Quite often I hear the comment, "I really don’t need to go to church; I can find God in nature." (Substitute here any form of that: the mountains, a beautiful golf course, the ocean.) Sometimes these comments come to me in the form of yearning for a place of peace in their lives. Other times it comes as a form of confession for not getting involved in church or attending worship. Either way, there is a hope that others will affirm their thinking. These conversations are part of the pastor’s role. They are rich encounters for me, for I know of which they speak.

I know very well the Rocky Mountain high of God’s presence when I reach the top of a 14,000’ peak. Who else could have created such grandeur and beauty? And I have experienced God’s restorative presence in the serenity of a beautiful beach. And even though I am not a golfer…yet, I can certainly understand the peace found in the beauty of a golf course.

I think it is essential for us to experience God beyond our church walls. If we only experience God in church, then we miss encountering God in the majority of our lives. What a loss to miss the handprint of God in the people who touch us each week. What a loss it would be if we miss God’s restoration that a vacation can bring us. How much we lose if we fail to recognize those holy moments of grace that are simply placed in our laps.

We all know that God is not contained in a building or place, but can be found in places we never thought possible. I was reminded this week of the old movie "Oh God". In the movie God, played by George Burns, chooses to connect with an agnostic grocery store manager, played by John Denver. God decides to make himself visible, somewhere in the cereal aisle, for a purpose. God wants him to tell others about him and the conversations they are having.

Funny and engaging, John Denver gets the expected response when he shares his conversations with his wife, his supervisor, and his neighbors; as something bordering on lunacy. Comedian, Lily Thomlin puts it like this: "Why is that when we talk to God we’re said to be praying, but when God talks to us, we’re schizophrenic?! Seeing that movie again got me to thinking of how God goes to unusual lengths to get our attention in order to be in relationship with us.

Only if we pay attention can we have the joy of recognizing God in our lives. This "noticing" can lead to conversations with God, also known as prayer, just like John Denver experienced. Often we are more focused on noticing others’ reactions, rather than God’s interaction with us.

None of us are born with knowing how to converse with God. We begin a bit shy, searching for the right words, the right place, the right way, before we learn there is no right way. God simply wants to be with us, hear what is on our minds, to offer direction, be part of our lives, so that we can fully enjoy this wonderful gift of life.

Developing our relationship with God is not unlike any relationship we have with friends or family. We have to initiate some of the time and be able to listen other times. You know those moments when you say to yourself, "That was a God thing" times when God gets our attention in ways we can’t ignore. These are the times we need to respond back, to stop rationalizing it away as coincidence, imagination, or craziness. We need to lean into the truth that God does speak to us, seek us out, wanting to hear our hopes and dreams. Now it’s usually not in the cereal aisle at King Soopers, but the insight can be just as clear.

In today’s Old Testament passage we enter the story when David is old and at the end of his life. King David was a great and beloved king, but he also had his shortcomings, to be sure. Not unlike any of us. You remember the story: the first time David sees Bathsheba, he is so taken with her beauty, that he must have her. So he succeeds in having an affair with her, and then his passions instead of his heart, lead him into having her husband killed, so he can marry her.

David is out of step with God and everything he believes. He was in this mess because he listened to himself instead of God. But David never loses his faith in God, and eventually gets straightened around. In gratitude to God, he decides to build a magnificent temple. But God denies the offer and chooses David’s son, Solomon, to build the temple instead. David wanted to make something great and magnificent to honor God, but God wanted a place of worship for the people of God.

So we enter the story as the temple is being dedicated by David’s son, now King Solomon. A celebrative crowd has gathered; there is music and dancing in the streets; countless animals are being sacrificed in thanksgiving on the altar. The people have come from all over the country, laughing, singing, and spreading the news everywhere in excitement, for this magnificent new house of prayer. The priests and religious leaders have gathered from across the country to officiate. At long last there will be a place to house the Ark of the Covenant, in which the 10 Commandments resided.

King Solomon leaves his palace and enters the courtyard scene. He raises his arms high to the heavens, and the noisy crowd diminishes to a hushed expectancy. And King Solomon offers this prayer of dedication:

This historical account is recorded in I Kings 8: 22-30. This is the Word of the Lord.

This new Temple was to be a house of prayer for the people. A place where God and the people could communicate with each other; where trust in this new God could grow; where the people would learn about God and how to worship. It would be a place where the people could offer their gifts in thanksgiving and praise to the one and only God. No more would they worship the gods of their culture.

It was not a place in the desert, but in the middle of Jerusalem, a bustling city. It was not on a mountain top, or along the Sea of Galilee or the ocean. No, this was to be a place of worship for friends and strangers; a place for all to gather to celebrate their lives. It was to be a place of prayer, to offer both the spoken and silent prayers of their hearts. It was to be a place where the priests interpreted the word of God and the people learned how to understand the Scriptures together.

