Trinity 10, Year A
First Reading : 1 Kings 19.9-18
Gospel : Matthew 14.22-33
Text: He went up the mountain by himself to pray (Matthew 13.23)
What are you doing here, Elijah? Our Old Testament reading took us to a moment of profound crisis in the life of the great prophet Elijah. Faced with the worship of Baal under the powerful patronage of Queen Jezebel, Elijah had declared a drought which was now in its third year. He had brought matters to a head by challenging the prophets of Baal to a great contest on Mount Carmel. Whose God would answer with fire? The prophets of Baal had danced and worshipped all day to no avail, but when Elijah prayed to God to ‘let it be known that you are God in Israel, that I am your servant, and that I have done all these things at your bidding’ (1 Kings 18.36) then ‘the fire of the Lord fell and consumed his burnt offering, the wood, the stones and the dust, and even licked up the water that was in the trench’ (v 38). When they saw it, the people cried out: ‘the Lord indeed is God’ seizing the prophets of Baal and slaughtering every one of them at the Wadi Kishon. Elijah’s God had triumphed, the people were returning to him in worship, and the drought could now end, but when Ahab shared the good news with Jezebel, she wasangry, vowing to take her revenge by killing Elijah. It was at this point that his courage deserted him, and he fled into the wilderness.
Which is where we came into the story this morning. What are you doing here, Elijah? And he confesses his fear. He has been very zealous for the Lord, but many true prophets have been slain and now ‘I alone am left, and they are seeking my life to take it away’ (1 Kings 19.10). What follows is a mighty demonstration of God’s power – in wind, and earthquake and fire – but God is not in any of that. There follows a sound of sheer silence, and God is there, in the silence. Elijah is still in great danger, but his trust has been renewed. What are you doing here, Elijah? He answers with the same words, but now they have an undercurrent of faith rather than fear, and God is able to give him a series of tasks to carry out. Moreover he assures Elijah that he is not alone. There are in fact some seven thousand in Israel who have not bowed the knee to Baal. Elijah needed to take time out to be with God in the wilderness. Having encountered God in the sound of sheer silence, he leaves his cave humbled by God’s quiet purposeful presence, and ready to undertake the next stage of his prophetic mission.
Our Gospel reading showed Peter going through a similar experience, at first full of courage in his bold response to Jesus, stepping out of the boat to come to him across the water, but then thrown off balance by his fear, before being restored by a gracious word and Jesus’ arm, outstretched to rescue him. In sharp contrast to both Elijah and Peter, Jesus himself, drawing strength from his deep and close relationship with his Father, knew how to keep his balance in a crisis. And the feeding of the five thousand was just such a crisis. To everyone else – the disciples as well as the crowds – it looked like a triumph. Jesus’ healing and preaching was attracting a great following. But John’s account concludes with the realization that the people ‘were about to come and take him by force to make him king’ (John 6.15). Things were getting out of hand. The sunny days of his Galilean mission were drawing to a close. He could see the danger. But how was he to continue
expressing his Father’s Love in words and deeds without stirring up that kind of Messianic frenzy? Dismissing the crowds, he goes up the mountain by himself to pray. He needed to take time out for prayerful meditation – as he had done for a longer period before embarking on his public ministry – as we know he would do again, in intense agony of spirit, as he faced the great crisis of his trial and crucifixion.
Jesus went up the mountain by himself to pray. There are no mountains within easy reach of Hampstead, but if you and I need that sort of space, there are quiet places such as Launde Abbey to which one can retreat for a day or two of peace and prayerful reflection.
I hesitate to talk about prayer. What can I share but my own stumbling inadequacy? We do of course have Jesus’ own advice, in the form of the Lord’s Prayer, given when his disciples asked him how to pray. It’s not just a form of words which we can use to express our prayers collectively, though it does fulfil that function. In my own experience the words of the Lord’s Prayer, just as they are, can be a wonderfully powerful resource, a crutch to lean on, in those moments of acute stress when we can find no other words to howl, to weep, to whisper. But since the Lord’s Prayer includes phrases which briefly express Adoration, Confession and Forgiveness, Thanksgiving and Intercession, it does also offer us a framework for a more extensive exercise of prayerful meditation when we are on our own.
But I have also come to feel that too much emphasis on the formal articulation and structure of private prayer fails to recognize the value, in the hurly-burly of a busy life, of simply trying to adopt, by the grace of God, a prayerful frame of mind in one’s everyday thinking and decision-making. It seems to me that such an approach, stumbling and imperfect as it may be, is as likely as any more formally structured prayer routine to open the door of one’s heart and mind to the inspiration of the Holy Spirit. It might be a thought that one should write a letter to someone – a real hand-written letter as Father Graham was suggesting last week – or it might be a plan to visit someone or talk to them on the phone, not with any clearly articulated agenda or intent beyond showing them that they are loved and not forgotten, and perhaps opening the door to their need. There is no clear boundary between thoughts and prayers, and I know that is what many of you already practise.
We can be sure that Jesus’ own heart and mind was open at all times to the inspiration that came to him from his Father. Moreover, his example teaches us the value, in our ordinary daily life, of a continuous prayerful relationship with God our Father, sustained by regular participation in worship. It was his custom to attend the synagogue regularly, as we attend church, immersing ourselves in the beliefs, the stories, the words which give expression to our faith.
As we continue in regular prayer and worship, let us also be open as he was to the need, from time to time, to ‘go up the mountain by himself to pray’.