Copyright: This article is reprinted on the Lift Up Your Hearts web site http://www.worship.ca/ with the permission of Currents in Theology and Mission (20-4, August, 1993) where it first appeared.
Pneuma is a journal on spiritual direction and
formation in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in
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The spirituality of Lutherans in America has some signs of health and vigor, yet it is weak in prayer. This should not surprise us, for Lutherans are not good at teaching one another to pray. We make efforts to teach one another about the Bible, theology, liturgy, and music, but we seldom focus on prayer. I believe there are three main reasons why Lutherans pay so little attention to prayer. I will discuss those three reasons and in each case propose a remedy.
The first and most important reason why Lutherans pay so little attention to teaching prayer is that we have not understood the nature of prayer. Because we have had an inadequate understanding of prayer, we have assigned prayer a relatively low priority. Various people have different ways of talking about prayer; I'll present my own.
I see prayer as an activity with four dimensions. The one dimension of prayer that we most easily recognize is "speaking to God." In our Sunday church bulletins those parts of the worship designated as prayer are the times when we speak to God. Also whenever we say, "Let us pray" before a meal or a meeting, we address God. In the bedtime prayers that we teach our children and do ourselves, we also talk to God. Now, speaking to God is definitely a part of prayer, but I'm afraid that most Lutherans think that is all there is to prayer.
The second dimension of prayer is "listening to God." Although I list this second, it is really the first and most fundamental aspect of prayer. Listening to God is paying attention to the Word of God as it comes to us through scripture, preaching, sacramental actions, hymns, the liturgy, the witness of other people's words and lives, and our own memory that has stored up the biblical stories and images. Listening is more fundamental than our speaking to God, because our speaking to God in faith is always a response to God addressing us. Another word for this listening to God is meditation. Meditation is listening to God and listening for God. To listen is to pay attention, to seek to hear. Watching is the comparable visual term; to watch is to look, to try to see. So meditation involves observant waiting, a receptive striving to understand the ways of the Lord, an openness to God.
Some of our meditating happens spontaneously; for instance, during the day for a few moments we may simply call to mind God's gracious dealings with us. That is spontaneous listening to God. But meditation may also come about by design. If we attend worship in faith, part of what we intend to do is listen to God. If we read the Bible devotionally either with others or alone, much of what we intend to do is listen to God. There are many particular types of planned meditation which hosts of Christians have found beneficial, but most Lutherans are not aware of them. A great deal of what we can learn and teach one another about prayer has to do just with this dimension of listening to God, the aspect of prayer which is most fundamental.
The third dimension of prayer is "paying attention to the presence of God." God is indeed present with us at all times in some way, but by far most of the time we are not attentive to that presence. In prayer we pay attention to God's presence. We may not feel that God is present; in fact, we may sometimes feel as though God is far off. But in any case, we are seeking that presence. Prayer in which the dominant element is either seeking the presence of God or acknowledging that presence is what is known as contemplative prayer. In "contemplative prayer" not much is said or heard. Words are few. There is much, much to be learned about contemplative prayer.
The fourth dimension of prayer is the "corporate dimension." In prayer we are supported by other people and we support them. Genuine Christian prayer is never an individualistic act. We learn to pray with the help of other people. As children we probably were schooled to pray by parents and other adults who taught us simple prayers and took us to church. Throughout our life we may continue to grow in prayer through praying with others, sharing concerns with one another, and reading the insights of authors both in scripture and other spiritual writings. Even when we pray all alone, prayer is a corporate action, for our prayer draws upon the faith and wisdom of others and often reaches out to others. And at those times when we find it impossible to pray, we are upheld by the prayers of others.
When we understand through experience the four dimensions of prayer, we can see the tremendous riches and meaning in prayer. Some of the virtues of prayer were documented in the book "Varieties of Prayer" by the pollster George Gallup, Jr. and a sociologist Margaret Poloma.(1) Poloma and Gallup distinguish four different types of prayer: ritual, conversational, petitionary, and meditative prayer. Ritual prayer is saying a written or memorized prayer such as the Lord's Prayer. Conversational prayer is talking to God in one's own words, and petitionary prayer means asking God for some material thing. In their poll those who practised meditative prayer answered "yes" to the following four questions: Do you spend time quietly thinking about God? Do you spend time worshiping and adoring God? Do you try to listen to God speak to you? What Poloma and Gallup call meditative prayer consists mostly of what I called the second and third dimension of prayer -- listening to God and attending to God's presence. In the study by Poloma and Gallup 52% of those who prayed, answered yes to all four questions. They practised meditative prayer. Poloma and Gallup found that those who practised meditative prayer were more likely than other prayers to report that they feel close to God. They also discovered another significant correlation: those who practised meditative prayer were much more likely to forgive someone who has wronged them. There was no correlation between church attendance and readiness to forgive, but there was a significant link between meditative prayer and forgiving. These findings are not at all surprising when one understands the nature of Christian prayer, that prayer is not merely our speaking to God.
