FIRST PRESBYTERIAN CHURCH, ATLANTA, GEORGIA

Sermon by Dr. George Bryant Wirth

 

April 20, 2008

 

CHRIST AT THE CENTER: OUR FIRM FOUNDATION

PRAYING FOR RAIN

 

Scripture:  I Kings 17:1-7; 18:17-21, 41-46

Matthew 5:43-48; 6:5-15; 7:7-8

 

INTRODUCTION

 

Last November, as one of the worst droughts this state has ever seen brought us to a point of crisis, Governor Sonny Perdue invited political and religious leaders from different faith traditions to meet outside the Georgia State Capitol to pray for rain.  In fact, his exact words were “to very reverently and respectfully pray up a storm,” in hope of ending the severe drought that has threatened not only the livelihood of our farmers, but also the economic stability of this entire region.

 

It wasn’t the first time a Georgia Governor had encouraged others to pray for rain.  Joe Frank Harris sent out a similar state-wide request in July of 1986, and got down on his knees during Sunday worship at the Roswell Street Baptist Church in Marietta, asking the Lord for relief from the dry spell back then.  Within hours, the rain began to fall and continued steadily for several weeks, which caused at least one citizen to call the Governor’s office complaining “Y’all turned this water on, and we’ve had just about enough”!

 

So there was some precedent for a public prayer meeting for rain at the Governor’s instigation, and sure enough, last November, two weeks before Thanksgiving, Sonny Perdue sent out the invitation.

 

About a month ago, Stacy Shelton, a top flight journalist who’s connected to this church family, wrote an article in the AJC about what has happened since then:

 

          “Rain the rest of that month (November) barely wet the pavement, but as the Governor said at the time, ‘God can make it rain tomorrow.  He can make it rain next week or next month.’

          And rain it has.  December was wetter than normal, and February was right on track.  January has been the only dry month since the prayer.  But Atlanta is still about 17 inches in the hole for the past year.”

 

The article concludes with a quote that Stacy was kind enough to ask me to make, and I said that “praying for rain is not a bad idea.  In fact, it’s Biblical.  Elijah prayed for rain, so why can’t we do the same today?’  (From an article “Perdue’s Prayers Answered?  Rainfall Heavier” by Stacy Shelton, Atlanta Journal Constitution, March 2008)

 

And that is the question I want to explore with you this morning.  Were Governors Harris and Perdue, both devout Christians, and all the others with them, standing on solid Biblical and theological ground as they prayed to the Lord for the rain to come down?  Is it still ok to pray for rain today?  What do you think?

 

I

 

The prophet Elijah thought it was the right thing to do a long time ago, and the story is recorded in I Kings 17 and 18.  During the 9th century B.C., Ahab, the King of Israel, had married a pagan woman named Jezebel, and according to the Bible, that was not a marriage made in heaven.

 

Queen Jezebel promoted cultic worship of the god called Baal among the chosen people.  This desecration of the first commandment, “You shall have not other gods before Me” (Exodus 20:3), displeased the Lord and a great drought and famine descended upon the land.

 

I Kings 18, verse 1 tells us that “After many days, the word of the Lord came to (the prophet) Elijah in the third year, saying ‘Go, show yourself to Ahab (and tell him that) I will send rain upon the earth.’”  King Ahab and Queen Jezebel were not receptive to the message, and blamed Elijah for all the trouble they were in.  Elijah boldly answered “I have not troubled Israel, but you have…for you have forsaken the commandments of the Lord and followed Baal.”

 

So a great contest was set up at Mt. Carmel, where Elijah confronted 450 prophets of Baal, declaring to them and to the rest of the Hebrew nation, “If the Lord is God, follow Him; but if Baal is God, then follow him” (verse 21).

 

The altars were laid out with sacrifices and wood, and the sign of God’s power was to be revealed by fire.  The prophets of Baal prayed to their god, who failed them.  Then Elijah prayed to the God of Israel, who consumed the altars with a blazing conflagration.  And as the fire burned, when the false prophets were defeated and destroyed, Elijah began to pray for rain.

 

The Bible says that he went up to the top of Mt. Carmel, bowed his head and put his face between his knees to pray…and not long after, the sky turned dark, the thunderclouds rolled, the wind blew in, and there was a great downpour of rain (I Kings 18:42-46).

 

Now, we need to remember that in those ancient days, people believed that God’s anger and displeasure could and did cause natural disasters and all sorts and conditions of bad weather.  Jesus offered a corrective view to that perspective in the Sermon on the Mount, declaring that “the sun rises on the good and on the evil, and the rain falls on the righteous and the unrighteous” (Matthew 5:45), meaning, I think, that God doesn’t use the weather to reward or to punish anyone.

