does he think he’s better than us?”

In the end, these former neighbors of Jesus become so enraged, they plot to throw him over a cliff.

They are so filled with insecurity, defensiveness, and close-mindedness that they miss their moment: to hear the gospel and gain wisdom.

And so we hear that famous acknowledgement from Jesus, as it appears in this passage from Luke: “Truly I tell you, no prophet is accepted in the prophet’s hometown.”

But as this line appears in Luke, it is about much more than Jesus’s being teased and threatened by the bullies and judgers that knew him when he was young.

We are reminded with this passage that it’s often those considered least deserving who receive and follow the gospel with the most wisdom, and the ones who believe themselves most deserving who fail to receive it with any wisdom at all.

As the crowd is turning against him, Jesus speaks of Elisha, who, among all the lepers in Israel at the time, chose to cleanse only one – a soldier from Syria. And of all the widows in need, Elijah was sent to one: the poorest of women in Zarephath. Both are examples of times when God’s care was given to those who exhibited faith and trust and openness – regardless of race or background. They are both reminders that no one falls outside God’s grace. And that no one person is more deserving than another – not even the community who helped raise the son of God, only to fear and reject him later.

The very human story of Elijah and the widow, whose name we never learn, is the example I want to focus on this morning. When Elijah first meets the woman who will save his life, he’s in a bad spot. He’s angered powerful leaders with talk of drought, and he is on the run.

He finds his way to Zarephath, where he is guided – the Old Testament says – to one woman in particular. She is, by her description, the least likely to come to his aid. She and her son are starving, and she is getting water to prepare what she believes will be their last meal. Elijah asks if she will make a loaf for him, and promises her that if he does, things will work out. So she brings him home, and shares what little she has, and a miracle occurs: they eat well all week.

But when her son gets sick, in her grief, the widow unfairly blames the easiest person – this strange man who has shown up at her house. Elijah does not leave, though he’d repaid his debt with bread. He begs and prays to God to save her son, just as the woman’s faith had saved him. And his prayers are answered.

This story has been interpreted many ways, but let’s consider it in the context of Jesus, standing before his fuming former neighbors, who have turned on him.

Jesus is observing that when people feel entitled to benefit from something, they often value it the least. If we come to church every Sunday and do our bit, we might think we get a golden ticket to heaven, but if we do not truly hear the words of the gospel – if we judge and gossip and spread harm – we have been blinded to the presence of God on earth.

The widow, with nothing to her name, took Elijah into her home. How many others would have turned their backs or even called the authorities? Because Elijah was there, her family was fed. How many times have judgement and closed-mindedness cost us the chance to experience God’s bounty? And, as the Old Testament says, because Elijah was welcomed, when her son fell ill, he was healed. How many times has a lack of generosity and openness led us to miss the power of the divine in our lives?

People aren’t without honour except in their own home. When we hear that line, we often think of ourselves as the person not getting recognition at home or being forced to play a part they have long grown out of. It is that person who must adapt then – to accept their home as it is - or shorten the stay.

But, of course, it’s not the person at all who is missing out. Just like it was not Jesus. When we fail to accept change in those we love, we don’t get to know who they truly are. When we don’t listen with fresh ears to familiar voices, we learn nothing new. When we aren’t open to new ways of hearing the gospel, our own telling of it becomes unbending and narrow.

As Jesus is constantly reminding us, the gospel is offered to everyone. The starving widow. The foreign leper. The tax collector and the fisherman. It may also be spoken and shared by anyone: that same poor widow, those fishermen, the Good Samaritan. Even that son of Joseph the carpenter.

Think of it: the people of Nazareth were so unwilling to listen, that, according to Luke, they drove The Messiah out of town and tried to throw him off a cliff. What might have happened had they opened their minds and hearts to listen can never be known.

May we all be wiser than they were.

Amen.