At some point, you may have wondered why we do church the way we do.  If you worship elsewhere when you’re on vacation—I hope you do!—you’ve noticed that different churches conduct worship in different ways.  You might even wish that we would do it more like they do!  Some services seem very simple, others quite elaborate.  The difference between a Quaker meeting and a Catholic mass couldn’t be more pronounced!  From one church to another, though, we also see basic similarities.  There’s almost always singing.  Scripture is almost always read.  There’s almost always a message that tries to bring together Scripture and our lives.  Often, there’s a time of giving.  There’s always praying.

To understand why we worship the way we do, why we sing what we sing, pray the way we pray, we don’t look only to culture and history: we look to Scripture.  We look, for example to what I just read to you.  Paul gives instruction for prayer.  We pray for all people (2:1); we do not refuse to pray for anyone.  Everyone is in need of prayer, even those whom we find offensive, those for whom we may find it very difficult to pray.  God help them.  God help us.

We do not refuse to pray for anyone, even the worst of sinners.  Paul tells us also to pray for “all those in authority, that we may live peaceful and quiet lives in all godliness and holiness” (2:2).  Commentators remind us that Paul was writing during the reign of Nero, famous for burning down Rome, his own capital city, in order to build a new one after his own liking.  He blamed the fire on those secretive, subversive Christians.  It wasn’t a happy time for Christians.  Pray for him?  Forget it!

There are those who cannot abide Joe Biden.  There are those who could not abide the last president, the one before him, the one before him, or the one before him.  In four years it will be the same, and in eight.  It is right and good, however, to pray for those in authority; God never said we had to like somebody before we prayed for him or her.  Every president, every politician, is a human being, with faults—many faults!—and limitations—many limitations!—as well as gifts and aptitudes given by God.  Have you ever noticed how the office tends to age its occupant?  The work resulted in an incapacitating stroke for Woodrow Wilson, not exactly a warm, fuzzy human being.  It probably killed Warren Harding outright.  It caused Eisenhower a heart attack or two.  His smoking didn’t help.  Idolized as Obama was by his idolizers, his smoking was not, but who can be surprised that he continued smoking, considering the stress of the job?

The decisions made by those in authority can have tremendous, almost immediate consequences for society and culture, for economy, security, prosperity, family.  Our elected officials need prayer!  Poor health—physical, mental, emotional, spiritual—is a bad place from which to make big decisions.  If we here need wisdom and divine guidance, divine encouragement, how much more our elected officials!

You may feel as if one administration or another hasn’t exactly been on your side or had your best interests at heart.  You’re not alone.  We are all of us stitched into a much broader fabric.  Not many of us can go off-grid, and those who do still rely upon us clueless ones they boldly left behind.  That bacon doesn’t cut and vacuum pack itself.  That chainsaw chain doesn’t assemble itself.  That sleeping bag didn’t weave itself.  Jeremiah told those exiled to Babylon what God expected of them: to pray for Babylon.  “[S]eek the peace and prosperity of the city to which I have carried you into exile.  Pray to the Lord for it, because if it prospers, you too will prosper” (Jer 29:7).  A peaceful, quiet life is not a bad thing, even if it’s a bad, inept, or corrupt government through which God chooses to be at work.

Our aim, at all times under all circumstances and administrations, is to live “in all godliness and holiness” (2:2).  Biblical scholar William Barclay writes of the untranslatable qualities of the Greek words translated as godliness and holiness.  The point isn’t to tell us that we just can’t fully grasp the terms Paul uses but to point out just how special, even unique, and certainly noteworthy, such living is.  We strive to live a godly, holy life.  We’re not remarkably good at it, but we know God is helping us, and we know that such living is possible, because Christ is with us, the Spirit is in us, and we’ve seen other people going about the work of life whom we would call godly people, holy people.

Not perfect people.  Godly—they took God and God’s expectations—and His grace—seriously, joyfully, gratefully, humbly!  They applied themselves to living the way God expects and actively resisted temptations to live a little differently from God’s expectations in this or that matter.  Holy—they prayed about their choices and decisions; they knew they needed God’s input, divine direction.  This showed in their daily living: the character of such people exhibits the strength of sound, vital faith.  Godly, holy people live for God; they understand that their daily living can help others to see God more clearly, or less.  Faithful living helps to make the way straight, for us and for others.

