Lent 1: How many prayers do we have in the bank?

I'm reading several books over Lent. Some of them are slim but I hope making up in substance what is reduced in page count. Starting with this unambitious new volume by Sheila Upjohn, The Way of Julian oif Norwich. A Prayer Journey Through Lent.

Unambitious refers to my own choice of a book that feels like playing at home. I've been reading Julian's Revelations over the years since my first encounter in 1974 with a book that, like some of our most dependable friends, we come back to after not having seen each other for ages, and pick up as if our last encounter was yesterday. 

Sheila Upjohn is an undemanding writer. Which doesn't mean that she is in any way superficial. Already it is obvious she knows this text intimately, as you would expect from someone who translation of the Revelations is one of the most popular and accessible, without ever being trite or dumbing down the intimacy that lies at the heart of mystical theology. 

Already there is cause to pause, for thought: "It's a new thought that our prayers are stored up in heaven, and it's challenging, too, when you think how few of them there may be." Just read that again and do a quick calculation of how many prayers have been added to our prayer treasury in heaven this past week. Upjohn raises this intriguingly searching question in response to Julian's description of how gladly God receives and keeps safe each of our prayers.

Our Lord himself is the first to receive our prayer, as I see it. He takes it, full of thanks and joy, and he sends it up above and sets it in the treasury where it will never be lost. It is there before God and all his holy ones - continually heard, continually helping our needs. When we come to heaven, our prayers will be given to us as part of our delight - with endless, joyful thanks from God." (Chapter 41)

That is such a subversive description of the dynamics of prayer. Not us giving a prayer of thanks, but God giving thanks to us for our prayers. Really? Our prayers are kept in heaven and continually heard; time bound as we are we tends to think a prayer is spoken, thought or felt, and time moves on. But, says Julian, the prayer perdures, and retains its efficacy as the voice of God's child that continues to echo in praise, petition and intercession.

Upjohn is right, at least for me. This is a new way of thinking about prayer, especially for those of us often tempted to think of prayer as a functional discipline, or a conversation along contractual lines. Even allowing for the more devotional intimacy of pouring out our hearts to God in love, gratitude and worship, the idea that all those spoken words, stirred emotions and ideas given thought, are received by a glad God grateful for the gift they are, and that they are stored in heaven as God's treasure - that's an altogether different level of prayer dynamic. 

That is why Julian is such a provocative companion during Lent. She insists that joy, gratitude and love are not one way traffic, but a cycle of giver and receiver in which each enriches the other by gift exchange. Prayer is a commerce of love.  

Comments

[Dave Summers]

Prayers stored up in heaven - it's a good thought. It reminded me of a cartoon I once saw where God, surrounded by angels, was sitting at his desk with overflowing in-trays marked "Win the Lottery", "New car", etc, and one with only a few sheets of paper marked "World peace".
But thinking of Jesus's comment about the Pharisee "praying to himself", I wonder how many of there bulging in-tray prayers - and indeed, how many of mine (there's a Lent reflection for me) - ever get through to heaven.
"Prayers stored up" also points to finding a balance between persistence and sometimes desperate repetition.

[Jim Gordon]

Hello Dave - good to hear from you again. Your points are all worth a ponder, but then the whole nexus of questions and experiences of prayer are worth a ponder! What I found intriguing in the Julian quote, and indeed in her overall approach to prayer, is her assumption that since God is love, first and last and foremost, God cherishes the words of those he loves, especially when spoken to God. That isnt a thought Ive come across in Evangelical thinking - the more Reformed would think such a thought sentimental and lacking seriousness about Gods otherness and sovereignty.
The prayers stored up I read as God storing them, filing them away as important documents of the soul. I guess God can be trusted to file away only those that are worth keeping!
Hope youre keeping well Dave - maybe this year we will be able to roam and mix again, even if at first with caveats.....
Shalom, Jim