In this conversation, Yolanda Denson-Byers discusses the Pray Without Ceasing initiative in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America, which fosters community prayer and deepens relationships within the church. Yolanda highlights the importance of prayer in addressing social justice issues and how it can empower congregations to engage with their communities. She offers practical advice for churches looking to start similar initiatives, emphasizing that prayer is a simple yet profound conversation with God.
Suggested Reading and Listening:
Pray Without Ceasing at Shepherd of the Hills in Minnesota
See Me, Believe Me: A Guide to Deepen Allyship with Congregational Leaders of Color
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00:00:27 --> 00:00:31 Hello, and welcome to Church in Maine, a podcast for people interested in the
00:00:31 --> 00:00:34 intersection of faith, politics, and culture. I'm Dennis Sanders, your host.
00:00:35 --> 00:00:39 One of my favorite stories about the church has to do with Nikolai Kierke,
00:00:40 --> 00:00:46 a Lutheran church in Leipzig in what was then East Germany in the 1980s.
00:00:46 --> 00:00:51 A group of people would gather in that church weekly to pray for peace.
00:00:52 --> 00:00:56 Now, that was a bold thing to do in a state that was officially atheist and
00:00:56 --> 00:01:01 under the watchful eye of the dreaded Stassi police.
00:01:02 --> 00:01:07 In 1989, the demonstrations started to take place after the prayers,
00:01:07 --> 00:01:12 and they were calling for an open country and a free people.
00:01:12 --> 00:01:17 More and more people started to join those demonstrations, and it grew and grew,
00:01:17 --> 00:01:20 and it actually started to spread to other parts of East Germany.
00:01:21 --> 00:01:27 And many people believe that these demonstrations helped to lead to the fall
00:01:27 --> 00:01:29 of the Berlin Wall on November 9th,
00:01:29 --> 00:01:37 1989, and to the end of East Germany and the unification of Germany a year later.
00:01:38 --> 00:01:42 And it all began with a prayer service.
00:01:43 --> 00:01:51 Now, I remember hearing a phrase in the Missionary Baptist Church back in Michigan
00:01:51 --> 00:01:55 in my youth, prayer changes things.
00:01:57 --> 00:02:03 That seems to have been the case in Leipzig in 1989, and I think it just might
00:02:03 --> 00:02:04 make a difference today.
00:02:06 --> 00:02:14 My guest today is Yolanda Denson Byers, the pastor of Shepherd of the Hills
00:02:14 --> 00:02:16 Lutheran Church in Edina, Minnesota.
00:02:16 --> 00:02:21 We're going to talk about Pray Without Ceasing, an initiative of the Evangelical
00:02:21 --> 00:02:25 Lutheran Church in America to gather Christians together to pray for the church,
00:02:25 --> 00:02:27 the nation, and the world.
00:02:28 --> 00:02:32 We're going to talk about the initiative as a whole, but also how it has been
00:02:32 --> 00:02:35 experienced in her congregation.
00:02:36 --> 00:02:42 Before we go into that, a little bit about Yolanda. She's an ordained pastor in the ELCA.
00:02:42 --> 00:02:48 Her call at Shepherd of the Hills began in July, 2023.
00:02:48 --> 00:02:54 She originally hails from St. Louis, Missouri, and she has been ordained for
00:02:54 --> 00:03:02 over 25 years, serving as a campus pastor, a solo pastor, a hospice chaplain, and now senior pastor.
00:03:03 --> 00:03:07 She is married to her wife, Tasha.
00:03:07 --> 00:03:15 Together, they have five children ranging from a toddler to a young adult and also a dog named Pox.
00:03:15 --> 00:03:21 So please join me in this conversation with Yolanda Denson Byers.
00:03:43 --> 00:03:48 Well, thank you so much for joining me this evening. I kind of want to start
00:03:48 --> 00:03:51 out by learning a little bit more about you, kind of your faith journey,
00:03:51 --> 00:03:56 and then a little bit more about the place where you serve at Shepherd of the,
00:03:57 --> 00:04:03 Sure. Well, thanks for having me, Dennis, and for the opportunity to be here with your audience.
00:04:04 --> 00:04:09 I have a really circuitous faith journey to the ELCA.
00:04:09 --> 00:04:12 I was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri.
00:04:14 --> 00:04:19 Upon my birth, my mother dumped me into the crib at our Missionary Baptist Church.
00:04:21 --> 00:04:24 And there I stayed for the first 18
00:04:24 --> 00:04:27 years of my life in that church so I
00:04:27 --> 00:04:30 was raised in the evangelical tradition I was
00:04:30 --> 00:04:37 raised in cradle-born black church tradition I grew up with the beauty of the
00:04:37 --> 00:04:45 gospel songs and the soaring prayers and the just wonderful sermons that lasted
00:04:45 --> 00:04:48 as long as my entire worship service lasts now.
00:04:49 --> 00:04:53 That sounds very familiar. Yes.
00:04:53 --> 00:04:57 We went to church in the morning, and then we ate lunch, and we went back to
00:04:57 --> 00:04:58 church in the afternoon.
00:04:58 --> 00:05:05 That's the way it was. So that was how I came to faith in Jesus Christ,
00:05:05 --> 00:05:09 where I learned about Jesus and learned to love Jesus.
