Wingardium Leviosa

Last week one of the men in the Wednesday morning group – we were studying 1 John 5:14 – 15 by the way – asked a really good question.  He painted a picture of visiting someone on their death bed and praying that they would be healed, “in Jesus name,” he pointed out that the text says that if we pray in that way that whatever we ask will be done for us.  That has not been his experience.  So his question was what does it mean to pray “in Jesus’ name,” or for that matter “in God’s will.”  The predominant thinking – and I have heard this from really good pastors – is that you have to tack on those three words to the end of the prayer in order to comply with the notion of praying in Jesus’ name.  Is that it?

Don’t think so.

In the first Harry Potter book and movie Sorcerer’s Stone, Harry, Ron, and Hermione are in charms class.  They are to be practicing a levitation charm, Wingardium Leviosa.  In the scene Ron is furiously waving his wand at a feather, saying the incantation.  Hermione stops him and tells him he is saying it wrong.  She repeats the incantation with emphasis on the next to last syllable emphasizing the long “o”.  The spell works.  It seems that a lot of believers approach prayer in the same way.  We have to say things a certain way with the right emphasis, attitude, quantity, and quality of faith or the prayer, will not work.  How is that not the same as sorcery?  Albeit Christian sorcery?  Is that what prayer is all about?  Getting the last three words right with the right inflection?

Take a look at these passages and I will share some more on that tomorrow.