How are we supposed to do church? How are we supposed to be church? Those are good questions, even though we are nearly two thousand years into this. We have some ideas about those questions; hopefully, our ideas have been formed more by the Bible, by sanctifying pastors and dear saints, than by our fickle society and fallen culture. What is worship about? Is there a right way to do it? Is there a way not do to worship?

What is worship about? It’s not about us. We are blessed with a great variety of churches. If one is just too big, you can find a smaller. If one is just too small, you can find a larger. If you don’t like the music at one, there’s always another. If you don’t like the preaching, there’s always another. We do have our preferences, don’t we? This can become a source of conflict if we aren’t all watchful over our own hearts. Worship is not about us, though we do have our preferences.

Paul speaks of prayer. Whatever we do in worship, and however we do it, let there be prayer. God’s people are a praying people. As we do prayer and learn by our doing, we are learning to do church, still, two thousand years later.

Paul is instructing Timothy that, in worship, there should be prayer for everyone, including those in authority (2:1-2). We pray for all, even those we don’t like. When Barack Obama was president, we prayed for President Obama; now that Donald Trump is president, we pray for President Trump. We may like one or the other (though probably not both); we may deeply dislike one or the other, or even both, and we pray for them. We pray for their health, for their peace, for their families, for their faith; we pray that they be given wisdom and wise counselors, that they be guided by God’s Word. We do not believe that living according to God’s Word results in injustice, oppression, or despair.

I’m amused and saddened by those who fear some sort of Christian theocracy coming to power here in the U.S.: Handmaid’s Tale sort of stuff, though that novel was written by a Canadian old school feminist back in the early ‘80s. Hardly the parable for our times that some regard it to be. Beloved, if we lived under the authority of God, we would certainly be no worse off than we are today; I daresay we would probably be a little better off. Of course, the “secret” here—which is no secret, to us—is that we all already do live under God’s authority. Some ignore it, flout it, among both those in authority and those under it.

We pray for everyone, including those whose decisions affect the lives of others, in hopes of living a quiet and peaceful life (2:2). Consider the alternative! Those in authority have the legal power to maintain civil order. But only God gives peace. People all over the world, including here in the U.S., are living where there is little quiet; millions live without the peace God alone can give. There was an old bumper sticker, some of you may remember it: Know Jesus, Know Peace. K-n-o-w. Have him in your life. The bumper sticker then took the k and the w away, leaving the word n-o: no Jesus, no peace. Paul commands Timothy to make it a part of worship to pray that God would be pleased to help everyone, including those in authority, to know Jesus, so that all might live in the blessed quietness of faith and share and enjoy, abundantly, the peace of Christ.

We pray for all, that all might live in quietness and peace, with all reverence toward God and with proper conduct (2:2). What is “proper conduct”? William Barclay translates Paul’s Greek as “godliness”; the New International Version of the Bible reads “holiness.” We pray for everyone, so that we might enjoy the sort of life where there can be all reverence toward God: where God is known, loved, magnified in our God-honoring living as well as in our God-honoring words. If God is worth knowing and worth praising, surely He is worth being known and praised by more people, truly known, truly praised, truly enjoyed.

Where do we see God revered? Where but in our lives, if we live to revere God, to glorify and enjoy Him forever. TV isn’t going to encourage us. The movies, by and large, will not, though there are Christian films of quality out there, in limited distribution. Except for a couple of radio stations, the music we hear doesn’t encourage us to revere God. I sound like a prude! Don’t get me wrong, I like a sick beat, too, but I’m fully aware that what I’m listening to doesn’t elevate God or faith or compassion or charity or mercy. Godliness doesn’t sell. Does anyone here really want to be known out there as a godly person? Oh, she’s so . . . godly. Yeah, he’s a godly man. Let your godliness be genuine.

Genuinely godly people pray. Pray for the kind of life—social, cultural, and personal life, for yourself and everyone—the kind of life where we all can enjoy quiet, peace, reverence for God and holiness in living. We pray for everyone and especially for those in authority. We pray for them because they have a part to play in helping to bring about such living. We want to live in peace, quietness, reverence, and godliness, too—even if we’d never admit that last part. Would you be okay if word got around that you were a Christian, a serious Christian? Think before you answer that.

We pray for these blessings for everyone because followers of Christ want everyone to be blessed. We want everyone to enjoy the blessings of quietness in pursuing their work, in enjoying their families and friends; we want everyone to enjoy the blessings of peace; that is, knowing, loving, and striving to obey God. We want everyone to live in reverence for God. If we all seriously revered God with serious reverence, what would that do to the crime rate? I do believe there would be a significant reduction in crime. We want everyone to live in holiness and godliness—lives finding fulfilment in relationship with God. O people of God! Just imagine what this world would look like if we all were devoted to living in holiness before God.