00:05:10 --> 00:05:15 And when I was 18, however, I left home and went to college.
00:05:16 --> 00:05:21 And when I got to college, I had never missed church. Even when I was sick,
00:05:21 --> 00:05:25 my mother took me to church because what better place would there be to get
00:05:25 --> 00:05:27 healed than on the altar?
00:05:27 --> 00:05:30 So I went to church even when I was sick.
00:05:30 --> 00:05:35 So at 18, I went to college. I didn't know what to do. So I woke up that morning.
00:05:35 --> 00:05:37 The first Sunday I was there.
00:05:37 --> 00:05:39 I said, Lord, you got to tell me what to do.
00:05:40 --> 00:05:42 God said, put on your tennis shoes, start walking.
00:05:42 --> 00:05:49 I started walking and I ended up at an A.M.E. Zion church that was on the edge of the campus.
00:05:50 --> 00:05:55 For people who may not know, that's a black Methodist denomination.
00:05:56 --> 00:06:02 And the very first Sunday I was there, they had me teach Sunday school. Why? Why?
00:06:03 --> 00:06:09 Nine to 12 years old, and I taught them all four years of my college experience.
00:06:09 --> 00:06:16 But when I was 20, in my junior year of college, I accepted the call to preach.
00:06:16 --> 00:06:19 That's the language we used in that church.
00:06:19 --> 00:06:24 And I got to preach on a Sunday morning, and that's when I entered the ministry.
00:06:25 --> 00:06:31 And I stayed in the Amesayan Church a long, long while until I finished my bachelor's
00:06:31 --> 00:06:33 degree and my master's degree.
00:06:34 --> 00:06:39 And then I moved out to Minnesota. And here I have stayed for the last 25 years.
00:06:40 --> 00:06:45 And when I got here, there were no AME Zion churches. There were AME churches,
00:06:45 --> 00:06:47 but that's not the same denomination.
00:06:48 --> 00:06:53 And so I had to look for a new denomination. And I was arrested,
00:06:54 --> 00:06:57 absolutely arrested by the ELCA's emphasis on grace.
00:06:59 --> 00:07:04 They taught us that there was nothing I could do to earn the grace of God,
00:07:04 --> 00:07:09 that Jesus had done all the work on the cross, that I couldn't outrun it,
00:07:09 --> 00:07:12 I couldn't out-sin it, I couldn't out-fox it,
00:07:12 --> 00:07:17 that that love was unconditional, that grace was amazing, and there was nothing I could do about it.
00:07:21 --> 00:07:23 And that just changed my whole life.
00:07:24 --> 00:07:30 And so I ended up doing a doctorate at Luther Seminary so that I would be really
00:07:30 --> 00:07:32 steeped in my new tradition.
00:07:33 --> 00:07:40 And I started pastoring in the ELCA. And so now I am at Shepherd of the Hills Lutheran Church.
00:07:41 --> 00:07:49 It is my third settled call, but I did quite a few interims throughout the last 25 years.
00:07:50 --> 00:07:55 And I love Shepherd. You know, I came into the Minneapolis area synod because
00:07:55 --> 00:08:00 I was looking for a synod that had a little more diversity than where I had
00:08:00 --> 00:08:02 come from, which was Southwest Minnesota Synod.
00:08:03 --> 00:08:08 I wanted to get around a few more people who looked like me and understood a
00:08:08 --> 00:08:12 little bit about the person of color experience in Minnesota.
00:08:12 --> 00:08:18 My congregation is largely European American, but we're becoming increasingly diverse.
00:08:19 --> 00:08:25 And they have a welcome statement that just knocks your socks off.
00:08:26 --> 00:08:33 And so that welcome statement was so expansive and it included everyone.
00:08:34 --> 00:08:39 And I said, this is a place I want to be. And so that's how I got to Shepard.
00:08:39 --> 00:08:45 So how long have you been there? Two years and four months. Wow. Okay.
00:08:45 --> 00:08:48 So that's still brand new. We're still enjoying the honeymoon.
00:08:49 --> 00:08:54 They're so good to me, to the neighborhood, to our community.
00:08:55 --> 00:09:03 This church, I think, is unique in their passion for radical welcome.
00:09:04 --> 00:09:07 You just come through the doors and you know that you are loved.
00:09:08 --> 00:09:11 Loved by us. but loved more by God.
00:09:11 --> 00:09:14 And that's how they welcomed me.
00:09:15 --> 00:09:19 And that's how they welcome everyone. So I'm really proud to be their pastor.
00:09:20 --> 00:09:22 I'm really proud to be the senior pastor.
00:09:23 --> 00:09:28 So tell me a little bit about the Pray Without Ceasing initiative.
00:09:29 --> 00:09:33 From what I've learned, it was something that was started in the Minneapolis
00:09:33 --> 00:09:37 Synod, I believe, and it's kind of grown from there.
00:09:38 --> 00:09:44 And I kind of wanted to hear about that and then also how it kind of started in your church.
