In our prayers for quiet and peaceful lives, who should we pray for? Everyone.
Here’s a transcript:
I’m thinking about the second chapter of First Timothy (1 Timothy 2:1-7), in which we are urged to raise our “supplications, prayers, intercessions, and thanksgivings” for everyone, particularly for those who are in positions of power and authority, so we might live quiet and peaceable lives: lives of godliness; lives of dignity.
The first thing I’ll note is that Paul directed these prayers to be raised for everyone. It’s up to a community whether they are going to set themselves up as a place which is consistent with quiet and peaceful lives, in which lives of godliness and dignity can be maintained by everyone. It’s not up to just one or two. We all have to cooperate to make that happen.
It is true, however, that there are major questions that people in authority — they make the choices, and others follow along. Sometimes these are choices but the better: choices that lead towards peace. Sometimes they are choices for the worse: decisions that lead towards war, and when people follow those choices.
I can’t help but observe that the Apostle Paul himself did not manage to live a quiet and peaceable life. It was a life, I think we’d have to say, directed towards godliness. It was a life in which he insisted upon his own dignity and those of other followers of Christ. But it was a life that led him into conflict over and over and over again with those in authority. It was a life that led to a martyr’s death at the orders of the Emperor of Rome.
I have no doubt that he raised his supplications and prayers, that he gave thanks for the good decisions of the officials that he ran into, but I also have no doubt that, well, not everybody in those communities did the things that were needful so that they and their neighbors could live peaceful and quiet lives. And certainly not all of the rulers that he encountered did so — definitely not the last.
Let us continue to raise our prayers. Let us continue to hold those in authority in prayer, not because they are doing what God wants, but because they can be a part of doing what God wants.
And let us continue to pray for one another that we might live and thrive in communities of quiet and peace, lives in which we might live faithfully, lives in which we might maintain our dignity.
That’s what I’m thinking. I’m curious to hear what you’re thinking. Leave me your thoughts in the comment section below. I’d love to hear from you.
