In case you have not noticed I take the spiritual life pretty seriously. People are often amazed to hear I have spent time attending the Baptist, Pentecostal, Methodist, Presbyterian, Catholic, Anglican, and most recently, Moravian churches. I have often been tempted to answer when asked, “Where do you attend Church?” to answer, “All of them.” I have stumbled my way through the church looking for only God knows what.
I consider myself blessed to have experienced so many different communities and to be a part of the very, different way the Spirit moves. I believe in demon possession as much as I believe in transubstantiation. It is entirely possible that a fish as big as Moby Dick swallowed Jonah, but I don’t think that is the point of the story. I think frogs might have rained from heaven and locust covered the land like a blanket of snow, but again, I don’t think that is the point. Jesus probably did walk on water and make blind people see by spitting in mud, but again, I don’t think that is the miracle. The more miraculous thing to me is that God talks and God is very interested in talking to us. The real miracle to me is God is at work in our lives even before we know it. God is stalking us and is trying to prepare us for the shock of becoming God’s beloved.
During Lent, I have failed at trying more different ways to pray than just trying to succeed at maybe praying consistently. Prayer for me is sporadic at best. Praying in color was fun, but I found myself looking for the best pencils to use and what knew Zen doodle design I could try. I made prayer beads one year. I think I made like 100 sets. I gave most away. I learned the Catholic, Anglican and Orthodox rosaries. All three. I sought out a spiritual director to teach me the finer art of centering prayer. I found that instead of repeating my word over and over or praying the Jesus prayer over and over, I just looked at squirrels. I bought prayer books and tried praying the hours. All offices. It was then that my spiritual director suggested I might be over doing it a bit and kind of missing the point of prayer. I still love my prayer books though, and I do use them from time to time. I prayed the Psalms, both ways. Cranmer’s and following the Lectionary. I practiced Lectio Divina and again, after finding a passage to meditate on, I would usually begin to chase rabbits after about five minutes.
The thing with prayer is it is hard to get into and hard to stick with. I am pretty haphazard when it comes to prayer, but every once in a while, the Spirit gets me by the collar and I fall into a season of prayer. I guess it is a good thing I wasn’t called to be cloistered, I am not sure I could have endured praying 7 times a day and as much as I like to wear wool, I do tend to prefer cashmere and merino. Somehow, I don’t think that is what habits are made of. Being an introvert, I would have not experienced too much difficulty with silence, but fasting, not so much.
So, I have been thinking lately about the things I pray about. I self-edit. And yes, I am insightful enough to hear a therapist voice in my head saying, “Kathleen…really it doesn’t matter if it is right or not, just let God know how you feel…”
Sometimes I wonder why we pray at all. Does it work? Does it matter? Maybe it just like playing Magic Eight Ball, sometimes you get answers and sometimes you don’t.
I suppose what I am looking for in prayer is something authentic. I wonder why the prayers of the people never include a space for those of us who just want to acknowledge that life can become unbearably painful and shitty. I want prayers to include words like, “God help me stop crying for answers when I know I will never have the answers. God, help me learn to live just for today and to accept the things I cannot understand. God help me be patient with you and myself. And help me not to be so distracted by squirrels, that I don’t feel my pain.” I don’t think you would ever hear that on Sunday morning. We don’t talk enough about distractions honestly either. I want to have a prayer partner who doesn’t mind me telling me that what she really prayed about today was her shoes. I want to have a prayer partner that tells me she really doesn’t want to pray today and does God really care about her new haircut? I want a prayer partner who will say, I want to hear someone say that they calculate how to catch glimpses of God walking out the door. I want to hear someone say they secretly want to know if God will come out from wherever God is hiding and surprise us. I want Jesus to show up, so I can lean over and whisper, "Hey, I am really hungry...want to go get something to eat? And did you really go without food for 40 days?" I want to lean over and whisper to Jesus, "Now, let's get real for a minute...who really was your fave? I know you had to have a favorite. And I am sure a time or two you had to want to get some Pharisee butt." I want a prayer partner who will honestly sit in pain and trust that God will hold it, even if we don’t exactly understand how that happens. Sometimes, I just want to watch the squirrels.
No comments:
Post a Comment