When we appreciate the nature of prayer, we can also see what a marvelous opportunity it is for Christian ministry and evangelism to have someone seek guidance in prayer. When we're dealing with prayer, we're dealing with the heart of the faith relationship with God. So when someone comes to us seeking to learn more about prayer, the basic thing to do is to help them listen to the Word of God and to let God's presence work in their lives. What a golden opportunity! Yet it is an opportunity that we may miss, if we are not prepared. Since Lutherans have commonly viewed prayer as only speaking to God and have not given much attention to prayer's other dimensions, we may be missing some wonderful chances for ministry and witness.
The second reason why we Lutherans have been slow to learn and teach one another about prayer is our persistent worry about works righteousness. While our positive concern has been to proclaim justification by grace through faith alone, we have also been watchdogs against efforts to earn God's approval. We have been especially wary of certain religious practices.
We can see one effect of the Lutheran fear of works righteousness in regard to the religious practice of fasting. Lutherans were so concerned about making fasting a genuinely free act of devotion that for quite some years now hardly any Lutherans observe a religious fast, except recently for the annual world hunger fast. Many Lutherans fast to control their weight or for other health reasons, but we have just about lost the meaning of a religious fast. Not for a moment do I think it necessary for Christians to fast; not at all. But I use this as an example of how our worry about misusing fasting as a way of climbing to heaven has led us to outdo Jesus' caution about fasting. We have gone a step further than Jesus and thrown out the baby with the dirty bath water.
We have not gone so far with prayer. But our anxiety about works righteousness has caused many Lutherans to be extremely wary of such things as giving instruction in prayer. In fact, the very use of the term "spirituality" often comes under attack. There are certainly good reasons for caution, for there are all sorts of spiritualities in the world trying to win points with God. A Christ-centred spirituality is essential. Our Lutheran tradition has served us well by having its signposts on the spiritual path point toward Christ.
Nevertheless, the opportunities for works righteousness abound and are by no means limited to such religious practices as prayer, spiritual direction, and fasting. Attending church, doing the liturgy, singing a hymn, preaching a sermon, visiting the sick, counseling the troubled, publishing a theological article, speaking to a conference -- all these religious activities and more are susceptible to the misuse of works righteousness. Any or all of them can be used to win God's approval.
So why have prayer and instruction in prayer been singled out for especially strong warnings? The trouble lies again in our inadequate understanding of the nature of prayer. When we think of prayer chiefly as "our" speaking to God, then prayer seems to be simply a human activity. When one operates with such a limited notion of prayer, it seems sensible to be anxious about its religious misuse. Ignorance about prayer feeds the worry about works righteousness, and that worry in turn prevents us from dispelling our ignorance of prayer through inquiry and knowledge. There is a lesson in this for us all: we should combine caution about works righteousness with knowledge and understanding. Then we can sift the wheat from the chaff, rather than throwing away the whole grain.
When I was in seminary, the neo-Orthodox theologians of the day frequently warned us against Christian mysticism as an attempt to build a ladder to heaven. I never read any Christian mystics. I never even considered reading them. After all, I "knew" they were bad, because I had been told that. Now surely there is much to be cautious about in many of the Christian mystics. But it is also the case that many of them are on to something central to the Christian faith, namely, that intimate relationship with God in Christ, that profound sense of God's gracious presence in our life that brings us to our knees in gratitude. Paul knew that. Martin Luther knew it. But in my seminary student wisdom, which was really ignorance, I did not bother to sift the wheat from the chaff; I cast it all aside.
Our inadequate understanding of prayer and our worry about works righteousness have combined to make most Lutherans ill prepared to learn and teach one another about prayer. I have a proposal that would raise our estimation of prayer to its appropriate status and relieve some of our anxiety about works righteousness with prayer. The proposal is this: we should consider prayer one of the means of grace.
It is common to recognize two means of grace -- the Word of God and the sacraments. In practice, Lutherans put primary emphasis on the Word and less on the sacraments, while the Roman Catholics do just the reverse. But in any case, Word and sacrament are recognized as the essential means by which the Holy Spirit creates faith and the community of faith, the church. Certainly there are human elements in Word and sacrament, for it is humans who enact the sacraments. Nonetheless, we are commanded by Christ to proclaim the gospel, to baptize, and to remember him in the eucharist, and we have a divine promise that God will work in and through those human words and actions to create and nurture faith.
In regard to prayer, Jesus includes both command and promise in the saying,"Ask, and it will be given you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you" (Matt. 7:7). What is more important than quoting a proof text from scripture, though, is to recognize that prayer is not merely "our" activity, not even "primarily" our activity. Prayer is fundamentally God speaking to us and we responding with our words, it is God's active presence coming to us and we acknowledging that presence. To realize the real character of prayer is, in effect, to view prayer as a means of grace. What I am proposing is that we Lutherans give explicit recognition to Christian prayer as a means of grace.
