As someone who leads worship on a regular basis I was a bit put off by a verse from Mark’s gospel today. Warning his listeners about the scribes Jesus says, in part, “They devour widows’ houses and for the sake of appearance say long prayers. They will receive the greater condemnation” (Mark 12:40). Really? Long prayers are morally equivalent to devouring the homes of widows? If this is true then I’m in big trouble. But this is really not the what Jesus is saying. The lengthy prayers that Jesus is talking about are made “for the sake of appearance,” not as a true act of faith. In other words, the scribes often practice a phony religion with prayers intended to attract attention to themselves and not to praise and worship God. And while dubious prayers may still seem mild compared to the eviction of widows, they do point to a greater truth. Our relationship with God says a lot about how we are apt to treat others. If we are praying, or worshiping, or showing up for church just so others will see us and be impressed, then we are really no better than those who mistreat their neighbors and take advantage of the defenseless.
Does that sound familiar? It should. This is just an extension of the gospel reading from yesterday, where Jesus said that love of God and love of neighbor are the two greatest commandments. It is impossible to do one adequately without doing the other as well. Insulting God with meaningless prayers IS the moral equivalent of mistreating one’s neighbors because not loving God is essentially the same as not loving those around us, and vice versa. So, it really isn’t the length of ours prayers that Jesus is warning us about-what a relief!-it is what those prayers say about us, how we feel about God, how we feel about each other.
Prayer: Lord, help us to love you and to love those around us. Amen.
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