Sermon for St Ed’s, 25 January 2026. Readings: Matthew 6:5-16 , James 5:13-20.
Over the next few weeks, apart from a break for Candlemas, we are going to be thinking about prayer. It is always good to be reminded why prayer matters, and today I want to focus on corporate prayer.
A few weeks ago someone asked me what I meant by that, and I realised it could easily be misunderstood. I don’t mean praying for big business, the banking sector, or corporate finance. By corporate prayer I simply mean praying together. When we pray corporately, we are gathered as the church, praying as one body.
When we pray together and say Amen together, we are agreeing with one another, affirming one another’s prayers. That might be during open prayer, when one person prays and we all respond with ‘Amen’ or ‘Lord, hear us’. But it also happens when we pray the same words together: our confession, the Lord’s Prayer, and other shared prayers in our worship. I’ll come back to that.
This week has also been the Week of Prayer for Christian Unity, which feels particularly timely. With unrest and division within the Church of England around Living in Love and Faith and same-sex blessings. Around the world, not least in America, we are seeing the rise of far-right attitudes, sometimes being aligned with the Christian faith. And honestly, there doesn’t seem to be an awful lot of ‘love your neighbour’ going on.
and I don’t think I can stand here this morning and not mention what is going on in the US. I know some of you think that sometimes I am too ‘political’ in my preaching, but you know where is our faith, our compassion, our love for one another, if we are not touched by awful things going on around the world.
Rene Good, Alex Pretti, may they rest in peace… and rise in glory.
Let’s be praying together for justice, peace and love to prevail in the hearts of those making decisions in the US right now.
Look, as Christians, we will not always agree on everything, that’s ok of course. I talk about us being an inclusive church where all are welcome in our differences. But our faith is rooted in loving one another as Christ has loved us. So, despite our differences, we must try and seek points of connection rather than division. As I have said before—and will say again when we mark Racial Justice Sunday in a few weeks time, this does not mean ignoring or excusing what is abusive, racist, or prejudicial. and there is plenty of that going on right now. God is a God of justice after all. But in our everyday relationships, in our walk of faith, we are called to seek unity where we can. And praying together is one of the most powerful ways of doing that.
I’ve been thinking a lot about unity. What does it actually mean? Unity doesn’t mean uniformity. It doesn’t mean we all think the same or believe exactly the same things. It means we choose to stand together, before God, as people who belong to one another.
So what does the Bible tell us about praying together?
In Matthew’s Gospel we hear Jesus challenging the way people were praying—the Pharisees and religious leaders—and then he teaches his disciples how to pray. He gives us what we now call the Lord’s Prayer.
And something struck me this week in a way it hadn’t before. Even though Jesus has just spoken about praying privately, in secret, this prayer is actually a corporate prayer. It is meant to be prayed in company.
It begins, Our Father. We don’t usually say ‘our’ unless we are with others. And later it says: give us our daily bread; forgive us; lead us. This is a prayer for the community.
Not only that, it gives us a pattern for how to pray together.
First, we give glory to God:
Hallowed be your name.
To hallow something is to honour it as holy, to revere it. So we begin with praise and worship. Worship is at the very heart of who we are as Christians.
Then we seek God’s will:
Your kingdom come. Your will be done.
As a church, we want to seek God’s purposes, not just our own ideas. We pray about decisions, we commit our meetings to God, and we ask for the guidance of the Holy Spirit. We could come up with a hundred good ideas before breakfast—but if they are not where God is leading us, they won’t bear fruit. We pray to see God’s kingdom here. and in the wider world.
Only then do we turn to our own need, and again, we do so together.
Give us this day our daily bread. Forgive us our sins. Do not bring us to the time of trial.
We pray for provision, forgiveness, and help in troubled times, as a community.
The Lord’s Prayer isn’t just a standalone prayer; it’s a guide. And we can live that pattern out whenever we pray together.
In Acts 2 we read that the early church were together and shared what they had so that none were in need. They prayed and worshipped together. When we pray corporately, we stand with one another. As we share joys and struggles, prayer often leads to practical care, seeing a need and asking, What can we do to help?
There is strength and courage in praying together. We lift one another up. We grow in compassion. Sometimes someone prays in a way that cuts straight to the heart of an issue and suddenly brings clarity or insight. We light one another’s fires and encourage one another in faith.
In Mineapolis this week 100 clergy gathered in protest at all that is going on there, they prayed, they sang hymns and did so in unity, suporting one another as well as their fellow citizens.
They were arrested.
In our reading from James, we see this same emphasis. James writes to believers who are dispersed, ie away from Jersualem, they are scattered, spread across a wide area. Though they are dispersed, they belong to something bigger. He addresses them not just as individuals, but as churches, as gathered communities.
‘ Are any among you suffering?’ he asks, pray together.
‘ Are any cheerful?’ sing songs of praise together. Those who are joyful can encourage those who are struggling.
‘ Is anyone sick?’ call the leaders of the church to pray.
James urges them to confess and pray for one another. The prayer of the righteous is powerful and effective, and he encourages them with an example of Elijah’s prayers.
We do this when we confess together in our worship. We can make ourselves deeply vulnerable by admitting what we have done wrong or what we struggle with, it’s hard to do that alone, but when we pray our confession together, we do so in unity, knowing that we are all praying the same prayer, all admitting something about ourselves that we might not actually want to say out loud, knowing we are not alone. We say, Forgive us, not forgive me” There is strength in that. We are not meant to do life alone. We are not made to be independent. Paul speaks of the body of Christ with many parts, and one body. That is who we are: a messy, sometimes chaotic, sometimes slightly dysfunctional family, but a body working together, a family nonetheless.
As James reminds us, v15:
The prayer of faith will save the sick, and the Lord will raise them up; and anyone who has committed sins will be forgiven.
What truth! And our liturgy reflects all this. We worship together. We confess together. We listen to God’s word together. We pray together. And we share the peace together—drawing us back into relationship with God and with one another.
So as we continue this season of thinking about prayer, my hope is this:
that we would grow in confidence and commitment to praying together;
that we would see corporate prayer not as something formal or routine, but as an expression of who we are—one body, one family, gathered before God;
and that as we pray together, God would deepen our unity, strengthen our love for one another, and shape us more fully into the people he calls us to be.
Because when we pray together, we are reminded that we do not stand alone—we stand together, held by God, and sent out in love.
Amen
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