There are precedents for this in the Lutheran tradition. On several occasions when Melanchthon and Luther discussed the regular means through which God accomplishes works of grace, they mention prayer. Melanchthon does this in the "Apology of the Augsburg Confession" (1531) while discussing the number of sacraments. Rather than requiring a physical element for a sacrament, Melanchthon defines sacraments as "rites which have the command of God and to which the promise of grace has been added." On this basis Melanchthon counts baptism, the Lord's Supper, and absolution among the sacraments and is willing to consider ordination a sacrament. Then Melanchthon adds, "Ultimately, if we should list as sacraments all the things that have God's command and a promise added to them, then why not prayer, which can most truly be called a sacrament? It has both the command of God and many promises. If it were placed among the sacraments and thus given, so to speak, a more exalted position, this would move men to pray."(2)
In the "Smalcald Articles" (1537) Luther identifies five means of grace: the spoken word, baptism, Lord's Supper, absolution, and "the mutual conversation and consolation of sisters and brothers." Matthew 18:20, 'Where two or three are gathered,' etc."(3) It is uncertain what is covered by mutual conversation and consolation, but the scripture passage Luther quotes is in a context speaking of prayer. "Again I say to you, if two of you agree on earth about anything they ask, it will be done for them by my Father in heaven. For where two or three are gathered in my name, there am I in the midst of them" (Matt. 18:19-20).
In his 1539 treatise "On the Councils and the Church," Luther gives an extended discussion of the church as the assembly of holy Christian people. He identifies seven signs by which the church can be recognized and through which the Holy Spirit gives people faith in Christ and thus sanctifies them. The seven signs/means of grace are: the word of God, baptism, Lord's Supper, the ministry which is necessary to the functioning of the preceding meanings of grace, "prayer, public praise, and thanksgiving to God," and finally bearing the cross or affliction. Thus like Melanchthon, Luther does not consider prayer simply a human work, but a work of the Holy Spirit. Luther says, "For prayer, too, is one of the precious holy possessions whereby everything is sanctified."(4)
More recently Gustaf Aulen in "The Faith of the Christian Church" has recognized three means of grace: the word of God, the sacraments (baptism and Lord's Supper), and prayer. Aulen does not call the Christian ministry a means of grace, although like Luther he considers it a "constitutive factor" of the church. Aulen says the main hindrance to considering prayer as a means of grace is that prayer has been interpreted as an exclusively human act. He says, "It is quite evidence, however, that this argumentation is not very cogent, since prayer is not only our turning to God, but also God's approach to us, and a mode through which God accomplishes his loving will. It is therefore a means of grace."(5) Aulen also observes, "The various means of grace, to which previous reference has been made, are indissolubly connected with prayer and become effective means of grace only in this connection."(6) As I noted above, there is no sharp distinction between prayer and worship, for a sermon or eucharistic action nourishes our faith when we meditate on them.
I agree with Aulen that along with Word and sacraments we should regard prayer as the third means of grace through which God works. If we were to do this, we would make provision in our churches and seminaries for teaching prayer just as we make provision for proclaiming the Word and administering the sacraments.
I said I would identify three reasons "why" we Lutherans have been slow in teaching one another about prayer. The first is that we have not understood the nature of prayer. The second is our worry about slipping into works righteousness. The combination of these two reasons has caused us to be very leery of prayer disciplines. Now we come to the third reason, which is that we tend to get our priorities somewhat out of order. To be more specific, Lutherans often forget that living the faith comes first and theology comes second. Or to put it another way, we tend to overlook that fact that walking the Christian path is the first order act and theology is a second order act. Theology is reflection on faith, theology comes second.
Unlike the Anglicans for whom the "Book of Common Prayer" is more significant than doctrine, and unlike the Methodists for whom hymnody is probably of higher value than theological teachings, Lutheran tradition has regarded theology and doctrine as very important. In my own opinion, doctrine is indeed very important. It articulates the solid substance in our tradition and gives us a critical perspective on the cultural trends that come along. Lutherans have made theology such a high priority that we have marshalled considerable human and financial resources to insure that theology is taught and taught well. At the same time, we reveal the value we place on the first order practice of praying by the meagre human and financial resources we devote to instruction in prayer.
The oddity of this prioritizing has been partly concealed by the fact that we get distracted by the numerous theological controversies in our tradition. There is always some dispute to get excited about. This attraction to theological controversy has been aided in our tradition by the tendency to paint a very narrow white line and attack everyone who strays just a little from it. What I have in mind is this. I'm told that when the highway patrol stop a driver whom they suspect has had too much to drink, they may make the driver walk along the white line that borders most highways. I suppose on most highways that white line is about four inches wide. I'm suggesting that many Lutherans are continually testing one another's theological sobriety by seeing whether we walk a straight white line. I'm also suggesting that many of us Lutherans paint a very narrow white line to be used as the standard. Rather than a line that's four inches wide, we paint one with a half-inch artists's brush.
