#97 Prayer - The Way of a Pilgrim
Prayer comes in many forms, yes even the Christian prayer. Of course Jesus teaches us to pray. While the Psalms are a collection of prayers and songs. Tradition as well has many prayers for us to choose from the Pentecostal, to Catholic, Evangelical, or Orthodox prayers. My second year at Bushnell University I took the question of how ought I to pray and went for a run. I prayed, I spent quiet time with God, and I read many books. I read Prayer: Experiencing Awe and Intimacy with God by Timothy Keller, The Hour That Changes the World: A Practical Plan for Personal Prayer by Dick Eastman, The Lord and His Prayer by N.T. Wright, The Cost of Discipleship by Dietrich Bonhoeffer and The Way of a Pilgrim by an unknown author, as well as exploring the Psalms and other prayers thoroughly.
Each of those experiences led me down a path of trying to understand what prayer actually is. Prayer is so central to the christian faith yet can you succinctly say what prayer is in a sentence? Give it a try, I will wait.
Answer: prayer is when you communicate with God. That might be too easy an answer yet consider the most important relationship in your life. In that relationship do you communicate? How does that relationship differ from the one you have with God? I would not be surprised if the answer is that your relationship with God is far from healthy and far from good.
I took away two lessons from all that striving after righteousness. The first is the Lord’s Prayer, a key that opens up prayer. Secondly the phrase “pray without ceasing” 1 Thessalonians 5:17 NASB, that is to be earnest in seeking after God.
The Lord’s Prayer is a format for how we ought to pray. The prayer of Jesus is a list of instructions of how to pray. Take a look at Matthew 6:9-13. Each phrase that Jesus utters is a step in prayer. At times we only follow one or two of the steps and that is okay. Yet to fully pray we should follow all the steps to develop our relationship with God.
The book The Way of a Pilgrim is thought to have been written by a Russian Orthodox monk in the 19th century. The central character of the book is a man who walks across Russia in search of obeying God. He is shown the verse “pray without ceasing” 1 Thessalonians 5:17 and given a simple prayer to repeat in order to internalize the message of praying without ceasing. The prayer is ‘Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner.’ This prayer is widely practiced by many groups around the world today but especially the Orthodox Church. I read of the protagonist walking through snowy days across Russia as I walked through the Streets of Eugene Oregon. The book struck me in its search for truth and the earnestness to seek after God.
The protagonist prays the Jesus prayer tens of thousands of times. He repeats the words over and over, day after day, until he finds the answer to the impossible command. The words he speaks become a feeling. That feeling becomes a rhythm of the soul. Without uttering a word he finds that the truth uttered in the prayer flows through him. I tried to pray the Jesus prayer I made it through maybe a thousand times before giving up. The prayer itself did not make that much of an impact on me. Yet the idea of praying such that very spirit prays has stuck with me to this day. When we pray we should remember just how messed up we are. We are so very messed up that even while praying we are sinning on some level. This realization allows us to take a step back away from ourselves towards true prayer not from our human selves but rather from the soul.
2 Timothy 3:16 which reads, “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, for training in righteousness” is the foundation that 1 Thessalonians 5:17 rests upon. Again also 2 Timothy 3:17 adds “so that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work.” I take this to mean that the commands of the Bible are good. Following those commands will make us better, to be equipped, and to be adequate, that is to be saved. When 1 Thessalonians 5:17 says “pray without ceasing” I must take it as just that. I am to pray without ceasing. The way of a Pilgrim offers one approach to fulfilling this command. I doubt whether I will ever reach that level of saintliness yet the way that I propose to live out this verse is to read 1 Thessalonians 5:17 in context and fulfill the rest of the command. That is to give thanks to God v.18, not quench the Spirit v.19, believe v.20, believe good things v.21, and don’t do evil v.22. This is an easier burden to carry. This can in a way be summed up as a position of the heart leaning away from evil and towards the truth, that is true prayer.
