“Prayer is not asking. It is a longing of the soul.”
Mahatma Gandhi
Dear Friends,
I’m thinking, this week, about prayer and its importance in our lives. We often speak about prayer as if it’s a “given” in our lives and yet, prayer is, by no means, that. For many, if not most of us, prayer doesn’t just happen easily or effortlessly. Prayer often involves struggle and challenge. I have discovered (am discovering) that prayer is a discipline that requires thought, intention and persistence. For this reason, I believe that prayer is a topic well worth our focus.
One of the most common impressions about prayer is that it provides a means of “getting what we want” from God. People have often been known to feel the need for prayer when they are faced with circumstances beyond their control, circumstances that threaten them or drive them to despair. Their need is so great that prayer becomestheir primary option for escaping their current predicament. This approach has sometimes been referred to as an example of a “fox hole theology” that approaches God out of pure need and desperation.
While there is certainly nothing wrong with the choice toappeal to God in our great hour of need, it is, I believe, to misunderstand the essential nature of prayer. Prayer, as Ihave come to understand it, isn’t so much about getting what we want, but about getting what we need—which happens to be a relationship with God. Some might even refer to this as a friendship with God that is cultivated over time.
Ghandi suggests that “Prayer is not asking, it is alonging of the soul.” The true meaning of prayer can be found in our longing for a relationship with God thattranscends whether or not our prayers are “answered” as we had hoped they would be. It’s our relationship with God that provides the true reward of prayer.
Soren Kierkegaard offers a slightly different understanding in his suggestion that, “The true function of prayer is not to influence God, but to change the nature of the one who prays.”
I believe that Kierkegaard is exactly right! Prayer isn’t really about persuading God to give us what we want. Prayer is essentially about creating a relationship with God that has the power to change us as we learn to understand the nature of God and what it is that God desires of us and for us.
A true life of prayer, then, isn’t one that persuades God togive us what we want. It is one that persuades us to live in harmony with God’s will and way for our lives. And thatrequires patience and persistence. It requires discipline and hard work. And it is precisely here that some are inclined to conclude that a life of prayer is not for them.
How sad! To be so close and yet so far! A relationshipwith God, just like any friendship, is not created in a day…or two…or three. It is cultivated over time, one prayer at a time. It may a take a while before we even realize what is taking place in our connection with God. But, if we persist in our prayer life, we will surely begin to see that, much to our surprise, the meaning of our prayer life is to be found in the transformation of our own life.
By the grace of God and our persistent prayer, we are nolonger who we once were. Instead, we have become what the Apostle Paul referred to as “new creations in Christ.”
That, if you ask me, is the sign of a successful prayer life, one that is measured not in getting what you want, but in getting the relationship that you need.
See You in Church!
Ron
Rev. Ron Dunn