The Beatitudes: A Responsive Prayer.

Marc Alan Schelske

The state of my mind mirrors the world around me just now - fragmented, easily distracted, hazed over with anxiety. There’s a mental app constantly running, predicting various alternate future scenarios. All seem increasingly grim. Even so, I am expected to function. To parent, and write, and pastor. All of those roles make sense when you are in a position to offer stability and hope to those you serve; none feel sensible when you are one of the people wobbling.

Of course, history is full of such moments. Arguably, more humans have lived in times of uncertainty, deprivation, and fear than in times of prosperity. It’s my good fortune to have been born in 1971 in the American Midwest and adopted by an educated middle-class white Christian family. I was born into one of the rare slices of history that has been relatively peaceful, stable, and prosperous. But the hard truth is that this terrible turn we’re experiencing is just a regression to the mean, a return to something more like what most humans across time have experienced.

Among all those humans who lived in the historical & geographical normal of oppression, deprivation, and fear were many, many who were followers of Jesus. That includes most Christians across the globe and throughout time! (Almost all of those addressed in the New Testament!) Those Christians had to learn how to follow the way of Jesus in a culture and context that wasn’t designed for them—they truly were aliens and strangers. Those Christians would look at our world of political infighting, uncertainty, and creeping fascism, and they would know what to do. But many, like me, whose life and faith have been experienced in the context of privilege and excess, are feeling disoriented. Perhaps this is part of the tremendous fear driving the shift toward authoritarianism we are seeing in the church worldwide.

My new book, Walking Otherward: Forty Meditations on Following Jesus’ Path of Other-Centered, Co-Suffering Love came out not long ago. I held an online launch party, as you’re supposed to do. But instead of a rah-rah celebration, I invited my friends, Susan Carson (SSU student), pastor Brian Zahnd (Sometime SSU professor and an influence of mine), and Dr. Bradley Jersak (of course, you know him!) to have a conversation about this very struggle.

Partway through the chat, Dr. Jersak shared his practice of praying the Beatitudes daily and suggested that the crisis of discipleship we are witnessing comes from folks being comfortable with a kind of Christianity that ignores this part of Jesus’ teaching. This wisdom struck me as immediately relevant to my church and me. I committed on the spot to praying the Beatitudes for Lent. I also invited my church to do the same.

We’ve been praying the Beatitudes together as the closing benediction to our gatherings as a responsive prayer, and here is the text we use. The leader reads the lines from scripture, and then everyone prays the commentary line. I offer it to you. Perhaps for you, like me, this can be a re-calibration of our inner compass, a way to cut through the fear and uncertainty as we squint our eyes to see the path of Jesus through the fog.

THE BEATITUDES: A RESPONSIVE PRAYER

“Blessed are the poor in spirit, 

for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.

”Help me to say no to the demands of the ego,

And to honor the poor.

“Blessed are those who mourn, 

for they will be comforted.”

Help me to grieve my losses,

And to comfort the grieving.

“Blessed are the meek,

for they will inherit the earth.”

Help me to choose meekness when tempted with power,

And to stand with the meek.

“Blessed are those who hunger and thirst (for righteousness),

for they will be filled.”

Help me to hunger for a right and just world,

And to act in ways that are right and just.

“Blessed are the merciful, 

for they will receive mercy.”

Help me to be merciful,

Even as You are merciful.

“Blessed are the pure in heart, 

for they will see God.”

Purify my heart,

So I can see You.

“Blessed are the peacemakers, 

for they will be called children of God.”

Help me to be a peacemaker

and to stand with peacemakers.

“Blessed are those who are persecuted for the sake of righteousness,

 for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.”

Help me to bear up under persecution,

And to stand with those who are persecuted.

“Blessed are you when people revile you and persecute you

and utter all kinds of evil against you falsely on my account.”

Help me to be willing to do what is right and just

Even if it costs me.

“You are the salt of the earth…

You are the light of the world.” 

Help me, Lord, to be Salt and Light.   

Amen.