00:09:45 --> 00:09:50 Yeah, so from what I understand, and I don't presume to be an expert,
00:09:50 --> 00:09:56 but I think that Bishop Anne, who is the former bishop of Minneapolis Area Synod,
00:09:56 --> 00:10:02 had a little bit of a vision for this and has gathered some people around herself
00:10:02 --> 00:10:04 to create Pray Without Ceasing.
00:10:05 --> 00:10:15 As we all know, our nation is in a little bit of upheaval, and we know that prayer changes things.
00:10:15 --> 00:10:19 That's what my mama taught me. Prayer changes things.
00:10:19 --> 00:10:27 And so she gave us an invitation to begin praying once a week in our congregations.
00:10:28 --> 00:10:34 And Minneapolis Area Synod sent out an email that I got, and it was an invitation
00:10:34 --> 00:10:38 to consider starting a Pray Without Ceasing in our congregation.
00:10:38 --> 00:10:44 We were early adopters. And I think that the reason we were early adopters here
00:10:44 --> 00:10:47 at Shepherd is because I come out of the Black church tradition.
00:10:47 --> 00:10:49 And we know about prayer meetings.
00:10:52 --> 00:10:56 The shortest prayer meeting I ever went to in a Black church was an hour.
00:10:56 --> 00:10:58 And the longest one I ever went to was more than 12.
00:10:59 --> 00:11:04 And so we have no problems praying and talking to Jesus about everything,
00:11:05 --> 00:11:06 anything, and all the things.
00:11:07 --> 00:11:12 And so because I had that life experience, I knew I wanted to do that here.
00:11:14 --> 00:11:18 It was a little scary because in the Lutheran church tradition,
00:11:18 --> 00:11:23 at least in the churches I've served, there wasn't a weekly prayer meeting.
00:11:24 --> 00:11:33 And also the concept that you could pray longer than three minutes or so was a challenging one.
00:11:34 --> 00:11:39 Some of the members of my congregation asked questions like, is this even Lutheran?
00:11:40 --> 00:11:42 What are we going to do for 30 minutes?
00:11:43 --> 00:11:48 Is it going to be awkward or scary? And those were real questions.
00:11:48 --> 00:11:57 They weren't being silly or they were really expressing anxiety, but also curiosity.
00:11:57 --> 00:12:00 And what I love about Shepherd is
00:12:00 --> 00:12:05 one of our strategic priorities here is experiment boldly, fail forward.
00:12:06 --> 00:12:10 So we're willing to just try new things. Even if we don't know if it's going
00:12:10 --> 00:12:15 to work, even if we're not sure it's going to work, we're willing to try new
00:12:15 --> 00:12:17 things to the glory of God.
00:12:17 --> 00:12:21 And if it fails, you learn something. If it succeeds, you learn something.
00:12:22 --> 00:12:24 So no matter what, you win in Jesus.
00:12:24 --> 00:12:30 So we just decided to try it. And the beauty of Pray Without Ceasing is that
00:12:30 --> 00:12:39 the team who created it provides a liturgy, like a sheet, every single week.
00:12:39 --> 00:12:44 And it gives you some prayer prompts, gives you some scripture to read,
00:12:44 --> 00:12:46 gives you some songs to sing.
00:12:47 --> 00:12:50 You don't have to follow it, but you can choose to.
00:12:51 --> 00:12:58 And so we use it here pretty loosely because we don't use instruments. We sing a cappella.
00:12:59 --> 00:13:03 And anything you know about Lutherans, we are a singing denomination.
00:13:03 --> 00:13:06 Yes, you are. I love that Lutherans can sing.
00:13:08 --> 00:13:11 I was going to say that that is actually...
00:13:12 --> 00:13:18 An interesting connection with the Black church is their singing, their love of singing.
00:13:19 --> 00:13:23 There's that connection there. I so agree.
00:13:23 --> 00:13:29 I so agree. And so because it's a singing church, you can sing Occupy.
00:13:29 --> 00:13:35 But we choose to sing songs that we know well and that can kind of sink into
00:13:35 --> 00:13:38 our hearts and be meditative.
00:13:38 --> 00:13:46 So we use a lot of Taze stuff. We use the old church hymns, you know, like Amazing Grace.
00:13:46 --> 00:13:50 We sing, Lord, listen to your children praying.
00:13:51 --> 00:13:57 You know, things that you can just sink into and allow the Holy Spirit to just
00:13:57 --> 00:13:59 minister to you as you sing.
00:13:59 --> 00:14:02 So we do some singing. We read some scripture.
00:14:03 --> 00:14:07 And then lately they've been having some very simple prayer prompt.
00:14:07 --> 00:14:12 What is going on in your life or in the world that makes your heart sing?
00:14:12 --> 00:14:17 And what's going on in your life and your world that makes your heart sad?
00:14:18 --> 00:14:22 And then we just kind of call those things out.
00:14:23 --> 00:14:28 And one of the things we love also about Pray Without Ceasing is that they encourage
00:14:28 --> 00:14:29 you not to be afraid of silence.
00:14:31 --> 00:14:35 Silence is its own sound, right?
00:14:35 --> 00:14:40 It is, yeah. And it's a sound that we don't often hear, especially in American
00:14:40 --> 00:14:44 culture, and especially not in urban centers.
