Pentecost 7C
July 27, 2025
Luke 11:1-13
INTRODUCTION
Fun fact about Luke’s Gospel: in Luke’s telling, Jesus spends more time in prayer than he does in all the other gospels combined! Today we see an example: after visiting Mary and Martha last week, Jesus has now left and takes some time by himself to pray. The disciples are so interested in this, that when he returns they ask him, “Lord, teach us to pray.” They are hungry to be close to God, as Jesus is.
We’ll see that prayer theme in other texts, too. In Genesis, Abraham will bargain with God, asking him again and again to save rather than condemn the people of Sodom and Gomorrah. “Come on, Lord, you don’t want to hurt innocent people,” he says. “Please, rethink your plan!” A classic prayer, right? “God, do this thing that I think would be better! Please and thank you!” And the Psalm gives thanks for the times when God has heard our plea, and responded. So prayer is a pretty strong theme today!
As you listen to the readings, consider what your own prayers are like. Do you spend more time in prayer asking God for help with things, or thanking God, or confessing, or applauding God’s good work, or simply listening for guidance? What does it look or sound like when God responds (whether that response is a yes, or a no)? Where is your own prayer life strong, or where could it be stronger? Let’s listen.
[READ]
Grace to you and peace from God our Father and our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.
Today’s Gospel reading always gives me a pang of self-recognition: when the disciples ask Jesus, “Lord, teach us to pray,” the same request rises in my own heart: “Yes, Lord! Teach me, too, while you’re at it!”
To be clear, intercessory prayer is not where I struggle – that is, the sort of prayer where I ask God for something. Heal this person after surgery, give patience to that person during a tough time in life, bring peace to places of conflict, help me understand that person causing me trouble, guide me on this decision, or yes, sometimes even, “Please let there be a parking spot.” I have no problem asking God for things!
No, the kind of prayer I struggle with is the listening kind, the contemplative kind, the kind where I simply dwell in God’s presence, and listen for what God has to teach me.
Inspired by this Gospel reading, I brought this question to my spiritual director this week. I said, “Contemplative prayer intimidates me.” She asked what was intimidating about it. I said that, like Martha from last week’s story, I am “worried and distracted by many things,” and my mind easily wanders. This frustrates me, causing more worry and distraction. I don’t think I’m very good at it, and I don’t like not being good at things, and if I’m going to struggle through something I at least want to see a tangible result on the other side, and so far, I wasn’t getting enough of that quickly enough to motivate me to keep trying. All of that is what intimidates me.
And so, I return to the disciples’ plea: Lord, teach me to pray.
Now on the surface, Jesus’ answer is a helpful how-to guide. Address God, acknowledge the holiness of God’s name and by extension this prayer space, ask for both physical and spiritual needs to be met, help us walk in God’s ways, keep us safe from danger. But as I said, I personally don’t struggle as much with asking for things. Jesus’ stories that follow about persistence in prayer are helpful, I suppose – keep at it, Johanna, even when it is hard! But again, they seem to be about persistence in asking for things.
This, too, I lamented to my spiritual director. “That’s not where I feel a longing, or a hunger in my prayer life,” I said. What I hunger for is a sense of connection with God in prayer. I want to leave prayer feeling like I have been fed and sustained by my encounter with the One whose name is holy.
And so, this is where my heart has landed in this text this week, my friends. Not with the full Lord’s Prayer, important and rich as it is. Not with the parables that follow. Not with Jesus’ memorable advice to “Ask, seek, and knock” – though any of these things I mentioned could alone yield an entire sermon series each! This text brings up SO many questions about prayer – how to do it, the efficacy of prayer, what happens when prayers don’t seem to be answered, a whole can of worms.
But that’s not where my heart landed this week. My heart landed on Jesus’ very first instruction: “When you pray, say: Father.”
Let me ask you something: when you pray, not just the Lord’s Prayer but in general, is there a name you are most likely to use to address God? Maybe it is Father, maybe something else? For me, I almost always address God as “God.” God: the one who is unknowable yet fully knowing, mysterious, all-powerful, beyond my human understanding… So really, is it any wonder, if that is the name I use to address God, and the images the name brings to mind, why it might be hard for me to feel the personal connection I crave?
Names matter. What we call someone matters. Parents often use cute nicknames for their kids when they need some love (sweet-pea, bug, baby girl), but their full name when they are in trouble. Lovers do the same thing, using terms of endearment in times of emotional intimacy, but different names when they’re asking for help, or when they are in a fight.
So what does the name you use in prayer for God say about your relationship with God, or about what you are hoping to get out of your time of prayer? Jesus suggests using “Father,” which is meant to indicate that our relationship with God is of the most intimate sort, and also that we, as children of God, strive always to be obedient children who walk in God’s ways. That’s all well and good. And I am lucky – I have a loving relationship with my earthly father, who happens also to be a person of deep faith whom I respect and admire. But not everyone feels that way about their father. How does it feel to call God Father, and have that bring up feelings of neglect, or abuse, or silence, or abandonment?
How would it feel different to call God “Mother” in prayer? My mom is compassionate, playful, creative and caring – so for me, calling God “mother” would bring those images to mind – also not bad, but those attributes are not always what I am seeking in a time of prayer.
So then thinking even beyond that parental image, God goes by many, many names; indeed, God cannot be contained by a single name or image! So what if we went into prayer calling God by a name that reflected the attribute of God for which we are yearning in that moment? If we begin by doing as Jesus suggests – “search and you will find,” searching our hearts for our deepest longing and desire from God as we enter a time of prayer – what names might we use?
I did this exercise myself this week and came up with some ideas from scripture and from experience. Listen to some of these names, and consider how they might feel as ways to address God in your personal prayer – how would they affect the nature of your prayer? Maybe close your eyes as you listen, if you’re comfortable and let these names form an image of God – which one feels right to you at this moment?
Divine Healer.
Listening Friend.
Source of Life.
Compassionate Creator.
Emmanuel.
Promise-keeper.
Loving Embrace.
Companion on the Road.
The One Who Weeps.
Light in the Darkness.
Way-maker.
How would addressing God by any of these names change the relationship you are building with God in prayer? Because in the end, that is really what prayer is: it is relationship with God. It is sometimes asking, in the way you can only ask someone who you know truly cares for you. It is sometimes listening. Sometimes it has an agenda, and other times it is sitting quietly in companionable silence. Sometimes it is a book club of friends, wrestling and asking questions about what can be gained from the written Word. Sometimes it is arguing. But always, it is a relationship, a connection, and one that has the power to change our lives, to fill us up, to sustain us and feed us, and give us strength for the journey.
I’m not advocating changing the Lord’s Prayer, or addressing God in that prayer as anything other than the name Jesus suggested (though pastorally, I do want to acknowledge that this name may or may not be a helpful or life-giving name for everyone). I am suggesting that in learning with the disciples how to pray (learning that continues throughout the life of faith), we consider even how we begin, at the very start of prayer. Names matter. What we call someone matters. It sets the tone and is the beginning of the God-connection we seek.
Let us pray… God of many names, you are our Father, and you are so much more than that. Expand our minds to know and experience the many ways you show up in our lives and in our prayer. Teach us to pray, so that we might continually deepen our connection with you. In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Amen.
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