Sermon for Proper 24 Luke 18 at Cathedral Eucharist

This, for me, has been a week of waiting. Waiting for the report from our Safeguarding Audit. Waiting for news of a friend’s job interview. Waiting for a grandbaby due at the start of the week, but still conspicuous by his absence. And my own personal impatience has been playing out against the background of our collective waiting – for the results of the Brexit negotations, for some sense of what the future may hold for us, and for our friends and neighbours across Europe and beyond, for a reassurance that the most vulnerable really WILL be taken care of in the weeks and months ahead. I’m not good at waiting at times like this. I’ve never yet been able to pray with any conviction that litany from the Iona community that includes the refrain “Thank you for the waiting time”. I want things fixed – preferably in line with my own personal agenda- as soon as is humanly possible, or better yet, according to a divine timescale that is actually QUICKER than my own. I have at least tried to pray...but, as the Rolling Stones once put it “I can’t get no satisfaction”. While I feel as if I’ve been emulating the persistent widow, thus far nothing much seems to have changed – and that makes me consider what is going on when I pray. A friend’s father used to ask her “Are you actually praying, or just worrying on your knees” - and I guess I have probably been doing a bit of that, - particularly where the grandbaby is concerned. And in fact, there’s nothing much wrong with that. Taking worrying situations into God’s presence is frequently the best possible approach. Pouring out hopes and fears, griefs and frustrations – and knowing that all our confused jumble of feelings and experiences is heard and understood by the One who loves us and knows us through and through. Worrying on our knees can sometimes be just fine. It really is important to do our waiting and worrying in God’s presence...but the one thing I’ve learned about prayer through the years is that the answers God supples are very seldom those I expected. Indeed, I don’t often recognise them at all, until long long afterwards. When I left Cambridge after 3 wonderful years singing the services in my college chapel, spending every available second immersed in the Anglican choral tradition, I was VERY angry with God. I knew what I wanted to do next and it just wasn’t possible. I didn’t so much pray as storm at him… “If I were a man, I might be able to join the back row of a cathedral somewhere...but as it is, there’s nothing for women, nothing for me at all. I’ll just have to try and find a job in an arts centre” No such job was forthcoming. I did a lot of other things through the years, - some wonderful, some less so...and had actually completely forgotten that conversation (was it a prayer?) til I found myself sitting around a table earlier this year with various reps from the local arts scene...and I suddenly heard my own words played back to me, and realised that God was chuckling gently as he pointed out that my long-ago prayer had come to pass by a very circuitous route. And yet, I’m still really bad at taking the long view...at holding on to my faith that God is at work when I don’t see the answers I hoped for What about you? Spend a moment considering those times when you’ve asked God directly for something. Not simply a general “Bless all your children” kind of prayer but something quite specific. Perhaps you’re still asking... How were your prayers answered? Did you get what you asked for? Or did you come to realise, in retrospect, that what you DID get was something better? If you can’t think of a time when you’ve asked directly for something – just possibly that’s because you aren’t quite sure that it’s a worthwhile exercise. Not long ago I heard the story of an inn that was being built in a part of the States where the spirit of prohibition lingers still. Many in the churches there were distraught at the prospect of anyone selling alcohol over the counter in their home town...so they held an all-night prayer meeting, begging God to intervene. A storm broke, lightning struck the inn, and it went up in flames. The owner then brought a lawsuit against the church holding them responsible. The Christians hired a lawyer and denied responsibility. On the day of the hearing the judge said, in his opening remarks“No matter what verdict is reached today, one thing is clear. The landlord believes in prayer and the Christians do not!” Ouch. I wonder if that charge could be levelled at us here. What are your expectations when you pray. Generally I think we have to let go of the idea of a quick fix solution. Luke makes this clear as he introduces the parable, unusually unpacking its meaning before he tells the story. This is about the “need to pray always and to to lose heart”. It may be just as well that we’re told that at the beginning, because it’s not the most accessible story in Scripture, is it. Jesus clearly intends the judge to stand for God, but this judge is about as unlike God as possible. He cares neither for God nor man, but is all about the quiet life..” And yet, this widow, the most vulnerable of the vulnerable, keeps on coming to him. Is this because she’s desperate, stupid or simply naive? Surely she must know his reputation...Perhaps she is simply a person of faith, hanging on to the belief that justice would prevail despite all the evidence. And she’s right. The point of the parable is, of course, that if even a rotten judge can be persuaded to do the right thing by someone who pesters him day and night then of course God, who is Justice in person, and who cares passionately about people, will vindicate them, will see that justice is done. And that concept of justice is key. We can’t expect God to fall in with our plans, just because we’re persistent. We’re invited to seek God’s kingdom and God’s righteousness...to know God’s mind, if you like, and tune our hearts and our wills to that. And that’s when prayer takes off. When we let go of our own agendas and seek God’s, trusting that God’s will really IS the best possible outcome for us, for our loved ones, for the whole hurting, broken world. Sometimes we’re not quite able to believe that is true. We have an idea of who God is, we’ve read the books, but have not really come to know God for ourselves. That, too, may take a while. It’s the vision behind Jeremiah’s words, as God own dream for Israel. No longer shall they teach one another or say to one another “Know the Lord” for they shal all know me from the least of them to the greatest. Know God directly...God’s messageswritten on our hearts, our hopes and dreams swept up in God’s great purpose of reconciling the world to himself. If in doubt about that, may I refer you to last week’s epistle. Remember Jesus Christ. God within reach. God sharing stories, bread and wine with us day by day. We can and we DO know God when we turn to Jesus. The days are surely coming when that will be true for the world ….but sometimes they seem to drag out rather. We live in the gap, the “now but not yet”, believing in God’s better future but finding ourselves in a frequently painfully imperfect present. So in the meantime – remember that you may be the answer to your own prayers...that if you are entreating God to do something about climate change, about injustice and oppression far away or close to home, about children crying and parents in despair...God may have work for you to do. And when you pray with persistence, don’t lose heart. You may be tired and disconsolate. You may feel there’s no point carrying on any longer, if nothing seems to change. But that’s the moment to redouble your prayers and ask God to show you how to live into his future, to write his name and his truth in your heart and not to be satisfied with anything less than God’s righteousness.