I recently attended the local National Day of Prayer event. Being there, I appreciated the moment and the opportunity to be in that location and experiencing what was taking place there. Thoughts kept entering my mind about prayer and the profound nature that the Creator of the cosmos (earth/solar system/universe) hears us, (according to Scripture): each and every one of us, and does that immediately each and every prayer. Try having that kind of access with your doctor, or lawyer, bank president or hair dresser; you might have to get an appointment to be heard. By Faith, that’s complete access to the Creator of all things and He is listening to us. Not only hearing us but listening, completely focused on what’s coming out of our hearts.
Most of my knowledge about prayer comes from the Scriptures Jesus and Paul shared in the New Testament. However many prayers in the Scriptures in the Old Testament were described as songs. The person that brought us the most prayers in Scripture was King David; he actually expressed prayers more than anyone else in the Old or New Testaments.
During the NDOP ceremony, my first thoughts were on Paul’s, James’ and Matthew’s teaching to pray without ceasing, pray for one another, and to watch and pray. That led me to another thought: how does God hear each of us all over the world, all at one time? And still another thought crossed my mind, one I can’t say for sure was the Spirit, but maybe, what if instead of English, Spanish, Chinese, etc, what if what God hears is our hearts, interprets our heart attitude mixed with all the languages of the world? Being able to interpret the heart of His creations seems to be a pretty universal teaching about God. Giving us the instruction to pray without ceasing, He must hear us even when we are not in a posture of prayer. He hears us speaking to Him in our heart language. The more I thought about that I became even more comfortable with that idea for one specific reason, we can’t disguise our hearts (pull the ‘wool’ over God eyes) like we can with our language and posture.
The instructions to pray for one another and watch and pray, those seem to me to be taught for us from the Spirit of the Wisdom of God. I’ve mentioned before another name for the Bible might be the Book of Wisdom, written by the Creator of Life. God, in His Word (Bible), is always teaching us how to live, how to Live Life more successful, more blessed, overwhelmed and peaceful by following the manual of God.
If a question asked what makes us human, it can be answered (as creations of God) that we’re human because we have the unique ability to be focused on helping not hurting, sharing truth not un-truths. Man without God is man trying to convince us that we’re just evolving creatures and progressing intelligent animals. The general worldly idea is that the chaos we see and hear about each day is simply the natural thing for us to do: simply animal things. We justify our sins by excusing our negative natures. In their human logic we just lump ourselves in with the dogs and cats, some people are antelopes and some people are lions. We’re just further along in the animal tree. Man always has, and more and more obviously each day, proclaimed that he himself is superior and creates his kingdoms and admonishes and opposes any idea of God’s Kingdom. The further down that road we travel the more chaos, the less peace, the more predatory, the less loving, caring, less praying for one another. You can’t observe the road the world is taking today and suggest that we are greatly improving, while at the same time declaring (and outlawing) that God is dead.
During the NDP event I quickly defaulted to Psalm 23, the Lord’s Prayer, and Jesus’ Prayer in John 17. They have always been my three favorites. I don’t know how we can improve on those prayers; they seem to cover most of the bases in our lives. Also in my sub-group is Paul’s two prayers in Ephesians 1:15 and 3:14: ‘give us Wisdom, the knowledge and revelation of Him, revealing to us what we are to do, how to live – be strong in the inner man, comprehending the breath (boundlessness), the length (endless) the depth (fathomless) the height (measureless) of the love of God.’ My two favorite songs about God’s love: Wes King’s ‘The Love of Christ’, a song based upon the Ephesians 3 scripture–
How wide, and how long, and how high, how deep is the love
How deep is the love of Christ
The width of two arms outstretched on a tree
The length of the road to Calvary
The height of the crown on a cruel cross
The depth of the pain is the cost
All for you, all for me
All for love did He bleed
All to set us free
My prayer for you is that you would know
Rich Mullins’ song, a prayer if you will, that while writing it, changed Mullins’ own life, ‘The Love of God’
There’s a wideness in God’s mercy
I cannot find in my own
And He keeps His fire burning
To melt this heart of stone
Keeps me aching with a yearning
Keeps me glad to have been caught
In the reckless raging fury
That they call the love of God
In Psalm 46 (vs. 10) there is a reference to ‘be still and know.’ In my personal experience, that is the order of prayer. When praying I like to pause a moment and let God speak ‘peace’ to me first, settle me down. Being still in the culture we’ve become today is almost impossible. It seems some kind of communication (television, radio, reading, talking on the phone) something fills any gap in our free moments. When we’re so busy, we simply cannot consider the ‘serious’ things of Life. The Psalm advises us to slowdown, pause, take a moment to stop the busyness and listen/talk to God, stop being Lord over every minute of our lives and make a time for The Lord. ‘Be still and know!’
Author Phillip Yancy defines prayer as ‘the act of seeing reality from God’s point of view.’ At the age of 30 years old, Jesus began his ministry with 40 days in the wilderness. He entered quiet communication with God, got God’s point of view about the next three years. The New Testament mentions or implies several times Jesus slipped way, sometime in the morning, sometimes in the evening, to be in prayer with the Father.
Sometimes I think the best posture for prayer, instead of on our knees or flat on our face is simply to be still, be unhurried. Stillness is not so much waiting as it is listening. It’s not even so much the length of our prayers but the consistency of our prayers. Some of my prayers consist of one word: Jesus. Many times, they have been some of my most powerful and comforting prayers I’ve ever expressed. It’s my heart expression and His great and wonderful ability to listen to my heart.