Matthew 26:36-42
One little girl wrote to Santa,
Dear Santa,
I better get my pony this year (and then in small print underneath that) or there will be consequences.
Another wrote:
Dear Santa,
If you can’t buy what I want, take it easy on yourself. Just give me tens and ones of money.
And another:
Dear Santa,
How are you? Well, enough chit-chat. Let’s get down to business. This year I (and the I was huge) want:
- A big space LEGO set
- Some jelly beans
- A Sharks jacket and hat
- An AK-47 assault rifle
- Any Nintendo game
We laugh at these kids letters to Santa. There are 100’s of them on the World Wide Interweb. Some are clever. Some are poignant. A majority of them will make you smile. Until you realize that many of your prayers to God are along the same vein: Give me what I want. Or there will be consequences.
Or you sit down and pretend you intend to chit-chat with God, but quickly give that up and end up “getting down to business” with your list of demands.
It’s too easy in our culture, in the ways that we pray, to get God and Santa mixed up. We assume that we can address both of them the same way.
But that would be a major mistake in our relationship with God. Here’s one of the main differences between our conversations with God vs. our conversations with Santa. When we ask Santa for something, we’re telling Santa what we want. We aren’t asking Santa to tell us what he thinks we should receive. We are making demands, and we completely expect Santa to comply. That’s Santa’s job.
On the other hand, listen to Jesus’ prayer to God in Gethsemane:
But let what you want be done, not what I want. (vs. 39)
But if I must drink (from this cup), may what you want be done. (vs. 42)
Jesus is not telling God what he wants done, nor is Jesus making demands. Jesus wants to know what God desires, but not just for knowledge’s sake. He wants to know so he can do what God wants.
We might be willing to pray what Jesus prays, if we know exactly what God wants done by us. We could at least weigh in the balance what we want compared to what God wants, and then make our decision. But even then, we are still weighing our own wants against God’s.
But what if we have no idea what God wants for us in a particular situation? Are we willing to totally put our own desires aside, giving way to God, not knowing what that way actually is?
Again, as in another sermon in this series, this is a matter of ego. Because, part of what Jesus is setting aside—maybe a large part—is ego. Ego says, “I know best what is best for me”; or, “I’m the boss of me”; or, more subtly, “God gave me a brain to use, and I’ll use it in this situation, rather than choosing to go in a direction blindly—even if that direction has to do with God.” Ego/self will attempt to sabotage the mysterious ways of God every time.
And note, this is something huge Jesus is sweating blood over in prayer. This is not just trying to decide between the navy blue or off-white toga. This is about giving in to one’s destiny whatever that may be. Of choosing to be obedient to God even though that meant, for Jesus, ending up in a horrible death.
So, how does a person choose or pursue their destiny? Even if that destiny is a big mystery? Do I get a say in what direction my life will take, or what my destiny will be? Or, as Jesus did, do I completely kneel to the will of God, no matter what?
This is a hard choice. And this is a huge decision. It seems to me, talking to Santa about something like this is highly dangerous. The reason that is so is because Santa is a big, fat embodiment of our ego. It’s asking only our self what our self should do.
When Jesus went through his temptations in the wilderness, Satan was playing the role of Santa (isn’t it weird that Santa and Satan have the same letters) in the temptation of Jesus.
“Let’s make bread so you can eat something. Go ahead and satisfy yourself. Nothing wrong with that.” How does Jesus respond to that taunt? He tells Satan, “A person doesn’t live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.” Do you get that? It’s what God says, not what I may want that matters.
“Here’s the kingdoms of the world—I’ll give them all to you!” And what does Jesus say to this? “Begone Satan! for it is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve.” Did you get that? We live to serve God, not the other way around.
So, in this prayer in the Garden, concerning his destiny, Jesus is rejecting the Santa/Satan/self prayer. That prayer is, “Don’t make me go through this.” Instead Jesus accepted the egoless prayer: “Let what you want be done.” As in the temptations in the wilderness, and here in the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus is faced with giving God his destiny rather than clinging to an ego-filled, self-chosen destiny.
Next, notice Jesus’ emotional state when he was praying: “sad and troubled.” It is when we are sad and troubled that we are most tempted to look for the easy—Santa—way out. “What can I do to quickly and with the least amount of effort, move out of this sadness and trouble?” Or, as Jesus prayed, “...if it is possible, take this cup of suffering away from me.”
When we’re sad and troubled we want the easy way, the least painful way. We are already in pain—we don’t want any more; and we especially don’t want to know the road we are headed down is going to lead to something really bad.
That’s what we expect from Santa. We ask for any outlandish gift we want, and Santa is supposed to deliver—right? Give me what I want. Santa asks no questions about our requests. Like, “What are you willing to give up if I give you what you asked for?” Santa never asks those kinds questions. We just say to Santa, “Give me, give me, give me,” and then expect Santa to reply, “Yes, yes, yes.”
But that’s not how it is when we pray to God. We may try the, “give me, give me, give me,” approach with God, but how does that go usually? God doesn’t like being used as Santa, no matter how well intentioned your Santa prayers are. God wants to know if we are in tune with him, not just in tune with ourselves. Our asking prayers can’t just be asking for asking sake—which is what Santa prayers are.
And our Santa prayers are usually in the form of a long list. Usually when we pray out of the self, the prayers—the requests—are selfish and many. Selfishness breeds more selfishness. But our authentic God prayers are singular—just one thing is prayed: “Not what I want, but what you want.” We pray that singular prayer every Sunday—it’s the first petition in the Lord’s Prayer that sets up everything that follows in that prayer: “Thy will be done.”
As we get closer and closer to Easter, this prayer, “Thy will be done,” will become more and more important. Remember the question that got me thinking about this whole sermon series. It was Alan’s question: What is your future/What kind of person do you want to be, and what are you willing to give up to make that happen? “Thy will be done,” is one of the main prayer/answers to that question.
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