It was not intended to be a place of isolation. By God’s design this temple was to a be a communal experience. God made it clear: "This will be a place of worship to honor me. You will gather together to learn together and uphold each other. The temple will be your house of prayer. Here will I speak and let my ways be known."

Thousands of years later, this is still true for us. Even though our world is a much more complicated place with many more choices, demands and expectations laid before us; this passage is all the more important for us to hear. We have been called into a family of faith.

Today’s story is about having a place to gather around the table as family. It is about God speaking to us through the teaching and example of others. For it is in this place that God speaks to each of us in unique and profound ways, and they are different from the ways we connect with God alone.

It is in this place we learn how to let the Spirit of God, who is in us, become visible to others. You know what I mean don’t you? Those times we have seen God in others? Those holy moments that gratefully did not slip by us, but reached out and touched us so deeply we knew it was God in another. The holy encounters of our lives; that’s what I’m talking about.

At one point in the movie, John Denver stops being concerned about the raised eyebrows and the innuendos regarding his mental state. He is so excited and alive with whom he is becoming, he doesn’t care about the ways others try to silence him.

This is what God wants for us too. I think there needs to be a healthy balance between recognizing God in our everyday lives;( in our conversations, our work place, our families, in nature), laid alongside our practice of coming to the temple. For one feeds the other.

This passage is timely. Here we are, this month, kicking off our 3 year capital campaign to take care of our temple. Around 45 years ago, God called Dr. Sweet and around 20 charter members to start Shepherd of the Hills Presbyterian Church. And whether we are aware of it or not, all of us have been called to this particular church. Whether it has been a formal call as it has been for Ron and me; or a call to become a member here, or a call to simply visit this church, God has been involved.

"You are my people, and I am your God", says the Lord. "You are to worship the Lord your God with all your heart and mind and soul." We are meant to have a place of worship, to care for it, and to use it wisely. I think this means not only the building and its upkeep, as we do for our own homes, but especially to care for all who enter here, as well. We need to be about providing the best Biblical education for adults and children we can; the warmest fellowship to each other and visitors; the most creative involvement in the needs of our world. Above all, we need always to be about God’s business of building our faith, for this is our one and sure protection for whatever comes our way.

Having said all this, prayer is still a delicate subject. It is not something we talk about with our casual acquaintances or neighbors, let alone people we don’t know. Even our legislatures argue about it. It is only in our own house of prayer, a place of safety, that we first dare to speak of it, test it, and try it out for size.

There is another comment I hear, and you might too, that goes something like this: "You know, I don’t pray in public because my relationship with God is a private thing and I don’t talk about it to others."

Now, I think there is a difference between private and personal prayer. Private indicates that it is just for me, not something to share with others. Whereas, personal, suggests that the experience is unique to the person, who may choose to share it. Again, I am suggesting that both are important.

Where would you and I be, if those people in our lives who modeled prayer for us, had refused to talk about it? What if our pastors, Sunday school teachers, or small group leaders had told us prayer was private not to be shared with others? Most influential, what if our peers, daring to offer a prayer publicly, had not?

When I served as a hospital chaplain here in Denver, the house of prayer for patients was most often their room. The chaplains frequently encountered a tension with doctors and our beliefs about faith and healing. One Dr. in particular had a reputation for being difficult. He considered Chaplains as unnecessary and said so. He would come bursting into the room and interrupt, even if I were praying with a patient. He was abrasive and arrogant.

One day I found myself alone with him in the nurse’s station. We were both charting when he spoke to me for the first time. Somehow we got onto the subject of his schedule as a surgeon. Fascinated with surgery, I was ecstatic and surprised when he offered me the opportunity of participating in surgery with one of my patients. It was a 14 hour, very complicated and life threatening surgery. In the operating room I stood side by side with the anesthesiologist. The atmosphere was tense. What was my role? I wondered, and realized quickly it was to pray; actually to take Paul’s words literally: to pray without ceasing.

Following the surgery, the surgeon and I found ourselves in the nurse’s station again. He turned to me and said, "So, what did you think? After I shared my excitement and learning with him, he offered. "What were you doing during the surgery? Assuming he was an agnostic or and atheist, I uncomfortably offered, "I was praying." Slowly, he turned fully in his chair, with tears in his eyes and said, "I know, I felt it. It made a difference to me. Thank you."

The operation was a success and our relationship shifted dramatically. Now when he came into the room of a patient I was visiting, he backed out in respect. And I had learned his arrogance was instead the confidence level, essential for him to approach our patient that day. The operating room had become a house of prayer.

You and I cannot be restored until we have come through the door of humility that prayer offers. When we come to God on our knees of praise, these are the prayers that mean the most to God. It is in this way that we are transformed. You and I come to our house of prayer expecting to meet God, and so we do.

Amen