A few nights ago, I finished a book with the very simple title of "Prayer", by Richard J. Foster. I would highly recommend this book to anyone who has ever been a little intimidated by the idea of prayer and is interested in taking a little bit of the mystery out of the whole notion and learning how to pray effectively in our every day lives. It's not a "be all, end all" book (most aren't), but I have found it to be incredibly useful. It's taken me nearly two years to finish, and I will likely read through it again because I feel there were so many important things within it, but this particular passage in the last chapter entitled "Radical Prayer" struck me as especially relevant to this season in my life.
"The true prophetic message always calls us to "social holiness", to use the phrase of John Wesley. By our praying and by our living we sabotage all class and rank and status distinctions.
Jesus was, and is, a social revolutionary. When he healed the sick, he did more than cure diseases: he healed in a society that would cast these people aside. When he pronounces his beatitudes upon the people, he was taking up those classes and categories that society deemed to be unblessed and unblessable. He told these "sat upon, spat upon, ratted on" people that they were precious in the kingdom of God. He blessed the children; he talked with an outcast woman; he hobnobbed with a wealthy crook (Mark 10:13-16; John 4:1-26; Luke 19:1-10).
We are to do likewise. In our praying and in our living we value all, breaking down every barrier. The class barriers have shifted somewhat in our day. The slender people we value; the fat we don't. The successful people we value; the failures we don't. The intelligent people we value; the ignorant we don't. And on it goes, ad nauseam. But for the children of the kingdom, it is not important who a person is, only that a person is.
Jesus' social revolution went all the way to the corridors of religious power. In the Sermon on the Mount he told the people, in essence, that the entire temple ritual system could dry up and blow away, and their blessedness would still remain. Jesus, you see, set people free rather than put them in bondage.
And so do we. By our prayers and by our words we liberate people, not bind them to us. When way pray for others, we are leading them to Jesus, their present Teacher, so they have no need of us anymore. Any faith that makes the blessedness of people dependent upon anyone or anything other than God himself is, to that extent, a false faith.
Social holiness takes us beyond our comfort zones and our geographic borders. When jesus defined neighbor with his parable of the good Samaritan, he was flying in the face of the popular view of neighbor, namely, that he is someone like us. Under the tutelage of the Spirit, Peter too came to the insight that "God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him" (Acts 10:34b-35).
A venerable, old sage once asked his disciples, "How can we know when the darkness is leaving and the dawn is coming?"
"When we can see a tree in the distance and know that it is an elm and not a juniper," ventured one student.
"When we can see an animal and know that it is a fox and not a wolf," chimed in another.
"No," said the old man, "those things will not help us."
Puzzled, the students demanded, "How then can we know?"
The master teacher drew himself up to his full stature and replied quietly, "We know the darkness is leaving and the dawn is coming when we can see another person and know that this is our brother or our sister; otherwise, no matter what time it is, it is still dark.""
-Kelley
