Matthew 6:5-8 “Closet Prayer”

One summer when I was still in college (1984), I spent three months in the country of Greece. The first month I was in a diplomatic language school in Athens, then one of the professors invited students to go out to the Island of Alonissos. We stayed in a house in the old village at the top of the island looking down over the Mediterranean Sea. We had no electricity. No phone. We did not even have running water. We bathed in the sea. We cooked in the hearth. We lit oil lamps in the evening to see. Supplies were brought in by donkey from the port. And, garbage collection was by another donkey. We fished for sardines for breakfast. Ate fresh goat cheese that was kept at room temperature in vats of fresh olive oil. In the afternoon we slept when it was hot. The evening neighbors played on their bazookia and sang.

We were nine people staying in that one little house on the hillside–not counting all of the cats that were always around. So, finding a little quiet place to read my bible and to pray alone was a challenge. I decided that the roof was the best place–late in the afternoon. I just had to crawl out onto it. Soon the rest of the people in the house would notice that I was gone somewhere and get a little worried. Even though I was reading the bible in English, others came out onto the roof just to sit there with me and watch me read the bible and to pray.

What I did not explain to you before is that everyone in the house was a communist. I did not know that when I signed on to go out to the island with them. The communists were very strong back then in Greece–and in fact they still are getting a percentage of the vote with 21 current parliament ministers out of 300. In those days they were more like a third of the vote. They noted when they saw my bible that they did not approve. Being communists, they were secularists. I have to say that although all I wanted to do was find a place off by myself to focus on the bible and prayer, I became the greatest curiosity to them. They really did not understand what I was doing up there on the roof.

Eventually it became routine that one or two of them would just come out onto the roof with me. They would sit silently just watching me. We did not try to communicate at all. They just joined me in my worship space. They really had not seen anything like it in their generation. They thought religion was just for their grandparents who were still superstitious. The concept of prayer, or being in God’s presence, was beyond them. Still they were curious.

The text of Colossians 4:2 already commands us to “continue in prayer steadfastly, being watchful. . . .” This command to pray constantly and earnestly can be found in many places in the bible. This particular scripture has Saint Paul asking that his prayers might “open a door for others to know the mystery of Christ–the Word of God.” To be sure, our scripture for today does not command us to pray. It says “when we pray, do not be like the hypocrites.” The assumption is that we are already regularly praying, but that we need to be quiet and sincere in our prayers.

Also, out on the island of Alonissos, there was one Christian church. It was Greek Orthodox of course. It had one priest who really kept himself alive by herding goats. Just the same he made a real good show on a Sunday morning. He was dressed like a prince with white robes. He wore a heavy metal cross on a chain around his neck. He kissed the icons and sprinkled the water over us with flare. Widows on the island knew their cue to start wailing during the time of community prayers. It really was a wonderful show. I really enjoyed that worship. And, of course my communist friends found the goings on at the local church beyond whimsical, especially since the goat-herder priest was also the town drunk. After worship on Sunday mornings he would be down at the port at the taverna continuing his preaching with a half bottle of ouzo under his belt.

The local church, with the flashy priest, was of no interest to my friends. What interested them was what was motivating me to crawl out on the roof in the evenings to be alone with the bible and in prayer to God. So, I naturally ended up expending a lot of prayer time over them in the end.

The command is to go into an “inner room” to pray alone. There was no inner room on the island, so I chose the lonely place, the roof. Some churches call this inner room a “prayer closet”; however, I think it should not be called a closet because of modern connotations of what that means. The Greek word that is being used is “tameion.” It is more like a pantry where food items are kept. In ancient days, grain would be kept there. The Greek is related back to the Hebrew understanding that we can pick out in the story of Joseph when he speaks of building grain silos in Egypt to survive the drought. I really like this understanding better than closet because this is where one goes to be fed. It is where we can keep our spiritual nutrients!

When we enter our prayer pantries, we are starved for the Word of God. We crave being in the presence of God. There, our spiritual weakness is replaced with strength. We do not do it to show others, but I know that when others see us being refreshed in heart and soul that they can see something powerful, and they wonder about the mystery of Christ.

On the subject of seeing, and on the mystery of Christ, we have this line in our text for today that says something odd. Maybe you missed it? We go into our inner room in prayer with God, but it does not say that God hears us. Rather, we read that God SEES us! Here I am pouring my heart out in prayer, but God is not hearing? Only seeing? That is a mystery.

Of course, and please note that I have preached this a few times already, so I repeat myself, that the verb “to see” in the Greek in this case is used idiomatically the exact same way it can be used in English. If I ask you, “Whom are you seeing this evening?” it means that you are meeting someone that has a special relationship right now in your life with you. So, God seeing us in this case means that God is perceiving our hearts. God is in a special relationship with us. Got it? God is not only hearing our prayers but seeing us, too.

In the past I have used the classic animated film “Avatar” to describe this: “I see you, Jake Sully!” Just think of the blue people in that movie and how they speak!

Now this last concept is super important to understand what comes next in the scripture. WE read that God already knows our hearts even before we pray. Sooooo, why do we need to pray at all? That is the typical “smart-kid-in-Sunday-school” response to this text, right?

When we pray, we tend to ask God for things that we think we need. Honestly, we may not even know what we really need. We might pray for success in something, but God knows that we need a good dose of humility instead. We might pray for justification, but God knows we need forgiveness. I am really happy that God “sees” us rather than just listens to our prayers. That is the mystery.

Yes, the real command here is to go into that special place with God when we pray. And yet, we have a secondary command here as well: “Do not be like the hypocrites.” I think this can be grossly misunderstood because the meaning of “hypocrite” has changed in English over the years since it was incorporated from the Greek. The original sense had to do with the idea that in Greek one can ask a question in one of three ways: One can ask expecting a downward response, that is “hypokritimai.” One can expect a neutral response that is reflexive, that is “kritomai.” Lastly, one can ask a question expecting a positive or upward response, that is “apokritimai.” So, this is really saying “do not pray while expecting a negative response from God.”

Those people who are on the street corners and places of worship praying aloud and making a show of it are the ones who do not believe that their prayers will be answered. They do not have that kind of sincere mysterious relationship with God.

This being said, it is not hypocritical for me as the pastor to publicly pray aloud in worship BECAUSE I fully believe that God will answer these prayers positively–though not always perhaps in the way I expect. The hypocrisy is only in praying while doubting that God is seeing you. I know God sees me and sees my heart. I hope you know that too!

Amen.