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A Miscellany of
Thoughts about Prayer
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Peace with God Peace with God is not a static motion. It is a positive gift
which accompanies our living in harmony with God's Plan. Dante's
oft‑quoted saying, "And in His will is our peace", is not to be understood
as surrender, resignation and quiescence. The Christian will discover that
he knows God's peace as he is aligned with God's Purpose. He may be called
upon to be strenuous; but he is inwardly relaxed, because he knows he is
doing the Will of God. This sense of knowing that he is co‑operating with
the Purpose defies human analysis, and is always found singularly
irritating by the opponent of Christianity. But Christians of all ages,
not excepting our own, have found it to be true. However painful or
difficult, or on the other hand, however inconspicuous or humdrum the life
may be, the Christian finds his peace in accepting and playing his part in
the Master Plan. Here again we must ask ourselves, "Am I doing what God
wants me to do?" It is not a question of what my friends or particular
Christian pressure-group want me to do, but of what God Himself wishes. By
sharing our life with God, by throwing open our personality to His love
and wisdom, we can know beyond any doubting what is God's will for us.
When we are at one with Him in spirit and at one with Him in purpose, we
may know the deep satisfaction of the peace of God. Writing down our prayers A prayer is a communication between us and God, which obviously does not need to be put on paper. Even so, if we have the gift of writing, some of us may find it helpful to write down our prayer. Writing down a prayer may help us to be definite that we really mean it. The act of writing down our thoughts in order helps us to be clear what we want to say. (The same would be true if we used a computer, or recorded our words, or discussed with someone how we wanted to pray.) If others see the prayer we have written down, it creates fellowship. We feel less lonely in our prayer life (we shouldn't feel lonely of course, but God may seem far away.) They may be helped as they pray themselves, and if they know what we are praying they can support our prayer with theirs. There was a Christian brother in hospital some 25 years ago, who had been told that his illness was terminal. He did not know how long he had to live. He prayed a lot, and wrote down some of his prayers in simple verses. Here is one of them: One Step There was no miracle recovery, but he was helped and supported in the days he had left and he was a great encouragement to the rest of us. The 'Jesus Prayer' This prayer can be taken as a pattern for our praying, or as a prayer which we repeat, with the aim of going further into God's presence. It can be said easily and slowly with the rhythm of one's breathing. 'Lord Jesus Christ, Son of the Living God, have mercy on
me, a sinner.' Praying for
mercy doesn't just mean 'I've done something wrong, so please forgive me.'
It's a much wider petition, that God will send his merciful presence and
help in a thousand and one situations, despite the fact that we don't
deserve it and never can. It is made in the confidence that when we come
to Jesus we thereby come through him to the Father. Saying
this prayer over and over again is not a kind of 'heaping up of empty
phrases' which Jesus criticizes. It is a way of coming into focus, of
concentrating on the God we know in Jesus as the one we can trust in all
circumstances, and of holding before his mercy all that we want to pray
about - delights, problems, sorrows, anger, fear, other people, government
policies, social problems, wars, disasters, celebrations. Prayer Lists Anyone can get a notebook and organize into daily or weekly lists the people and situations they want to pray for. Even those who can't bear lists at any price may find that a diary and an address book, and perhaps even a map, will remind them of situations and people. There will be things to thank God for (gratitude is always a sign of grace) and things to say sorry for (penitence, likewise). There will be things to ask for, not least in relation to God's love and power surrounding and helping particular people for whom we wish to pray. As we reach for some of the astonishing promises in the New Testament ('If you abide in me,' said Jesus, 'and my words abide in you, ask whatever you will, and it shall be done' [John 15.7]), we discover that they are balanced by a strange phenomenon. When we come eagerly to claim such promises, we find that, if we are serious, our desires and hopes are gently but firmly reshaped, sorted out and put in fresh order. Using other people's prayers Help in prayer is available from those who have trodden the path ahead of us. Part of our difficulty about this is that we are so anxious to do things our own way, so concerned that if we get help from anyone else it won't be 'authentic' and come from our own heart, that we are instantly suspicious about using anyone else's prayers. We are like someone who won't feel she's properly dressed unless she has personally designed and made her own clothes; or like someone who feels it's artificial to drive a car he hasn't built all by himself.... There's a lot that comes from the depths of our hearts which
may be authentic but isn't very pretty.... When Jesus' followers asked him
to teach them to pray, they wanted a form of words which they could learn
and use..... There is nothing wrong with having a form of words composed
by someone else.... Some Christians, some of the time, can sustain a life
of prayer entirely out of their internal resources, just as there are
hardy mountaineers who can walk the Scottish highland in their bare feet.
But most of us need boots, not because we don't want to do the walking
ourselves but because we do..... Good liturgy (prayers) can be a sign and
means of God's grace…. an occasion of humility (accepting that someone
else has said, better than I can, what I deeply want to express) …. and
gratitude. |
