The Necessity of Prayer

I don’t know how many out there prayer journal, but I find it’s a great thing to maintain. The composition of my entries never quite stays the same, but they all have one thing in common: They are a way of more clearly seeing how an interaction with the Lord takes place. I was saying in my last post that I came to some revelations about other areas of my life in prayer not too long ago, but that would not have been acccomplished without that journal of mine. What I need to work on is taking it or simply some paper with me wherever I go, that I might write down things as they come to me. See, I think it’s extremely important…even necessary…to live a life of continuous prayer, that you might be made humbly aware of your total reliance on relationship with the Lord. I’ve had several things brought to mind in the middle of work and during other occasions, and I never take the time to withdraw and pray about it at that moment. That’s the best thing to do, but one step at a time, after all.

I had a few thoughts about prayer some years ago that still come back to mind on odd occasions, and I thought I’d share them. The first is, as all good revelations are, both simple and profound. It goes something like this:

Prayer is ‘us’ in our relationship with the Lord. You hear couples refer to ‘us’ and ‘we’ all the time, signifying the conjoined life that they share. In this life, both male and female bring things to relationship that bring each other to knowledge and grace in one another. In the relationship we share with the great Bridegroom, prayer becomes an ‘us’ in that it serves as a conversation, a ‘knowing’ rather than a ‘determining’. Prayer does not so much change things as makes them known to us. The Father has a plan that we cannot conceive of but can grow in an understanding of.

Now, this first statement has since really expanded in my life. I conceived of it when I was still in a state of prayer-fear and rationalization of povidence, but it does reflect a beginning point for where I’ve gotten to. The second was a slightly different understanding, the circumstances of which I don’t remember. But it’s a bit of a different feel.

Prayer for any result is a selfish desire. I do not mean that we are entirely self-seeking in prayer, but rather that we are praying for a revelation of God’s power in the world in which we live. This revelation will affect the life through which we move and from which we derive our identification in the world but do not exist as ‘of it’ We cannot know what prayer will do, or if it will do anything, but the simple knowledge that it may is part of its power.

The life of continuous prayer, then, leads one into a more real relationship with Jesus, and is necessary to keep each of us – by us I mean Christians – aware of the sovereign grace that allows us to exist and work in the world.

Prayer

I was just looking over some Christianity Today articles that have built up over the past few days, and there’s one by Phillip Yancey that really struck something. Prayer was an issue that came up in Bible study on Sunday night – we’re doing the book of Jonah – and it seems like a good time to talk about some things surrounding prayer. In fact, it seems like a very good time to talk about things of prayer, and I’m going to focus my next few entries on that discipline. I’m really into spiritual disciplines these days, prayer and solitude being among the most important. I just want to start off with a piece of an article by Phillip Yancey, taken from a document found here to give you some idea of where we ought to be. Yancey says that “Although Jacob did many things wrong in life, he became the eponym for a tribe and a nation as well as for all of us who wrestle with God. We are all children of Israel, implied Paul, all of us God-wrestlers who cling to God in the dark, who chase God from room to room, who declare, ‘I will not let you go.’ To us belong the blessing, the birthright, the kingdom.” Yancey’s understanding here comes, I think, from a long battle with God throughout his life. How many of us wrestle with God…how many strive with the Lord? How many of us could pluck up the gumption to do it? I know it’s not really a natural thing for me, although it’s become a craving. I desire to wrestle the direction I should go out of the Lord, although I exist in a strange sort of tension between learning to listen and seeking to hear right now, and through that God speaks. This morning in prayer I came to some other realizations about various things in my life, but I’ll share them next time.

‘But earnestly desire the greater gifts’

So I’m listening to Mark Driscoll again – Spiritual Gifts part III – and a thought comes to me: What are the greater gifts? Contextually, the Word seems to say that the greater gifts are that of apostle, prophecy, and teaching, but that a church must then be gifted in miracles, healing, helps, administration and tongues (This in 1 Cor. 12:28-31). Listening later to Spiritual Gifts part IV, Driscoll looked at the list, in Romans, of encouragment, giving, leadership, mercy and hospitality. These, he explains, are the gifts that mimic the character rather than the attitudes of Jesus. So the question then becomes ‘what are the greater gifts’? If we seek to become more Christ-like, rather than apostolic, should not these be the gifts we ‘earnestly desire’? It’s been a puzzle for me for the last few days, because I’ve needed some theological ideas to work on while I’m auto-selling to people at work, and these are really good ones to mull over. See, I’m inclined to desire those gifts that augment, and, to coin a word, Christify the world we live in, gifts that give us aptitudes to get out there and really minister to the hurting world. Though, as I write this, it’s becoming clearer that the gifts are necessary in all forms. The gifts of teaching, prophecy, and apostle are those that build up and edify the church for those who do go out and serve with the gifts of Christ’s character, and both sides of the coin are needed. Those whose gifts lie in both edification of the believers and augmentation of the body of nonbelievers that we minister to are those that the world needs more of, to bridge the gap. Anyway, the point I’m trying to make here is that we need to be really sure what the ‘greater gifts’ for our own ministry and our own walk are, that we may truly function in the plan God lays out for us.

