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Sabbath Edition
What Can Our Muslim Cousins Teach Us About Preparing for the Christian Sabbath?
Saturday, July 25, 2015
Jeff Lampl
Sabbath Edition
What Can Our Muslim Cousins Teach Us About Preparing for the Christian Sabbath?
Saturday, July 25, 2015
Jeff Lampl
“Rejoice
always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances;
for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 (NIV2011)
for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus.”
1 Thessalonians 5:16-18 (NIV2011)
They
pray! Muslims pray five times
each day, if possible kneeling in submission to God as they do. The
Christian’s mealtime graces were meant to help foster prayer throughout the
day. I do hope that our series this
winter on emotionally healthy spirituality helped you to form some new prayer
habits that you have kept up. Some
of you pray each morning, others with your children at bed time, others “pray
without ceasing’.
As
for myself I have always struggled to keep a consistent prayer time.
I’m not consistent in anything!
So the fact that most Muslims pray as they do is impressive and
motivating to me. And as
I’ve thought about this, I have found it more and more difficult to believe
that those prayers 5 times a day are nothing more than empty ritual.
Habits form attitudes. It
is true that “as we think so we do” but the opposite is true too.
I suspect that most Muslims pray out of faith, faith that there is a God
and that God will be merciful to them.
It seems to me that God would not only not reject these prayers outright
as empty ritual, ,rather the God we know through Jesus hears the cries of the
those who genuinely seek Him. One
of evangelical Christianity’s favorite verses is Ephesians 2:8,9 “saved by
grace through faith, not by works”
While
I worry greatly about mass prayer in Mosques with signs above them that read
“death to Israel” or “death to America”, while Muslims who pray this are
a minority but a minority which numbers over 50 million, while
there is so much danger in following an understanding of God which relies on
power over love, yet my faith tells me that somehow and in some way the God of
Jesus Christ will speak to faithful people everywhere who seek him.
"Then
Peter began to speak: “I now realize how true it is that God does not show
favoritism but accepts from every nation the
one who fears him and does what is right."
Acts
10:34-36
Tomorrow
is the Sabbath. Why not renew
your commitment to prayer, learning from our Muslim Cousins that we too can make
time each day to talk to God, receive his direction, his discernment in
decisions before, and intercede on behalf of both your loved ones and your
enemies.
Years
ago I came across a terrific prayer guide. It’s
not to prayed in a “rote” kind of way rather as guide to reflect on its
contents.
“This,
then, is how you should pray:
‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’” Matthew 6:9-13 (NIV2011)
‘Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
your kingdom come,
your will be done,
on earth as it is in heaven.
Give us today our daily bread.
And forgive us our debts, as we also have forgiven our debtors.
And lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from the evil one.’” Matthew 6:9-13 (NIV2011)
For
more:
follow on Twitter @jefflampl
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