00:14:45 --> 00:14:48 And so we have cultivated a love for silence.
00:14:49 --> 00:14:55 And we spend, you know, three, four, five minutes at different intervals in silence.
00:14:56 --> 00:15:01 Um, and it's healing and we can hear God.
00:15:01 --> 00:15:05 You know, I think we think of prayer as like talking to God,
00:15:05 --> 00:15:13 but sometimes we have to remember also the invitation to get quiet and to hear God speak to us too.
00:15:14 --> 00:15:19 And a lot of us have experienced very healing words from God,
00:15:19 --> 00:15:27 words of kindness, compassion, affirmation, friendship, encouragement.
00:15:28 --> 00:15:32 And that's just a beautiful part of what we do together.
00:15:33 --> 00:15:37 So what do you think has been the result of this time together?
00:15:38 --> 00:15:41 And I probably should ask, how long has the time together been?
00:15:41 --> 00:15:46 Has it been, you know, half hour, hour and what has been the result of that?
00:15:48 --> 00:15:53 So it is officially scheduled from 11 to 11.30.
00:15:53 --> 00:16:00 So we do Bible study from 10 to 11. So we put ourselves deeply in prayer and in Bible study.
00:16:00 --> 00:16:05 And then we leave that and we go to the sanctuary, which is another location for prayer.
00:16:05 --> 00:16:08 And it's officially from 11 to 11.30.
00:16:08 --> 00:16:12 And when we first started, we kept it really tight.
00:16:12 --> 00:16:14 It went 11.30 on the dot. We were done.
00:16:15 --> 00:16:20 And two weeks ago when we did it, they were still sitting in the sanctuary at noon. Wow.
00:16:21 --> 00:16:25 Yeah. And so God is doing something. Yeah.
00:16:25 --> 00:16:31 God is up to some marvelous work. And what's happening is that it's not only
00:16:31 --> 00:16:33 deepening our relationship with God.
00:16:33 --> 00:16:39 That goes without saying. The prayer is how we deepen our relationship with God.
00:16:39 --> 00:16:47 But it's deepening our relationship with each other. And I think that might be the surprise of PwC.
00:16:47 --> 00:16:53 You cannot pray for someone without loving them. You cannot pray with someone
00:16:53 --> 00:16:55 without getting invested in their life.
00:16:55 --> 00:17:02 You can't pray in a group without turning your face to the neighborhood. it, right?
00:17:02 --> 00:17:09 And so it's transforming the way that we are in relationship with each other
00:17:09 --> 00:17:14 and with our neighbors, with our country, and with our world.
00:17:14 --> 00:17:20 And I think that's kind of the surprise for me because I've always thought of
00:17:20 --> 00:17:27 prayer, I think we're taught to think of prayer as something very private and very individual,
00:17:27 --> 00:17:32 particularly in the Lutheran Church, very private and very individual.
00:17:33 --> 00:17:36 But in praying so intentionally together.
00:17:38 --> 00:17:41 We're experiencing something new about beloved community.
00:17:42 --> 00:17:49 We're experiencing something new about walking with one another as the church, right?
00:17:49 --> 00:17:55 So we talk about the church as the church, where Jesus is presence in the world,
00:17:55 --> 00:18:00 and we're his hands and we're his feet and we're his smile in a world that so
00:18:00 --> 00:18:04 desperately needs him, full stop. We need Jesus.
00:18:05 --> 00:18:11 And so I think what's happening is we're discovering ourselves as that body.
00:18:12 --> 00:18:16 We're learning to appreciate the diversity of this body,
00:18:16 --> 00:18:23 not just in terms of race or ethnicity or class or gender expression or LGBT
00:18:23 --> 00:18:29 status, but just the way that we encounter the divine, right?
00:18:30 --> 00:18:35 So some people say our father, some people say our mother, some people say our creator, right?
00:18:35 --> 00:18:39 Some people are comfortable praying out loud. Some people pray silently.
00:18:39 --> 00:18:45 Some people clap their hands when we're singing. Some people sit and sing meditatively.
00:18:45 --> 00:18:52 There's rich diversity in the ways that we encounter Jesus and the ways in which
00:18:52 --> 00:18:55 the Holy Spirit expresses herself through us.
00:18:55 --> 00:19:06 And it's enlarging our capacity to make room in our hearts and minds for all of our neighbors.
00:19:07 --> 00:19:11 That kind of leaves me, you know, this is, as you said earlier,
00:19:11 --> 00:19:16 and I think even in reading the material about Pray Without Seizing,
00:19:16 --> 00:19:23 that it's kind of a response to what's kind of happening outside of the church. How do you think it is?
00:19:25 --> 00:19:29 Dealing with what's going on outside of the church? And how do you think it's
00:19:29 --> 00:19:37 helping people respond in ways to the wider world and how we deal with that?
00:19:38 --> 00:19:45 Yeah. I think when we sit at the feet of Jesus in prayer, we begin to see the
00:19:45 --> 00:19:48 world and see our neighbors through the eyes of Christ.
00:19:49 --> 00:19:56 And what I know about Jesus is that God loves us all. so unconditionally.
00:19:57 --> 00:20:02 And we have this mandate to love God with all our heart, mind,
00:20:02 --> 00:20:05 soul, and strength, and love our neighbors as ourselves.