 

Moreover, in this modern era, with all of our scientific research and knowledge about the atmospheric conditions which create hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and droughts, no one that I know still believes these destructive displays of nature are, literally, “acts of God” – and perhaps someday our insurance companies will delete that phrase from their policies!

 

But right now, all across this state, there are many citizens, including two governors of Georgia and a whole host of Christians, who are pleading with God, just as Elijah did, and they’re praying for rain.  So the question remains: “Is that prayer still Biblically viable and theologically justifiable today?”

 

II

 

Some folks would say “No,” and they might quote Albert Einstein who said years ago that “God does not play dice with the universe.”  In other words, at the dawn of creation, God set in motion certain laws of nature which He does not alter or violate.  So good weather and bad weather will inevitably come and go, and praying about it is really of no use, because God doesn’t play games with the world He has made.

 

But if you told that to the governors and their faithful group of intercessors, I think you’d be hard pressed to convince them that their prayers have not made a difference.  And to tell you the truth, I agree and have been praying along with them.

 

Now that’s not the case when it comes to asking the Lord for sunny skies on your regular golf day – prayers which a friend of mine refers to as “God’s junk mail.”  I recall several years ago when we scheduled a church golf tournament to raise money for youth mission trips.  As we all arrived, the thunder started to roll.  On the first tee, the skies broke open and when the rest of the foursome looked at me, asking “Preacher, do something!” I replied with the standard brand answer, “I’m in sales, not management.”  So we laughed together as it rained even harder, and were totally drenched by the time we made it back to the clubhouse.

 

I’m not talking about those kinds of rain prayers.  We are talking instead about lifting up our hearts and petitions to the Lord when the drought is so severe that there’s nothing more we can do except for asking God to hear us and help us in our time of trouble and distress.  And although we may never know exactly how it works, when the rain finally does begin to fall, we can all thank God for the blessing that He has showered upon us.

 

That is also true, my friends, when we pray for those whom we love as they are preparing for surgery or recovering from sickness or suffering in some kind of pain.  When we pray for them and for ourselves, God has promised to hear us, to come alongside us, and to lead us every step of the way through the healing process.

 

How do we know?  Psalm 23 tells us so: “Yea though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil, for Thou art with me.”  And Jesus confirmed that promise was true as He taught His disciples to pray, saying “Ask and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock and the door will be opened to you…for if you…know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father in heaven give good things to those who ask Him” (Matthew 7:7, 11).  The question is: Do you believe that today?  If you do, or if you want to, then please listen to this story.

 

III

 

In the 1950’s, when Dr. Leslie Weatherhead was minister of the City Temple in London, they used to get two thousand people out for the Sunday evening service.  In his book “Wounded Spirits,” Weatherhead tells about a Sunday afternoon in 1954 when he heard that a young boy named Alistair, just seven years old, was seriously ill with poliomyelitis.

 

Unknown to Alistair’s parents, who were parishioners, that evening in worship, Dr. Weatherhead asked the entire congregation of two thousand to pray silently, together, all at once, for Alistair, and to think of Jesus Christ as if He were standing by Alistair’s bed laying His hands on the boy’s head.

 

As they prayed, Weatherhead said, “We cooperated with God, and became, with the doctors and nurses, part of the healing team.”  The prayers were prayed at City Temple at seven o’clock.  The service had started at 6:30.

 

Three days later, that minister received a letter from Alistair’s mother, and in it she said this:

 

          “All day Sunday Alistair was ill and feverish; and at 6:30 his temperature was 103.  Then, at 7:30, his temperature dropped three points, and he said to me ‘Mummy, I feel better now.  May I have some supper?’  Today, we went to the hospital and the surgeon said that while Alistair will be left with some disability, he will be able to walk again, and someday maybe even run.  It is going to be a long time ahead for him, but there is every hope of a good recovery.”

 

And it was only after all of that had happened that Alistair’s family learned about the prayers in the City Temple.

 

(Story from a sermon by Dr. Robert Cleveland Holland, “The Prayers of the Fitzroy Street Methodist Church,” preached in the Shadyside Presbyterian Church, Pittsburgh, PA on April 13, 1980)

 

 

 

 

CONCLUSION

 

I believe that story about the power of prayer reveals a great mystery – God has drawn near to us through His Son, our Savior Jesus, whose Holy Spirit has been let loose and is at work in this world: healing us in our sickness, suffering and pain…holding onto us when we are anxious and afraid…helping us to go on instead of giving up…and encouraging us with hope as we pray for rain to end this drought.

 

You see, the power of prayer is available to us.  And if we are ready to tap into it, then Jesus has told us what to do: “Ask, and you will receive; seek and you will find; knock, and the door will be opened for you.”  And when we pray that way, putting our trust in Him, we’ll discover that His promise is true.

 

In the name of the Father, and the Son and the Holy Spirit.  Amen.

 

 

 

 

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