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“Prayer: Sharpening The Ax”
Mark 9:39-50
James 5:13-20

October 1, 2006 - Kim M. Henning

A young man approached the foreman of a logging crew and asked for a job.

“That depends,” replied the foreman. “Let’s see you fell this tree.”

The young man stepped forward, grabbed hold of an ax, and skillfully felled a great tree.

Impressed, the foreman exclaimed, “You can start Monday.”

And he did. Monday, the young man worked. Tuesday. Wednesday. He worked hard. Thursday afternoon, the foreman approached the young man and said, “You can pick up your paycheck on the way out today.”

Startled, the young man replied, “But I thought you paid on Friday.”

“Normally we do,” said the foreman. “But we’re letting you go today because you’ve fallen behind. Our daily felling charts show that you’ve dropped from first place on Monday to last place today.”

“But I’m a hard worker,” the young man objected. “I arrive first, leave last, and even have worked through my coffee breaks!”

The foreman, sensing the young man’s integrity, thought for a minute and then asked, “Have you been sharpening your ax?”

He replied, “No sir, I’ve been working too hard to take time for that.”

That short little story invites us to think about two questions that I believe are very important. Using the words of the young man cutting down trees, “What are you working so very hard at?” Are you giving all you’ve got to give—to your family, trying to make your family work? Are you exhausted? Are you giving all you’ve got to give—to your marriage, trying to keep your marriage alive? Do you feel fatigue? What are you working so very hard at? Perhaps you are unemployed and find yourself looking for a job. It’s hopeless, you quietly mutter. Or perhaps you are caught between two generations, on the one hand you’re taking care of parents and then there are grandchildren. They both need you. Sometimes you don’t know if you should answer the phone when it rings. The first question is, “What are you working so very hard at?”

And then the second question is, “Are you sharpening the ax or are you working with a dull blade?”

James, the brother of Jesus, wrote a letter to the church—it is the letter that bears his name. In that letter, James makes a bold assertion. The human being, at the human being’s best is the human being that prays.

“Are any among you suffering?,” James asks. “They should pray.”

How’s that for a response to a huge problem? It sounds almost like a command.

Are any suffering? --------------- They should pray.

He goes on, “Are any among you sick? Call in the elders from the church...and have them pray over them. The prayer of faith will save the sick and the Lord will raise them up.”

What is keeping you awake at night? James writes, “confess your sins to one another, and pray for one another, so that you may be healed.” Then he says, “The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective.”

If you’re not praying, James seems to be saying, “You’re working with a dull ax.” If you’re not praying, James seems to be saying, You are wasting all kinds of energy, when in fact you could be more efficient, stronger, more effective, more loving. “Pray.”

If you’re not praying, James seems to be saying, you are nothing more than a mortal being mortal. “You should pray.”

What makes this an odd scripture, is that James is predominantly a book where James talks about “doing” faith. Martin Luther did not like the book of James. He called it an ‘epistle of straw’ because James is always telling his listeners to ‘do’ something. Feed the hungry. Visit the widow. Cross the great divides between humanity. Do the faith. Do the faith. Do the faith.

Martin Luther may have missed, he may have overlooked, James chapter 5, where James says to that beloved congregation, “pray.” Don’t trust yourself to be all things to all people. Pray. Don’t carry the burdens yourself. Pray. Pray for each other. Pray for the weak. Pray.

John Bunyon writes, “You can do more than pray after you have prayed, but you cannot do more than pray until you have prayed.”

“Prayer without ceasing,” Paul wrote to the early church. Prayer is what keeps the ax sharpened. Prayer is what restores the knowledge of “the image of God” to a people otherwise beaten up. Prayer is what gives hope to the dark night of the soul.

You should pray. That is what James simplistically. “You should pray.” Why? When we fold our hands, we shift our focus of attention from the problem, the dilemma, the heartache, to the glorious power of God. The human being alone is just that, a human being alone. But a human being in prayer has formed a partnership with the great, “I Am,” “the God of Abraham,” “the God of Moses”, the God before whom even Jesus bowed.

Who are we to think that we can take on the world by ourselves, if even Jesus knew his own limitations here on earth. “You should pray.” In prayer, we call upon God’s spirit, when our spirit is depleted. In prayer, our hearts are lifted up when we ourselves are bowed down. In prayer, we say with confidence as Jesus did, “Not my will but thy will be done.”

Last week at this time, ten of us were making that journey back home from Biloxi, Mississippi. It was about a twenty-two hour drive. We left Biloxi, early Saturday morning, and returned mid-afternoon Sunday. One story. On the Wednesday that we were in Biloxi, the ten of us after that day’s work attended a prayer service that was held at a local congregation just down the street from us. The preacher was charismatic and loud and dramatic. His sermon was about “Believing in God.” He started kind of quietly, but built some adrenalin as he went along. Toward the end he started a bit of a chant, saying something like, “Come on, preach with me. I can’t do this alone. The world is addicted. We must be addicted to Jesus. Come on ya’ll, preach with me. The world needs to hear us. We’ve got to get the word out there. Preach with me. Preach with me.”

Well, I could never preach like that. But I would like to close with ‘pray with me.’ I can’t pray alone. Pray with me..... the world is bent on war and terror and killing. Pray with me. Pray with me. I can’t do it alone. Pray with me for our schools where principals and teachers must endure all kinds of violence and angry behaviors. Pray with me. Pray with me for our poor who never have enough, they don’t have enough to eat. They don’t have enough to pay their heating bills. They don’t have enough. Pray with me for our parents who must work harder than ever before to raise children who are respectful and faithful. Pray with me for our sick....pray for their spirit, pray for their healing, pray for doctors and nurses and care givers. Pray with me. Will you pray with me for the church? The church is the Body of Christ—no less, it is us, all of us together, and it is so tempting to assume that someone else will pay the bills, someone else will visit the sick, someone else step forward.

Pray with me... Will you pray with me?