The world does not live this way. We may be very dubious about the prospects of anything changing, really changing, yet we have changed, been changed by God in Christ through the power of the Holy Spirit, God’s ability to bring about change. We continue to pray then, for everyone, for those in authority, pray in faith that God is active and at work, and actively at work in us, too, especially as we pray. Beloved, prayer shapes us, changes us. In prayer, we open the door, the Holy Spirit in us opens the door, for God. By our praying, in faith, love, candor, confession, hope, sorrow and joy, God shapes us, shapes our thinking and our caring, shapes our faith and our practice of it.

On that day known to the Father, we may well be amazed, stunned, humbled beyond description, by how many prayed for us without our ever knowing it. Some of us may have been prayed into faith by those who, whether they knew us personally or not, loved us so much for the sake of Christ, for the sake of our Father, eternal, powerful in heavenly majesty, that they were always praying for faith for those who did not believe, praying to be guided to someone badly in need of Jesus. God answers prayer. Need proof? Turn your eyes upon Jesus.

Paul repeats himself in what I read to you. This must be important, and Paul would be the one to know the truth of it: God wants everyone to be saved and to come to know the truth (2:4). God wants this, and He isn’t going to force anyone to believe. Here is the mystery, the frustration, here is our anguish for those who have not accepted Jesus: just save them, God; just make them believe; force them to believe! Anyone who believes in God, who trusts in Jesus, has been made to do so by the Holy Spirit: none of us would have, otherwise. In a way that I suppose I cannot explain to anyone’s satisfaction, however, God forces no one to believe.

Jesus never forced anyone to do anything, though we forced Jesus to suffer, to be humiliated, to heft the rough lumber of his cross, to drag it up to the hill where we forced Jesus to die. Now perhaps you remember that Jesus has already told his disciples (Jn 10:17-18) that no one has forced him to any of this, that he voluntarily lays down his life, voluntarily takes all the abuse, the mockery, the degradation, the spittle and hatred; he does it for us, and for all who will believe. Then, he takes his life up again.

He lays his life down a man; he takes his life up as God. As man and God, Jesus alone brings God and mankind together (2:5): the meeting point, the bloody sacrifice whereby we are reconciled. In Jesus on the cross, God reconciled to us His wayward children, and we, God’s wayward children, reconciled to our Father in heaven. Peace. Sacred peace. The peace of Christ, passing all understanding.

Paul writes that Jesus is the proof that God wants everyone to be saved (2:6). Contemplate that. Pray about that, this week.

Without taking anything away from the grace and power of women in prayer, Paul calls special attention to men at prayer. God knows we need it more. I thank God for every man here: you are doing something very countercultural, because you and I know that the message our society and culture has for us is that church is for women and children, not for men, real men, anyway. But to whom shall we look as our model for true manhood? Jesus ate and drank, gave sight to blind people, healed cripples, defied the ignorance, prejudice, and self-righteousness of those in power, and raised dead people to life—oh, and he rose from the dead himself. Lord, I’d love to be that sort of man! Jesus prayed, oh did he pray! Jesus is praying every chance he gets.

Brothers, I’m speaking to you, now, because the women already know it: there is something deeply good, stirring in the soul, in a man who prays, who prays with his family, who leads his family in prayer. Daily mealtime prayer. Prayer at those special meals: Easter, Thanksgiving, Christmas. My mother wasn’t reluctant to pray. And it always felt fit and proper at those special family meals for my father to pray, and I think he looked upon it as a privilege and a joy, no burden. If you need to write out a prayer, then do it, but pray: lead your family in prayer. Your discipleship may not be sterling—whose is? Is mine? No!

A man of faith and prayer lays a foundation of blessing and peace, strength and integrity in his family for generations to come. A man of faith and prayer shows his family Jesus. We see and hear him, we come to love him because our fathers know and love him. We know our mothers love him: women just love Jesus. Children whose mothers or maternal figures bring them to worship tend to stop coming as they become adults. Children whose fathers bring them tend to continue attending. There are always exceptions, both ways. I’m convinced, however, as I look around, look around this sanctuary this morning, that what this world needs are more men who love God. What the Church needs is more men who love God. What this congregation needs are you men, who love God.

For all of you, and especially for the men, as disciples of Christ Jesus, live work and pray for quietness in your families as for peace in your faith. Live and work and pray for reverent lives; strive for that godliness the world rejects and your family needs.

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.