Sermon - Be persistent in prayer

Be persistent in prayer. There was in the Independent newspaper a few years ago an article about Barbara Cartland . She was asked how she began a new story . “I always pray for a good plot” she replied.”Yes I start by praying for a good plot” . The article ended with the statement . Barbara Cartland has written over 400 plots that is over 400 hundred unanswered prayers . In Keith Wards book “Christianity” “a guide for the perplexed” he writes “Prayer is love of the good and beautiful”. For Keith Ward prayer begins by loving what is good and beautiful around us . To love something is to contemplate it , pay attention to , appreciate and enjoy it . Part of prayer is to attend to and delight in all beautiful and good things - going to a concert handing ourselves over to the music is a form of prayer . Going to an art gallery and really paying attention to the pictures around us is a form of prayer . Last week I went to Tate Britain to see the Turner water colours I left the exhibition with a renewed sense of wonder and a positive feeling about life . Reading a good novel and thereby seeing the world through the imagination and sensitivity of its author is a form of prayer . The enjoyment of friends and shared activities be it rowing on the Thames early in the morning or simply spending time pottering in the garden being close to nature or practising Ti Chi is a form of prayer . In all these activities something of God`s beauty and light is reaching out towards us . The good and the beautiful wherever we find it has the potential to lift us out of ourselves and give us a renewed sense of hope and life. While on holiday we have the time to explore these avenues of prayer . But there is also another form of prayer , the desire to put ourselves at the disposal of God`s own spirit . In other words to be open to gifts of his Spirit . The first gift we can pray for is the gift of love . A love which both delights in the joys of others and shares in their sorrows . We should pray that we find real happiness in the happiness of others that their joy is our joy. There should be no envy or resentment in the happiness of others rather a real concern that others find the happiness they long for . We should pray never to harm others even when they harm us but always be concerned for their good. To pray for this gift of love is to share in the spirit of love , God`s own spirit transforming our spirit. His light and beauty enlightening us momentarily transfiguring us. We could pray for the spirit of joy . Joy is a gift of the spirit something of God`s own joy for which we can ask to have a share in .To have a joyful mind is always to think of things that will make human lives more beautiful and to be thankful for all good things however small . We could pray for the gift of peace . To be at peace is to be calm in all things , calm in the knowledge that we are grounded in God , who cannot be injured or destroyed by anything at all . We could pray for the gift of patience . Patience is that capacity not to insist upon things happening just when and as we wish . Patience is that ability to act as well as we can in any given situation and leave the outcome to God . The list is endless : kindness , generosity , faithfulness, gentleness , self-control . These are all gifts of God`s own Spirit , his life on offer to us . His desire to share something of himself with us , his kindness his generosity his gentleness his life . So often we see prayer as asking for things , rather than sharing in a life richer and deeper than our own , the life of God`s own spirit coming alive within us . Barbara CARTLAND was nearer to the truth than her critics realised . We can all pray for a good plot , the story line of our own lives that it may reflect something of the beauty and goodness of God himself . Lord of heaven and earth , as Jesus taught his disciples to be persistent in prayer , give us patience and courage never to loose hope but always to bring our prayers before you ; through Jesus Christ our Lord Amen