00:20:06 --> 00:20:12 And then, you know, if you keep sitting at Jesus' feet, you get this call to
00:20:12 --> 00:20:16 peacemaking and to justice doing, right?
00:20:16 --> 00:20:20 And to walking humbly with our God, right?
00:20:20 --> 00:20:25 And to acts of mercy and almsgiving and compassion.
00:20:25 --> 00:20:29 And you sort of hear Jesus when
00:20:29 --> 00:20:34 he says, when you did it to the least of these, you did it to me, right?
00:20:34 --> 00:20:40 And so that flies in the face of some of the Christian nationalism and in some
00:20:40 --> 00:20:44 of the policies that we're seeing in our nation right now,
00:20:44 --> 00:20:48 because Jesus really didn't stutter when he said,
00:20:48 --> 00:20:53 feed the hungry give drink to the thirsty clothe the naked house the homeless
00:20:53 --> 00:20:58 visit the sick and in prison care for the widows and orphans he he didn't stutter
00:20:58 --> 00:21:01 and and when the people said,
00:21:02 --> 00:21:09 um when did we see you hungry or thirsty or naked or sick so when you did it
00:21:09 --> 00:21:10 to the least of these you did it to me.
00:21:11 --> 00:21:16 And so I think he was very, very clear that that's our mandate as Christians,
00:21:17 --> 00:21:20 and that anything that flies in the face of that is not of Christ.
00:21:20 --> 00:21:25 It's not of Jesus. And so it gives us glasses,
00:21:25 --> 00:21:35 it gives us lens through which to understand whether the policies and procedures
00:21:35 --> 00:21:42 of our nation are in alignment with the gospel of Jesus Christ.
00:21:42 --> 00:21:51 And it calls us to confession and to repentance, because this isn't something
00:21:51 --> 00:21:53 someone out there is doing.
00:21:53 --> 00:21:56 This is something that we are doing.
00:21:57 --> 00:22:04 We are one nation. This is what we say, one nation under God, indivisible.
00:22:05 --> 00:22:12 And so we're each responsible for what we allow to happen in our country.
00:22:13 --> 00:22:20 And so it is, I think, one of the beauties of PwC is that it's also very humbling.
00:22:21 --> 00:22:31 It calls you to your better angels. It calls you to want to be a Jesus follower.
00:22:32 --> 00:22:36 Some people are really even having a hard time with the word Christian nowadays
00:22:36 --> 00:22:40 because of how that word has been hijacked.
00:22:40 --> 00:22:45 And I've heard more people starting to say, I am a Jesus follower.
00:22:46 --> 00:22:52 Like where Jesus goes, I will follow. And Jesus goes to the marginalized,
00:22:53 --> 00:22:56 to the oppressed, to the downtrodden, to the forgotten, forsaken.
00:22:58 --> 00:23:05 And Jesus is always trying to make life better, right? And always calling us to share.
00:23:05 --> 00:23:12 You know, I think about the feeding of the 5. That is really a story about sharing, right?
00:23:12 --> 00:23:20 It's a story about radical sharing. And so I think that's how it affects how
00:23:20 --> 00:23:23 we understand what's happening in our country right now.
00:23:23 --> 00:23:29 Because instead of feeling hopeless, as you sit at the feet of Jesus.
00:23:30 --> 00:23:35 You realize, I may not be able to change everything, but I can change something.
00:23:35 --> 00:23:42 But I can do my little part and my little sphere of influence in my neighborhood.
00:23:42 --> 00:23:49 And if all of us Christians were doing that, just imagine, just imagine how
00:23:49 --> 00:23:51 transformative that would be.
00:23:52 --> 00:23:56 And so I think we're finding hope, and we're finding courage.
00:23:56 --> 00:24:01 You know, Dietrich Bonhoeffer said, we're not called just to,
00:24:01 --> 00:24:08 you know, bind up the wounds of those ground under the wheel of injustice.
00:24:08 --> 00:24:12 We're to drive a spoke into the wheel itself.
00:24:12 --> 00:24:15 Right. And so how do you drive that spoke?
00:24:16 --> 00:24:21 It is through the unconditional love, the amazing grace, the peacemaking and
00:24:21 --> 00:24:26 justice doing that we are called to do as Christians.
00:24:28 --> 00:24:33 So, I'm kind of curious, have you been able to talk to pastors and people from
00:24:33 --> 00:24:39 other congregations about their experiences with Pray Without Ceasing and what
00:24:39 --> 00:24:41 have they been learning and finding out from it?
00:24:42 --> 00:24:47 You know, I really haven't talked to a lot of pastors who are doing it, to be honest.
00:24:47 --> 00:24:56 But what I did have an experience of is I was the keynote speaker at a synodical
00:24:56 --> 00:24:58 event that was all pastors.
00:24:59 --> 00:25:02 And I brought PWC there.
00:25:02 --> 00:25:08 It was in Wisconsin, in Milwaukee area synod. And I just asked for the opportunity
00:25:08 --> 00:25:15 to, inside of my teaching, because I wrote a book called See Me, Believe Me.
00:25:16 --> 00:25:20 And so I knew they wanted me to cover that material.