Gentle like Jesus

Listening to Mark Driscoll lately, I’ve noticed a lot of his sermons have titles like ‘Single like Jesus’ or ‘Suffering like Jesus’, but what’s most pertinent to me right now is, as you can see, gentle like Jesus. The Good Shepherd has a way of leading his sheep that’s unequaled, unparalleled, and generally unknown amongst us foolish humans. A way of truth that speaks in love, and a way of love that speaks His truth. I’ve been coming to realizations lately that are not the most self-glorifying, which, as we all have, I’ve been guilty of -> self-glorification, that is. Praise God for his lovingkindness that brings us through each of our lives…God’s really big, you know. But I do offer some humble praise to His Most High for that leading. Anyway, what I’m getting at here is that we…specifically I…am not always the most gentle in speaking or in moving day to day through life. I fail, I fall, I seek after the Father again, I fail, I fall, etc. Through most of today I was upbraided about things like being judgemental, being arrogant (what I term intellectually arrogant), and being harsh in speaking, not gentle nor confrontational in charity. Upbraiding which I’ve needed, because I’ve needed prayer which I’ve not yet gotten. That’s coming up on Friday, hopefully, with a time of solitude and quiet for prayer, confession and devotion. And a time for humbling, as well, I hope. I rely a great deal on my own faculties to sort things out, while Jesus always looked to the Father. As a result, I also rely on my own faculties to discern, rather than the leadings and promptings of the Holy Spirit. Although I think I have some form of discernment, I’m not entirely sure on that yet, having been to long reliant on my own understanding. Scriptural upbraiding: Trust in the Lord with all of your heart, and rely not on your own understanding. In all of your ways recognize Him, and He will not abandon you; He will carry you through. Ancient words that never lose their potency. My point here, however, is very simply this: I’ve got to be more transparent before God, because He’s not going to shine through me until I can understand that He needs clarity of spirit before Himself, before the great I AM. Clarity of spirit only comes with confession and devoted examination of the whole state of the soul (verging into anachronistic phraseology for a moment.) This devoted examination is just as relevant today as it was in Jesus’ private prayer and in His relations with His Father. We each of us need to understand that the gentleness of Jesus speaks to each of our souls, and to everything which we utter.

Who is this man Jesus?

I sign my emails with a quote from St. Justin Popovich, one of the desert fathers of the Orthodox church. While I’m a Presbyterian, I’ve got a somewhat wider-ranging desire to see the things of Jesus; who He is, His nature and power, and what he means in a secular world. Thus the quote, one of many that speak as to the character of Jesus. The doctrines of the Presbyterian faith are still a relatively unknown thing to me, but the certainty of Jesus is not. What does it mean to have the nature of Christ in us, to be co-heirs, indeed, co-sons with and of the Word of Life? John 1:1-4 – “In the beginning was the Word, and the word was with God, and the Word was (my emphasis) God. He was in the beginning with God. All things came into being through Him, and apart from Him nothing came into being that has come into being. In Him was life, and the life was the Light of men.” These verses (New American Standard translation) are power-packed, but we can’t see the power in them because we ignore the fact that Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life. Trust me…coming from two degrees that get their kicks from post-modernism, in which narratives are relative and the Word is a way, a truth, and a life I know what it is to be subject to meaning. Even worse, I know what it means to be questioning ourselves as to our own meaning. Take Deconstruction, for example, in which logical continuance brings a practitioner to a secular realization of the fact of Ecclesiastes 1:2 – “‘Meaningless! Meaningless!’ says the Teacher. ‘Utterly meaningless! Everything is meaningless’” (New International) It’s right there, folks. But that’s a tangent. What I’m trying to get at is that we’ve got to have a sense of the Jesus who was, is, and will be again, one “‘like a son of man’, dressed in a robe reaching down to his feet and with a golden sash around his chest. His head and hair were white like wool, as white as snow, and his eyes were like a blazing fire. His feet were like bronze glowing in a furnace, and his voice was like the sound of rushing waters. In his right hand he held seven stars, and out of his mouth came a sharp double-edged sword. His face was like the sun shining in all its brilliance.” This from Revelation 1:13-16 (NIV). I’m saying we’ve got to remember that this guy is THE ONE. He is the Son of God, but he is the Son of Man. We owe ourselves entirely to his gift of life. My quest now is to find the Son of God as a son of Man, as a brother to me. I know Him, but I don’t as I want to. What I do know leads me to say ‘Oh my God’ in awe, in wonder and in peace. But there’s still more.

Who is this man Jesus? What I want to ask now is who is this man Jesus to me ? Who is he on a day to day, on a minute to minute, on a second to second basis? Who is he to others through me. Am I like Him? I can with certainty say that I’m not yet where I want to be in the mind of Christ. But I can also say, as St. Justin did…”With Christ as the incarnate divine Logos the eternally complete divine Truth enters into the world. For this reason the Gospel says: “Truth came by Jesus Christ”" (John 1:17)

A link to the fathers:

One Hundred and Twenty Wise Sayings of the Desert Fathers.

Welcome to speakingthetruth

Hello, folks:

Many of you who know me wouldn’t suspect that I would like to be open about my thoughts in such a semi-public manner. At least, many of you who have known me. This is different. This is new. This was a random thought that crawled through my head today, not something I would think of on my own, so I figured I should act on it, reason being that if it’s not me, it’s God. That’s what it’s all about, folks. The Lord of Hosts, the Soul-Saver. I wanted to start this to get some thoughts out there, to share my faith in one of my primary and favourite ways: the medium of writing. I hope to do at least a weekly comment or document, just to get God out there as He shows himself in my life. I’ll probably end up with more than weekly entries, but we’ll see.

Talk to you again soon.

Christ-bearer.