Friday, July 29, 2011

Those Dull Old Lutheran Prayers and Pray-ers

In Lebanon, Tennessee, not far from the city where I abide, an area where car racing and Nascar is king, you open the races with prayer.  Never mind that Nascar was born of moonshine running and that the first drivers were experts at evading the law, snaking their way through the back roads at breakneck speeds, and bringing home the fruit of the still.  Anyway, at a recent race one Baptist brother decided to forgo the dull old prayers of the past and put some zip into praying up the cars and drivers before the race.

Joe Nelms of Family Baptist Church gave the invocation at Saturday night’s Nationwide race at Nashville Speedway. Late in the prayer, Nelms channeled his inner Ricky Bobby when he borrowed a line from the film “Talladega Nights”.


“Lord, I want to thank you for my smokin’ hot wife tonight, Lisa, and my two children, Eli and Emma, or as we like to call, ‘The Little E's,'" he said, while also thanking automotive companies, like Goodyear and Sunoco, Reuters reported.  You can read about it all here.

Brother Joe would probably give the old General Prayer from TLH a big yawn as well as the great collects and prayers of the church.  Some Lutheran folks do as well.  In fact I had somebody tell me once that I when I prayed I sounded like a prayerbook.  I thought it was a compliment.  Turned out it was not.  You may argue with me but I think that before you can pray on your own, you need to learn how to prayer with the saints before you.  I believe that collects teach us how to pray because they also teach us about the God to whom we pray and the promises which are the foundation of our prayers.  It is neither our blessings nor our wants that best shape our prayers but the promises of God.  We are moved to prayer best not by the woes and failures of our mortal lives but by the promises of God.  When we do not see clearly or have trouble trusting in those promises, the Spirit intercedes with prayers formed of our groans and sighs.  Brother Joe would certainly disagree, but I believe that if you want to improve your prayer life, you can begin by praying the ancient collects and prayers of the Church, waling in the foot steps of the great pray-ers of old.

4 comments:

Sue said...

Amen.

And I'm still learning at age 59! Hard to improve on the words of the saints before us...

Anonymous said...

There can be sincere and humble
prayers offered "ex corde" and based
on the ACTS of prayer.

A=Adoration...of God
C=Confession..of sins
T=Thanksgiving..for blessings of God
S-Supplication..spiritual and
physical requests

Rev. Allen Bergstrazer said...

Matthew 24:5 But all their works they do for to be seen of men: they make broad their phylacteries, and enlarge the borders of their garments, and love the uppermost rooms at feasts, and the chief seats in the synagogues, and greetings in the markets, and to be called of men, Rabbi, Rabbi. I’m sure Joe Nelms vehemently eschews the wearing robes and has never been in a Synagogue in his life, but he sure has the other part down: “I want to get somebody’s attention, so that’s been our desire every time we’ve been up there, to try to make an impact on the fans and give them something they’ll remember, and maybe they’ll go home on a Friday night or a Saturday night and say, 'Maybe I ought to get up and go to church in the morning,'"
I think this prayer garnered plenty of attention-for Joe Nelms. It drew attention to how low (brow) some people will go to get noticed and call it out reach, in this case bordering on vulgar. Ephesians 5:4; “Let there be no filthiness nor foolish talk nor crude joking, which are out of place, but instead let there be thanksgiving.” We all know what James said of the tongue, and we’ve all had our moments, but it reinforced every stereotype of evangelical Christians and proved once again that they’ve become a caricature of themselves. Boorishness for Jesus.

Dixie said...

We all know what James said of the tongue, and we’ve all had our moments, but it reinforced every stereotype of evangelical Christians and proved once again that they’ve become a caricature of themselves. Boorishness for Jesus.

"Like" or "+1" depending on your social media preferences. This is probably the best assessment I have read of the smokin' hot wife prayer.