A Gourmet Meal - PENT 10C-2016

This morning I would like to try something.

I would like all of you to close your eyes. Now focus on a sound that you hear.

Now listen for a sound farther away, and farther away again – until you are listening to the farthest away sound.  Give people a chance to listen and breathe.

Did this exercise change you a little bit? Perhaps your head doesn’t feel as fuzzy, or you feel more present/centered; or maybe your breathing has slowed. Are you more aware of what and who is around you?

I learned of this exercise when I was in high school.  A teacher, who was always concerned about the success of his students, offered tidbits of wisdom on how to cope with stress – in this case exam stress – particularly the kind that would have students drawing a blank.  He suggested that before an exam we calmed ourselves by focusing on the farthest away sound we could hear.  If we went blank, or our hearts were racing, we were to listen to the pencil or pen scratching of the student in the next row and then one in the next row and so on.  More often than not pausing to do the exercise re-focused our brains on the task at hand.

Do you focus your heart and mind before, and/or during prayer?

The human mind is pretty amazing. We use only a small portion of the grey matter we’ve been given.  And what we do use is chucked full of schedules, appointments, outside noise, instant replays, the task at hand and others waiting to be accomplished; it is full and constantly busy deciphering data and analysing situations.

Concentrated prayer becomes difficult in this murky mind mess.  In this state prayers end up being all about the “ask,” as if God has a cosmic grocery store in the sky; ready to fill our shopping bags with what we want and what we perceive we need.  Our prayer life is often of the drive-thru sort; “fast food.” These prayers are the quick “help” prayers, and sometimes include the quick “thanks.”

This morning, the first reading and the Gospel share prayers that are not of the “fast food” variety.  Rather these examples are of the gourmet variety.

I recently finished the book, Praying Like a Gourmet, by David Brazzeal.

David’s book considers prayer from the mind and heart from a “foodie” perspective.  The ideas shared in the book are recipes for a fuller prayer life.  The recipes are the next step in prayer – moving one from simply getting the groceries to having a full course meal.

Bring to mind the last multiple course meal you partook in.

For some this would include: before drinks and hors d’oeuvres – often eaten while guests continue to arrive; then there is gathering around a neatly dressed table with appetizers, salad, main course, and dessert with after dinner drinks.  Remember the people in attendance – those gathered around the table. Remember the decked out table with each place setting, cloth serviettes.  Such meals are anything but fast food. The experience is carried over a span of hours with lots of conversation and laughter; enjoyment of culinary dishes and the company of others.  At the end of the evening one is left with a feeling of being full: satisfied, overflowing with warmth, hospitality, contentment.  One leaves feeling better about themselves and the world then when they sat down to eat.  The body, mind, and spirit are nourished and filled with hope.

Last week we read that Abraham was visited by three visitors.  He had bread made and a calf prepared --- the meal preparation took time, lots of time; there was lots of time for conversation and fellowship.  The text this morning suggests that God was at the meal.  The three men have gone ahead and we encounter Abraham in a deep conversation with God.  Abraham is not presenting a “fast food” wish list – he is trying to determine the depth of God’s justice and what role he -Abraham- plays within the endowment of this justice. The conversation is not quick or easy.  I picture Abraham mulling over God’s answers and whether or not to ask the next question – hoping for God to have a vaster sense of justice than Abraham ponders is possible; Abraham’s questions are daring and push the limits of his faith each time he seeks a deeper understanding of God via how vast God’s sense and practice of justice is.

As Jesus teaches the disciples to pray, the Lord’s Prayer also speaks to a deeper form of prayer – the prayer itself is a recipe, that when prayed is a full course meal.

Our Father – is God’s invitation to dinner, our willingness to welcome God to sit at our table

Who art in heaven –  we honour God’s presence and acknowledge that God is beyond ourselves

Hallowed be your name – in these words we praise and bless the Guest; humble ourselves; thank the Guest for coming – when indeed the Guest could have declined

Thy kingdom come.   – and there it is: the focus statement of the prayer.  It is the sound the pencil makes in the next row of the exam room; and the next row after that; ever spreading further outward – God’s justice increasingly endowed. It is a moment of pause for contemplation.

The opening part of the Lord’s Prayer is invitation, praise, thanks, and contemplative focusing.  In Praying Like a Gourmet, all of these courses are positively filling the person who is eating and the ambience sets the stage for the main course to come. By the time the main course is begins the people gathered at the table are so focused on the bounty and the other people at the table, so whelmed by fellowship, that the grocery list of prayers one carries with them becomes short, if remembered at all.  The items on the regular grocery list: give us this day our daily bread, are said, but, because of the courses before are no longer said in a self-serving prayer – as we are in a state of mind thinking of others.  This “ask” becomes give us our daily bread so that we have something to share with others.

And then there is another “ask,” forgive us our sins – but it also does not stand alone, it has become deeper conversation with a statement of our participation in God’s justice as we forgive those indebted to us.

And do not bring us to the time of trial. A forward thinking prayer, as there is much work to do for God’s kingdom to come.  The time of trial is the end – and the request is not an “ask” of protection for ourselves, or a selfish want of having a life without hardship; it is a deep conversation, an aspiration of being involved in kingdom work – so consumed with and endeavouring to endow others with grace that trias goes by- unnoticed and unhampering mission.

The Lord’s Prayer is a full gourmet meal deal!

Let us try another exercise. Choose a person sitting near you.  Close your eyes and picture them. Think on them.

To think on them, is to concentrate and focus on their image, just as you focused earlier on listening to a specific sound. To contemplate the image of this person is silent prayer for them, a prayer that doesn’t need words, or specific petitions, just a lifting up of this person before God. The silent honouring of the person, a holding of them in the palm of your hands, sitting with them at a common table.  And if there should be thoughts, perhaps articulated prayer come out as, “If there be one found righteous, God, would you save the city?” “As we forgive those indebted to us.”  “To them -daily bread, no time of trial.” “To them your kingdom come.”

In an ongoing research study, that is my collection of peoples stories, the majority of people say prayers at bedtime and include the Lord’s Prayer. What an opportune time to practice gourmet prayer.

Consider bedtime as a time when God’s kingdom is under your pillow.

As you lay your head down to sleep, recall the person sitting beside you in church – think on them; now bring to mind the physically closest person to you, then think on the people who live next door, …and the next door.  Work your way down the hallway of your apartment building, or the houses down your street. Next (if you are still awake), think on people further afield: those on the streets, faces from the supermarket, those you know in the next town, province, country, around the world (those who are known and those unknown).  This could become, as I talked with the children earlier, your beaten path to sleep; a beaten path of prayer -drawing your heart to allow the unleashing of God’s kingdom around you and through the world.

As I think on you as I fall asleep this week, I will hold you and lift you before Our Father. As I think on you, it will be for a full course, gourmet, multi-course meal --- no fast food in your prayer diet.  May God’s kingdom come through my prayer, through your prayer, through our prayer --- as God is invited to dine with us and us with each other, may God’s justice surprise.