A peaceful, quiet life is a good thing, and many governments, even vicious governments, can provide conditions under which such living is possible.  But Christians are interested in more than a peaceful, quiet life.  We aim to live a God-ward life: godly living, living according to faith.  We want others to perceive the goodness of the Lord, to understand the joy of God’s blessings: peace, for example, and quiet.

God has His reasons for putting people in positions of authority.  One reason, a big, blessed reason, is to promote the sort of peace and quiet in which godliness and holiness can flourish.  When these flourish, others may begin to notice: never underestimate the power of your example.  God is at work in hearts all around you, near you, to soften them, open them to God.  Part of His way for opening those hearts is by causing these people to notice godliness and holiness in action around them.  The precious blessings of peace and quiet may just make it all the easier for the hold outs to notice, to hear and reflect.  No one listens or reflects very well in the midst of chaos and panic.  Please remember that the news industry—from whatever angle—thrives, depends upon, chaos and panic.

Paul is quite clear: God our Savior, “wants all people to be saved and to come to a knowledge of the truth” (2:5).  There is no class or color whom God casts aside.  A peaceful, quiet state can provide the external conditions for people to come to this knowledge of the truth and so come to salvation.  Our godliness and holiness can provide impetus.  People need to see that kind of living in action, need to see that such living is possible even here, even now.  They aren’t looking for perfection—we all stumble!  They are looking for a real alternative, a real way, a true hope.  We have that, by the grace of God.  God provides the light, the water, the fire, the Spirit.  Our godliness and holiness, made possible for us through the work of the Spirit in us and impossible for us without that Spirit—I say our godliness and holiness help to shine God’s light upon the truth, so that people come to a knowledge of the truth and thereby come to salvation.  No one comes to salvation without coming to a knowledge of the truth.  The truth is that we all need salvation and cannot obtain it from our side of eternity: self-salvation is no salvation.

Paul affirms this saving truth when he writes “there is one God and one mediator between God and mankind, the man Christ Jesus, who gave himself as a ransom for all people” (2:5-6).  Prayer points us to praise.  One God.  Some in the ancient world would have agreed with that, though they would have added that this one god was mostly unknowable and unknown.  The general attitude in the ancient world was not unlike the contemporary pluralist attitude: you have your god, he has his god, they have their god, and we have our god.  Such thinking leads very far from truth; it leads very far from salvation, and who benefits from that?

Prayer points us to promise.  One mediator.  Many roads led to Rome, but only one way leads to God: Jesus Christ.  Such exclusive talk was as offensive in the ancient world of Paul and Timothy as it is in our own times.  So, shall we agree with the world that, because some regard this Christian talk as offensive, such talk must necessarily be false?  Because it offends, it must be a lie?  Beloved, when sin is at work, the only thing that won’t offend is a lie, and you can be sure that the one offensive thing must be the truth.  But what a strange thing this “lie” of ours does!  Jesus does not demand anyone’s money or resources; he requires nothing from us as payment for his mediation; he makes the payment!  He pays for what we didn’t want but desperately needed.  He opens the way by his blood; his life is the bridge over which we cross to the Father.  This mediator gives, gives “himself as a ransom for all people.”

Some in government speak of themselves as public servants.  I grimace when I hear that: it always has the ring of insincerity and mendacity in my ears, but I don’t peg human nature very high, either.  “Public service”—we see true public service in what Jesus does for us, does for all people, irrespective of who they are, where they live, how they live, what they have done or even will do.  Available.  Salvation is made available to everyone through the ransom Jesus pays, through his mediating sacrifice, bringing man and God back into relationship.  God invites us to cultivate that restored relationship through prayer.  Let us be a people of prayer.

And to Jesus Christ, who loves us and freed us from our sins by his blood, and made us to be a kingdom, priests of his God and Father, to him be glory and dominion forever and ever.