00:25:20 --> 00:25:25 But I don't think you can even talk about racism in America without prayer.
00:25:26 --> 00:25:33 Without grounding in prayer. And so I asked for the opportunity to bring PwC.
00:25:33 --> 00:25:35 It was about 40 pastors to them.
00:25:36 --> 00:25:40 And so we did have a Pray Without Ceasing experience.
00:25:41 --> 00:25:47 And, of course, you know, pastors sing really well. So we really just the power
00:25:47 --> 00:25:50 and the presence of the Holy Spirit descended from,
00:25:51 --> 00:25:56 And we really experienced God in wonderful new ways.
00:25:56 --> 00:26:03 And I heard from many of those youngsters, I cannot wait to take this back to my congregation.
00:26:04 --> 00:26:08 And that excited me. And that's what's happening all over the country.
00:26:09 --> 00:26:14 There's a scripture that says that it's like fire shut up in my bones.
00:26:14 --> 00:26:17 And I can't contain it, right?
00:26:17 --> 00:26:24 That's how I think of PwC. It's like a fire of the Holy Spirit that's spreading,
00:26:24 --> 00:26:28 and it's creating a revival.
00:26:29 --> 00:26:34 It's creating a revival of sorts for us in the ELCA.
00:26:34 --> 00:26:39 And as it spreads from church to church, I think that's going to continue to happen.
00:26:40 --> 00:26:46 And I also don't think that you can have these prayer experiences at church
00:26:46 --> 00:26:48 and not bring them home, right?
00:26:48 --> 00:26:54 I don't think that you can have this sort of experience in your home and not
00:26:54 --> 00:26:57 be transformed in your behaviors in the neighborhood.
00:26:58 --> 00:27:06 So one tiny kernel of a prayer, you know, my mother used to tell me that Jesus is a whole prayer.
00:27:07 --> 00:27:14 Call his name Jesus. It's a whole prayer. And I think as we're calling the name
00:27:14 --> 00:27:20 of Jesus, it is. It's setting a revival.
00:27:20 --> 00:27:27 It's opening people up in new ways to what God is doing in the world. Right.
00:27:28 --> 00:27:34 And I'm getting ready for, we use Revised Common Lectionary.
00:27:34 --> 00:27:38 And so around this time of the year, we start using some apocalyptic literature.
00:27:39 --> 00:27:44 And I was talking to my mother like, this doesn't feel like something far off.
00:27:45 --> 00:27:49 No. You look at the world right now. Not right now, no. You know,
00:27:49 --> 00:27:51 pretty apocalyptic, right?
00:27:52 --> 00:27:58 And so I think people are yearning desperately for some hope,
00:27:58 --> 00:28:04 for reassurance of salvation, to know that God hasn't left us,
00:28:04 --> 00:28:09 hasn't forsaken us, that God still has a good plan for us, not to harm us,
00:28:09 --> 00:28:11 but to give us future and hope.
00:28:11 --> 00:28:17 And I think that, you know, as we study our Bibles, as we pray without ceasing,
00:28:17 --> 00:28:27 we get renewed vigor to transform the world for Christ, for the sake of Jesus Christ.
00:28:27 --> 00:28:33 And I'm excited to see what God will do. Do you think that this is helping people
00:28:33 --> 00:28:41 really see prayer as a part of, I guess, justice work in some ways?
00:28:42 --> 00:28:48 I think for me, from what I remember learning about the civil rights movement
00:28:48 --> 00:28:51 is how much prayer was a part of that.
00:28:51 --> 00:28:58 And I even also remember hearing the story, I don't know if you're aware of the story.
00:28:59 --> 00:29:03 There was a Lutheran church in Leipzig, Germany, that they would meet,
00:29:03 --> 00:29:07 this was in the early 80s, every week for prayer.
00:29:08 --> 00:29:14 And then that prayer would become kind of a little bit of a protest, and that grew and grew.
00:29:14 --> 00:29:23 And that actually became a movement that led up to the kind of movement into
00:29:23 --> 00:29:28 89, which then led to the Berlin Wall falling.
00:29:29 --> 00:29:35 And that all began with a little prayer movement in a church in Leipzig, Germany.
00:29:35 --> 00:29:39 And so I'm kind of wondering, do you think that this is kind of rekindling that,
00:29:39 --> 00:29:46 at least in some parts of Christianity, that belief that prayer does have this role in social justice?
00:29:47 --> 00:29:52 I love that idea. You know, I can say for certain that I've experienced that
00:29:52 --> 00:29:55 as an African-American, right?
00:29:55 --> 00:30:00 So, you know, when we were enslaved peoples, we would steal away in the midnight
00:30:00 --> 00:30:03 hour into the hushed harbors, and we would sing,
00:30:03 --> 00:30:09 and we would pray, and we would, you know, believe that the same God who delivered
00:30:09 --> 00:30:11 the Israelites would deliver us, right?
00:30:11 --> 00:30:16 And it gave us the strength and the courage to go back and face another day, right?
00:30:17 --> 00:30:21 And then during the American Civil Rights Movement, over my head,
00:30:21 --> 00:30:25 I hear freedom in the air, right? There must be a God somewhere.
