"Prayer is a gift of God, and a work of his grace..." Those words were written 50 years ago in a book with the telling title, Reality and Prayer. I like that connection. Sometimes prayer is wishful thinking, desperate pleading, meditative reflection and even faithful if passionless routine. I've done all these. Often enough I've thought prayer is something that starts with my decision, my inclination, my need. But here is someone reminding me it is God's initiative, gift, work, grace, invading my life, nudging my mind, kick-starting a relationship I'm in danger of neglecting.
The reality of prayer is a problem in a world where we've become used to scientific explanations, accustomed to problem solving by technology, presuming overall control of our environment, security and safety as built in mechanisms of a developed society. But that deeper reality beneath the surface of things, the presence and power of the God who is both beyond and in the midst, the sense of a personal Presence who seeks us and finds us - that is gift, grace, mystery. And it may be that the way we now live our lives compels the God who seeks us, to first wound our hearts with what the author of the Cloud of Unknowing called "a dart of longing love", in order for us to register on our everyday radar, the real presence of the God we are way too busy to make time for.
Faithful friendship is when someone is committed to "staying in touch", "thinking about you", "being there for you", and so the text, the email, the phone call, the card, becomes a sacrament, a hard copy of those emotions of care, affection, love, attentiveness, thoughtful kindness and many others that together sustain a relationship that has been allowed to grow into part of who we are. Prayer is the gift of the faithful friendship of God.
Edwin Muir tells of just such a moment in his own life when God in grace and gift addressed the careless poet at bedtime, and re-awakened a friendship gone stale. It is one of the utterly authentic personal stories of being arrested by God.
“Going to bed alone, I suddenly found myself (I was taking off my waistcoat) reciting the Lord’s Prayer, in a loud, emphatic voice – a thing I had not done for many years – with deep urgency and profound and disturbed emotion. When I went on I became more composed; as if my soul had been empty and craving, and were now being replenished, it grew still; every word had a strange fullness of meaning which astonished and delighted me. It was late; I had sat up reading; I was sleepy; but as I stood in the middle of the floor, half undressed, saying the prayer over and over again, meaning after meaning sprang from it , overcoming me again with joyful surprise; and I realised that that simple petition was always universal and always inexhaustible, and day by day sanctified human life.”
Lovely post and I like the photo as well. Prayer is indeed a very personal thing and is something different to everybody and can change depending on our needs and moods. God bless you.
Posted by: Paul Carder | June 06, 2015 at 01:25 PM