Praying When You’d Rather Not

(Based on Psalm 37:1-11, and Luke 6:27-38




Last Sunday a question was raised about praying for one’s enemy. It was not a theoretical question, it came from the heart and in response to the tragic slaying of medical missionaries in Afghanistan. We have heard of similar atrocities in recent times. Tempers run high when we learn of brutal, and what strikes us as senseless, slayings, often committed in the name of religious beliefs. The God in question may be Yahweh, or Allah, or some pagan deity who it is believed not only condones such behavior, but demands it. Or it may be strictly secular and political in nature. It scarcely matters. Such behavior strikes at the core of our beliefs about human beings.



We live in a nation that says all men are created equal and that we are endowed with certain inalienable rights, rights that come from God or a higher power or whatever name we choose to use. We believe in the rights of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Such a belief is the foundation of our government and our way of life. Our laws and civil codes do not make sense without this fundamental belief.



Because we believe this, it always shocks us when we encounter behavior that violates these rights. We forget rights are not sacred to all peoples and races and nations. There are things we simply do not do. And when others do them with impunity, we are shocked, repulsed, appalled. Timothy McVey, the Oklahoma City bomber, spoke of the death of innocent children as "collateral damage" and we were stunned. Those children were living, breathing, human beings. They were life renewing itself. They were God’s children. You cannot, you must not dismiss them this way.



Arguments about abortion make no sense if human life has no intrinsic worth. Disputes over illegal immigration are easily resolved if all one sees is statistics, dollar signs and data in a computer. Without the human equation, disputes about social issues sound foolish. I was watching a video of a Harry Potter movie recently in which dragons are given a hard time. In keeping with the usual disclaimer we so often see at the end the credits, assuring us no animals were harmed in the making of this film, the producers proudly announced "No dragons were harmed in the making of this film." If one does not happen to be an animal love, one might ask "who cares?". I, for one, would be delighted to see someone announce, "No human beings were harmed in the making of this film". Such an announcement would certainly be in keeping with our stated belief in the sacredness of human life.



However, wars still go on. Cruelty is still tolerated. Nations, tribes, families, drug cartels, religious fanatics, you name it, all still divide up the human race, labeling some as being good, decent, acceptable human beings while others are dismissed as not worthy of the benefits of being called human. Mark Twain attacks this in a less than subtle way in his classic "Huckleberry Finn" when he has Huck respond to a question about an explosion on a river boat asking ‘was anybody hurt?’. Huck replies with the casual words, ‘no ma’am, just a nigger got killed.’ That such a remark raised no eyebrows speaks volumes about attitudes toward blacks in those days. That we haven’t come that far in our attitudes since then, is all too regrettably true. Back in the fifties when I was on a seminary choir tour, I remember being assured by my host that people got along just fine with the colored folk in Florida. "We have no race prejudice here." He boasted. And almost in the next breath, he pointed at a stretch of beach and said, "That’s where the damn Jews swim."



Even Christians carry on the warfare, with antics like the self-proclaimed Rev. Phelps of Topeka, Kansas, who proudly pickets the funerals of known gay soldiers announcing how God hates gays and has sent another one to hell.



So when we hear of the death of decent, caring, human beings because they represent a hated religion, or a despised nation, we show we have learned our lesson well. Such behavior is unacceptable. You just don’t do such things. At the same time, we are challenged to look at what we do do. How do we respond to such cruelty? What is our responsibility to the hated enemy? Can we really pray for them? In the musical "Fiddler on the Roof" the rabbi is asked if there is a prayer for everything. Is there a prayer for the Czar? He replies, "Of course." and he chants, "May the Lord bless and keep the Czar, far away from us!"



Our scriptures this morning give us guidance, but it is advice we might rather not hear. Don’t fret about evildoers, the Psalmist tells us. Trust in the Lord and do good. And Jesus tells his disciples "You’ve been taught ‘an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth’ but I don’t go along with that. No, if someone steals a garment from you, give him your cloak. If he slaps your cheek, turn your face and let him slap the other." Even as we listen to this advice, every molecule in our body rebels. This is too much. No way.



There was an interesting incident that occurred in Philadelphia, also in the fifties. A Korean student named In Ho Oh was murdered by a gang of teenagers. The student was on the way to the post office to mail a letter to his family in Korea when three or four teenagers confronted him and demanded money. When it became clear the student had none, they took out their frustration on him by beating him senseless. He later died in the emergency room at the hospital. I knew the nurse who was there when this happened.



What makes this story interesting is the reaction of the student’s parents. They wrote a letter to the City of Philadelphia requesting a piece of ground where their son might be buried. They did not want to spend the money it would cost to transport his body back to Korea. Instead, they set aside that money in a fund they created for the purpose of providing an education for the teenagers who had killed their son. They wanted good to come out of tragedy.



I’ve wondered what finally happened. Did the boys get the education those Korean parents were ready to provide for them? Did they make something useful of their lives? Did grace grow out of tragedy? I do not know. What I do know is how that example of forgiveness set an example for countless Christians who might not have been reached any other way.



I know how impossible Jesus’ teaching sounds. I know how praying for one who has hurt you can seem idiotic. I also know what happens to the soul that clings to bitterness and revenge. I remember Howard whose father was of the old school of discipline (those were Howard’s words). That meant the father never spared the rod, but beat the boy relentlessly. One day, the beating was so severe, an arm was broken. In Howard’s word, he said, "I learned an important lesson that day. As bad as it hurt, I remember saying to myself, he’s either going to kill me, or he’ll finally get too tired to beat me any more. Either way, it will have to end. I’ll never be afraid of him again." Of course, this did not change the boy’s behavior, it merely proved to the father he had no control over his son. The boy was immune to threats or pain - a very dangerous way to be.



I’ve learned another lesson, one not born so much of violence, but from the corruption of the human heart. Hatred destroys twice. It destroys the relationship in which that hatred was born. It also destroys the one who hates. As one person put it, "Resentment is the poison I prepare to kill you but end up drinking myself." When I hate you, you win. Even indifference, that in-between form of hatred, destroys both the hater and the one hated. When Jesus urged us to pray for our enemies, and do good to those who would harm us, he merely reminded us what wise men have relearned through the ages - that hatred harms the hater far more than the one hated. I carry the burden in my soul when I hate you. I am the one who sickens, and finally die.



Thus being urged to pray for one’s enemy is not just a pious suggestion, a Pollyanna game of sweetness and light; it is a radical prescription for healing that is the only real healing one can ever find that really works. When Jesus hung on the cross, we are told he prayed for those who had hung him there. "Father, forgive them, they don’t know what they’re doing." Did this in some way change God’s mind about the soldiers, the priests, the fellow criminals or the crowd that mocked him? I doubt it, although it may have cause one or two of them to think again about what they’d done. But it did do something for Jesus. It released him from the hatred and revenge that could have poisoned his own soul as he hung in agony on that cross. It was enough that he had to die, it would have been far worse if he had taken bitterness and anger with him to his grave.



Can we pray for our enemy? Can we pray for those who show no regard for human life? Can we pray for terrorists? Religious fanatics? Murderers? Child rapists? Spouse beaters? Vicious gossips? Evil doers of all kinds? Jesus believed we can. He showed us how. Knowing what can happen if we do not, the question must be rephrased. Can we pray for our enemy? Ah, how dare we not! Amen.