00:30:26 --> 00:30:31 And they rooted themselves in the gospel music of our tradition and in the prayers
00:30:31 --> 00:30:34 and in the preaching and in the word,
00:30:34 --> 00:30:42 which allowed them to withstand hoses and dogs and beatings and jailings.
00:30:42 --> 00:30:48 And so, yeah, I think there's a direct correlation between.
00:30:50 --> 00:31:00 Any kind of peacemaking and justice work, and that work has to be empowered
00:31:00 --> 00:31:05 and fueled by the power of the Holy Spirit, right?
00:31:05 --> 00:31:10 And we've been having a lot of talks around my congregation,
00:31:10 --> 00:31:14 Shepherd, about the difference between being political and partisan.
00:31:15 --> 00:31:19 Because you'll hear people say in churches, well, you ought not be political.
00:31:19 --> 00:31:25 And I love to remind people, Jesus was not killed because he was so spiritual.
00:31:26 --> 00:31:29 He was killed because he was so political, right?
00:31:29 --> 00:31:36 Politics has to do with how we allocate resources, how we care for the least of these in our society.
00:31:36 --> 00:31:41 Politics has everything to do with our faith and with our Jesus.
00:31:41 --> 00:31:50 And so while we are not partisan in churches at our best, let me put that caveat,
00:31:51 --> 00:31:57 at our best, we're not partisan, meaning I will never tell my parishioners who to vote for.
00:31:58 --> 00:32:01 We are political, right?
00:32:03 --> 00:32:09 How we feed the hungry has to do with our politics. How we house the homeless
00:32:09 --> 00:32:11 has to do with our politics.
00:32:11 --> 00:32:16 How we treat incarcerated citizens has to do with our politics.
00:32:17 --> 00:32:24 And our politics ought to be informed by the word of God and by the words of Jesus.
00:32:24 --> 00:32:31 Because as Christians, there should be no sphere of our lives that is not captive to Jesus Christ.
00:32:32 --> 00:32:41 And so I think that you're wise in saying that there's some power.
00:32:41 --> 00:32:49 Intimate, inextricable connection between justice work and mercy doing work.
00:32:52 --> 00:32:58 And peacemaking and our understanding of God's will for the world, right?
00:32:59 --> 00:33:06 We as Christians pray, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
00:33:06 --> 00:33:12 Not only just some by and by when this life is over, I'll fly away. Yes.
00:33:12 --> 00:33:17 And on earth as it is in heaven.
00:33:18 --> 00:33:22 And so, yeah, I think You're absolutely right. That's wisdom, Dennis.
00:33:23 --> 00:33:29 So do you think if there are churches out there that want to do something like
00:33:29 --> 00:33:35 this, also other ELCA churches, but maybe churches from other denominations,
00:33:35 --> 00:33:38 what advice would you give them?
00:33:38 --> 00:33:42 How would they want to start something like this? Yeah.
00:33:46 --> 00:33:49 Well, first of all, I would say go to the website.
00:33:49 --> 00:33:54 Okay. So if you go on your Google, you can type Pray Without Ceasing, E-L-C-A.
00:33:55 --> 00:33:59 Okay. It will take you to their website. And then there's a drop-down menu,
00:33:59 --> 00:34:01 and on the drop-down menu it says Resources.
00:34:03 --> 00:34:07 And under Resources, each week they publish a liturgy.
00:34:08 --> 00:34:12 So you really could just start that simply. If you didn't even know how to start
00:34:12 --> 00:34:16 or what to do or what to say, you could do that, right?
00:34:16 --> 00:34:23 But you could also just do it the way we do it in the black church you could
00:34:23 --> 00:34:29 just get yourself in a room together and say does anyone have a song,
00:34:30 --> 00:34:35 and sing the song that comes from someone's heart and then you could say what
00:34:35 --> 00:34:41 are the things that are burdening you and you could speak them into the room
00:34:41 --> 00:34:46 and then you could say what are the things that give you joy or that for which
00:34:46 --> 00:34:48 you would like to give thanks.
00:34:48 --> 00:34:53 And then you could speak them into the room and then you could close with the Lord's prayer.
00:34:54 --> 00:35:02 Um, and in, in the midst of that, when silence falls as it inevitably will, don't be afraid.
00:35:04 --> 00:35:10 See it as an opportunity to sit in the presence of the Holy Spirit and to see
00:35:10 --> 00:35:14 if God has something to share with you, right?
00:35:14 --> 00:35:17 And so I think it could be as simple as that.
00:35:17 --> 00:35:23 A lot of denominations have devotionals that are published, like a daily devotional.
00:35:23 --> 00:35:28 You could start by reading the devotional and then rolling into what gives you
00:35:28 --> 00:35:32 joy, what makes you sorrowful, and close with the Lord's Prayer.
00:35:32 --> 00:35:39 So I think it can be as simple or as complex as you make it as a pastor.
00:35:39 --> 00:35:41 I kind of think about this like a wedding.
00:35:42 --> 00:35:46 You can spend $500 or $50, or you can spend $50.
00:35:47 --> 00:35:49 But at the end of the day, you're just as married.