Now, I'm not an ELCA theologian taking a pot shot at Missouri or Wisconsin Lutherans. All you have to do is read some of our ELCA neo-Lutheran theologians and you can often find a very narrow white line. For instance, some Lutherans like to say that the doctrine of justification by faith is the doctrine by which the church stands or falls. Yet if one reads on, one often finds that very few folks even in the Lutheran tradition have taught the proper doctrine of justification. Those in Lutheran Orthodoxy did not get it right, and the Pietists certainly did not. The Formula of Concord also has the doctrine a bit skewed. Melanchthon is the Lutheran reformer second only to Luther, yet Melanchthon's stock today in our tradition is amazingly low, because later in his life he also did not formulate a pure doctrine of justification. And then when we come to Martin Luther himself, there is a tendency to see the purest articulation of justification by faith in the "early" Luther. Mind you, "this" is the doctrine by which the church stands or falls. By this judgment, though, it would appear that the Lutheran church, which has at least been "trying" to walk the white line, has in fact been wandering drunkenly all over the place.
When we look at other things beside theological formulation, however, we often find that down through these centuries of inadequate theological formulation God has continued to bring people to faith in Jesus Christ. In spite of our many theological shortcomings, the Holy Spirit has been active. There are limits, as Luther recognized in the Smalcald Articles, Part II, Article I, for when there is not witness to Jesus Christ, the faith dies out. Yet the Lord seems able to work in spite of less than perfect theological articulation. We all know persons who are theologically "unsophisticated" and totally unaware of the current controversies in academic theology, yet their trust in the Lord and their compassion for others puts us theologically trained folks to shame.
I do not say that theology is unimportant. I think it is indeed important. Yet doing theology and engaging in theological debates are not as important as such first order things as singing God's praises, meditating on the works of God, proclaiming those works of God, caring for the needs, and loving one another.
Of course, there is not a sharp division between these first order activities of faith and the second order activity of theology. Lutherans have been right to emphasize that how we do theology influences how we pray, but we have frequently minimized what the early church stressed: how we pray (and do not pray) influences how we do theology. The influences flow in both directions between prayer and theology. My point is that we should modify our priorities by placing a higher value on fundamental practices of the faith such as prayer and put a somewhat lower value on theology and its controversies. Furthermore, this shift in priorities should be reflected in how we allocate human and financial resources in the Lutheran churches.
I have made three recommendations regarding Lutherans and prayer:
If we Lutherans were to take advice seriously, I believe it would make our spirituality more Christ-centred. The major direction signs on the pathway of Lutheran spirituality do indeed point toward Jesus Christ. That's as it should be. However, we have been far less successful in helping people gain access to God's healing grace. For example, not long ago I led a prayer retreat at a rural church in Iowa. One middle aged woman on that retreat expressed to the group her persistent feelings of guilt over having been a poor mother to her oldest son when he was young. She was a regular churchgoer who has been baptized, heard many sermons on forgiveness, and had often received holy communion, but God's Word of forgiveness had not really reached that part of her life. Certain forms of prayer in which memories are held up before the Lord and offered for healing might be helpful to her. Another person at the same retreat said she was so busy with the dual responsibilities of job and home that she found it difficult to sense Christ's presence in her life. It is not helpful to merely say that she hear more sermons and take communion more frequently. What she needs is advice on prayer such as, when possible, pausing just a couple of minutes to take a few deep breaths and maybe use the Jesus prayer to remind her that Christ is indeed present with her in the midst of the hubbub.
Arguments over works righteousness and theological fine points are not at the top of the agenda in such real life situations. What is at stake is helping people live day by day in the presence and strength of Jesus Christ, and for that we need prayer.
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(1) Margaret M. Poloma and George H. Gallup, Jr., "Varieties of Prayer" (Philadelphia: Trinity, 1991).
(2) Apology of the Augsburg Confession XIII, in "The Book of Concord," tr. and ed. by Theodore G. Tappert (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1959), 213. I am indebted to Ralph Quere for pinpointing these passages in the Reformers.
(3) Smalcald Articles, Part III, Article IV, in "The Book of Concord," 310.
(4) "On the Councils and the Church," in "Martin Luther's Basic Theological Writings," ed. Timothy F. Lull (Minneapolis: Fortress, 1989), 561.
(5) Gustaf Aulen, "The Faith of the Christian Church," tr. Eric H. Wahlstrom and G. Everett Arden (Philadelphia: Muhlenberg Press, 1948), 356.
(6) Aulen, 401.