Prayer and I have had a bit of a rocky relationship for quite a while. It's a frustrating nebulous thing no one really talks about how you should go about it. It's just something you DO. You talk to the "man up in the sky" for a few minutes, tell him what you want and then move on with your life until you need to do it again. Pastors use the "prayer time" seemingly to wrap up their sermon by providing a closed eye summary of bullet points. The time when prayer has always felt the least odd or awkward for most people is when in dire need. That's easy. You've reached the end of yourself, everything is spinning out of control, and you have no power over outcomes, of course you toss up a prayer.
My position on prayer in the past has been one of, "Well, He knows what I need and he's either going to give it to me or he isn't" or "How in the world is multiple prayers and long hours on my knees going to help? Honestly. He knows my heart, is it really going to sway Him if I bow, scrap, grovel, and wail until my knees bleed and my vocal cords shred?"
When we look into the prayer lives of those in the Bible you see characters more open than others and with some, if you were to take it at face value, they don't seem to have prayed at all. A fault of not recording every detail. I was always oddly comforted that the disciples fell asleep while Jesus asks them to pray with him. I know I'd be spouting all kinds of excuses. "Look, rabbi, come on. We just had a meal, had some wine, and it's getting late. Never mind that we walked all day to get you that donkey and foal you wanted. I close my eyes for two seconds and I'm gonna pass out." They surely didn't need a devil to force them to sleep. My personal schedule is enough to make it so that I can't close my eyes for long without sawing logs wherever I happen to be. My sister-in-law can attest to this. Ten minutes at her house and I'm on her couch in an unconscious state.
I've admired those of other faiths and their various "prayer" activities. Buddhist meditation, the Muslim dedication to praying five times a day no matter the circumstances, and Kabbalist (Jewish Mystic) prayer/meditation.
It's not secret that I favor the Kabbalists in many respects. Sure, they got a little wacky with their Books of Splendor and were really bad at picking who the Messiah is but there was a discipline born out joy that was their prayer life. For them it was about communion with the LORD, that sure heaven was something to look forward to but a glimpse could be experienced here and now. It was coming into his presence and singing praises right along with the angels surrounding the throne. There was a direct experiential component there. It was rarely about asking for things or giving a litany of ailments and discontent about our lives. No Kabbalist would ever presume to tell the LORD how things should be, or how he needed to provide this way, or give him this kind of car now. Although the Lord's Prayer was a Christian document the Kabbalist heart was more often than not, "Not my will be done, but YOUR will be done".
During my early years in FEC (Fundamentalist Evangelical Christianity) I can't remember a single pastor, deacon, or elder who was in love with the LORD. I grant you that perhaps they kept it 'til their personal devotional time, or maybe they were on their way to being in love with the Lord. There were men who TRIED to love the LORD and went to pains to make it seem that way. There were men who wrestled with the LORD sometimes in the very pulpit as they preached. There were men who put on every appearance of being "in good with God". There were men who clearly felt obligated to preach and pastor because of what the LORD had done. And these men formed my notions of why to pray. Namely, "God says do it, so you do it." Prayer was a box to check off the list right up there with "made sure I turned off the oven". It was a regulation. I've had people tell me all my life that this whole "experiencing God" things is just a scam. You do what the book says, you come on Sunday, you put money in the plate, and if you get a little thrill during "How Great Thou Art" when the people harmonize a little then that's fine, but it's NOT the Holy Spirit. Somehow, it's MEANT to be bland all the time.
Once I entered into my thirties and wasn't so angry with those who had taught me, I started taking notice that the teachers in my life were suddenly people who had been broken. They'd had divorces they didn't plan on, children having children out of wedlock, scandals, or even things they'd never mention but you could see the brokenness somewhere about the eyes. They were often quiet and gentle. When they spoke with authority it was rare but bedrock solid. And when it came to prayer it was like a soothing breeze to a weary soul. If you brought up Jesus then there it was, a new look in their eyes. Like they couldn't wait to talk about Him and hoped you just stand back and say "Ok...3...2...1...GO!" and they'd tell you everything the good Lord had done for them, ever, up until 5 seconds before you asked. It was always their prayers that stuck out to me. You can tell when a prayer is from the heart or manufactured, tested, focused grouped, etc. That sincere prayer is born out of brokenness and a love for Him to whom we pray.
All of that to say...(a common phrase here at the Oubliette) I've reclaimed some of the baby from the bathwater I talked about last time.
I did some research online as to different prayer times and I now am praying (as regularly as capable) three times a day. Of course there's a bajillion opinions on what to pray when and inevitably they all disagree with each other. I pray at 9:30am, 12:30pm, and at 7pm every day. Traditionally it's meant to be 9am, 12pm, and 3pm (as I understand it) but life gets in the way. They were monks who set this up and not stay at home husbands who have a child to homeschool, a house to clean, and (biggest differentiation) a wife to look after.
Over the past three to four weeks that I have been praying three times a day I've noticed that my life has taken on some fairly serious changes. When I do pray all three times I've noticed that I am calmer, and react more in line with the "fruit of the Spirit" than when I do not. Sin is not constantly crouching at my door like it once was. I am thinking about the LORD more throughout my day making decisions and choices based on His word in the Bible. Remarkably I have more of a sensation of His presence throughout the day. That presence is something I've wanted for a very long time. I once asked someone why it was that I only feel His presence at church. If God is everywhere shouldn't I feel His presence everywhere? They shrugged and said something along the lines of how if we felt Him everywhere then we wouldn't need faith. I still disagree with that. It's like saying we worship a God who wants to be known but doesn't want us to know Him; or a God who reaches out but doesn't want us to take hold; a God who gives us communion but wants it to be only about the bread and wine.
It's easy to look at rituals or ritualized anything and say that the power is in the act. As Christians we know that isn't true. The reason that I will live my Christian walk partly through "ritualized" prayer is because it creates a rhythm in my life that has me regularly orbiting my the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. It has more to do with the promise that if I draw near to Him then He will draw near to me.
I confront myself regularly with the question from my youth, "Why pray to a God who already knows my needs before I as?" Every time I respond that, "I don't know why...but the God who fashioned the universe (literally one song) out of His words, who sent His Son to die for me, this God who greatly loves these specks of dust on a blue dot in space....ASKS me to." He shoves the fact of omnipotence, omniscience, and all the other OMNI that is integral to His being aside and wants to hear about my day, my struggles, how He can help, my joys and praises to Him, etc.
When I pick up my son in my arms at day's end and ask him how his day went, even when he's been home all day, he doesn't hesitate. He doesn't say, "You know, Papa. You were there with me all day." No. He screws up his face, puts a thoughtful finger to his chin and says, "Wehw..." (That's "well" for those who don't speak his language) and begins to tell me everything.
I thank God that every day my children reminds me of what He means when He says that we must all come to him like little children.
Pax,
Will
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