00:35:50 --> 00:35:57 And so I think it's the same with prayer. Like, you know, it does not have to be fancy.
00:35:57 --> 00:36:01 It doesn't have to be structured. Yeah.
00:36:02 --> 00:36:07 I have a four-year-old, and I'm always just telling him, all prayer is is a
00:36:07 --> 00:36:11 conversation with your best friend. You know how to do that, right?
00:36:11 --> 00:36:16 All of us, we know how to talk to our friend, to our spouse,
00:36:17 --> 00:36:19 to our loved ones, to our coworkers.
00:36:20 --> 00:36:24 It's the same thing. It's just a conversation with a friend.
00:36:25 --> 00:36:32 And I think we all know how to do that. I think we trip ourselves up when we
00:36:32 --> 00:36:35 feel like there's a right way to pray.
00:36:36 --> 00:36:39 Yeah, I agree. It's not. And there really isn't.
00:36:40 --> 00:36:44 No. And I've even had people come to me and say, I feel so guilty,
00:36:44 --> 00:36:46 Pastor. I fell asleep when I was praying.
00:36:47 --> 00:36:50 And I'm like, I always ask them, do you have a child?
00:36:50 --> 00:36:53 Do you have a grandchild? Yeah, exactly.
00:36:53 --> 00:36:56 How do you feel when they fall asleep on your bosom?
00:36:57 --> 00:37:03 How do you feel when they fall asleep in your arms? Are you mad?
00:37:04 --> 00:37:14 No. When I look at my baby in my arms, I just feel overwhelming love and gratitude for that child.
00:37:14 --> 00:37:20 And I think that's how God feels about us. Exactly. Yeah. Exactly.
00:37:22 --> 00:37:28 Well kind of as we conclude I wanted to ask is there if people want to know
00:37:28 --> 00:37:33 more kind of to chat with you or if there's I know you had had written a book
00:37:33 --> 00:37:40 and I'd love to have you back on to talk about that book a little bit more where can they contact you,
00:37:41 --> 00:37:47 So I would invite people to go to my website. My church website is S-O-T-H,
00:37:48 --> 00:37:51 soft, S-O-T-H, church.com.
00:37:52 --> 00:37:55 There you can connect to me. You can connect to Shepherd of the Hills.
00:37:55 --> 00:37:57 You can connect to what we're doing there.
00:37:58 --> 00:38:03 You can also just type my name into amazon.com, Yolanda Denson Byers.
00:38:03 --> 00:38:10 My book will pop, See Me, Believe Me. And I'd love you to read it and start
00:38:10 --> 00:38:13 some discussions about anti-racism in the church.
00:38:15 --> 00:38:19 Well, Yolanda, this is a great conversation. Thank you for this talk.
00:38:19 --> 00:38:26 And to talk a little bit about the role of prayer, this actually kind of brings me back.
00:38:26 --> 00:38:32 Because like you, I grew up in the Black church and kind of the importance of
00:38:32 --> 00:38:35 prayer. And I think the importance of prayer right now at this time.
00:38:35 --> 00:38:39 I think that this is before we kind of do anything.
00:38:39 --> 00:38:42 And I think sometimes when we're trying to figure out what are we going to do,
00:38:42 --> 00:38:49 how we're going to do things, sometimes what we need to do is simply sit down and just pray.
00:38:50 --> 00:38:52 Start with prayer. And just start.
00:38:53 --> 00:38:59 So thank you so much. Thank you, Dennis. It's been a joy to be with you. All right.
00:39:31 --> 00:39:35 So, what are your thoughts on the episode? I'd love to know.
00:39:36 --> 00:39:40 Feel free to send me an email to churchinmain, all one word, at substack.com.
00:39:42 --> 00:39:47 Just to note, I will be changing that email soon to a different email address,
00:39:47 --> 00:39:51 but I do want to hear what you have to say.
00:39:52 --> 00:39:58 So, again, you can leave me a note at churchandmain, all one word, at substack.com.
00:39:59 --> 00:40:06 I will include links. You can. There will be links to the Pray Without Ceasing initiative,
00:40:06 --> 00:40:13 also a link to an article that Yolanda wrote about the experience,
00:40:13 --> 00:40:18 and also links to the book that she wrote.
00:40:20 --> 00:40:26 That is also there as well. And just to note that I don't think that you have
00:40:26 --> 00:40:31 to be a Lutheran, an ELCA congregation to be part of this initiative.
00:40:33 --> 00:40:35 My congregation, which is a Disciples of Christ congregation,
00:40:36 --> 00:40:41 is a part of it, though we do share space within the ELCA congregation.
00:40:43 --> 00:40:47 So I think it's a good way of being a part of this.
00:40:47 --> 00:40:51 And I think especially in the times that we're in, it's a good way of being
00:40:51 --> 00:40:54 a part of something that's important.
00:40:56 --> 00:40:59 So that's my two cents.
00:41:00 --> 00:41:05 If you want to learn more about this podcast, listen to past episodes,
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00:41:51 --> 00:41:55 That is it for this episode of Church in Maine. As I always like to say,
00:41:56 --> 00:41:57 thank you so much for listening.
00:41:57 --> 00:42:02 Take care, everyone. Godspeed, and I will see you very soon.