A Reflection for the Seventh Sunday After Pentecost

Grace – by Eric Enstrom

Thoughts on Prayer:

Maybe some say, "I know human love, and I know something of its power to heal, to set free, to give meaning and peace, but God's love I know only as a phrase." Maybe others also say this, "For all the power that human love has to heal, there is something deep within me and within the people I know best that is not healed but aches with longing still. So if God's love is powerful enough to reach that deep, how do I find it? How?"

If that is really the question, if we are really seeking this power, then I have one thing to say—perhaps it is not the only thing, but it is enormously important: ask for it. There is something in me that recoils a little at speaking so directly and childishly, but I speak this way anyway because it is the most important thing I have in me to say. Ask, and you will receive. And there is the other side to it too: if you have never known the power of God's love, then maybe it is because you have never asked to know it—I mean really asked, expecting an answer.

I am saying just this: go to him the way the father of the sick boy did and ask him. Pray to him, is what I am saying. In whatever words you have. And if the little voice that is inside all of us as the inheritance of generations of unfaith, if this little voice inside says, "But I don't believe. I don't believe," don't worry too much. Just keep on anyway. "Lord, I believe; help my unbelief" is the best any of us can do really, but thank God it is enough. 

From The Magnificent Defeat by Frederick Buechner)

One of the strengths of Tyler Staton’s book, “Praying Like Monks, Living Like Fools”, is that Staton has a keen sense of how to mine a quote from the past. He’s able to get to the heart of an ancient thought, and make it pithy and digestible in a way that makes you go, “Hmm.” It’s a great book.

Here’s a smattering of some of these bite-sized nuggets of wisdom from the past:

1.    This Presence is so immense, yet so humble; awe-inspiring, yet so gentle; limitless, yet so intimate, tender and personal. I know that I am known. Everything in my life is transparent in this Presence. It knows everything about me—all my weaknesses, brokenness, sinfulness—and still loves me infinitely. This Presence is healing, strengthening, refreshing—just by its Presence . . . It is like coming home to a place I should never have left, to an awareness that was somehow always there, but which I did not recognize. - Thomas Keating

2.    Prayer is our humble answer to the inconceivable surprise of living. - Rabbi Abaraham Joshua Heschel

3.    We must lay before Him what is in us, not what ought to be in us. - CS Lewis

4.    If you are praying, you are already ‘doing it right. - Roberta Bondi

5.    If we really mean to pray and want to pray we must be ready to do it now. - Mother Teresa

6.    What do I need to do to be spiritually healthy? You must ruthlessly eliminate hurry from your life. - Dallas Willard

7.    In contemporary society our Adversary [a biblical title for the devil] majors in three things: noise, hurry, and crowds. If he can keep us engaged in ‘muchness’ and ‘manyness,’ he will rest satisfied. - Richard Foster

8.    And so we end up as good people, but as people who are not very deep: not bad, just busy; not immoral, just distracted; not lacking in soul, just preoccupied; not disdaining depth, just never doing the things to get us there. - Ronald Rolheiser

9.    If you can’t love, you can’t pray, either. Praying is loving. And learning to pray means learning to love. - Johannes Hartl

10. There is a prevailing bias among many American Christians against rote prayers, repeated prayers, “book” prayers—even when they are lifted directly from the “Jesus book.” This is a mistake. Spontaneities offer one kind of pleasure and taste of sanctity, repetitions another, equally pleasurable and holy. We don’t have to choose between them. We must not choose between them. They are the polarities of prayer. The repetitions of our Lord’s prayers (and David’s) give us firm groundings for the spontaneities, the flights, the explorations, the meditations, the sighs, and the groans that go into the “prayer without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17 KJV) toward which Paul urges us. - Eugene Peterson

From Tyler Staton’s book, “Praying Like Monks, Living Like Fools

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 GOD BLESS US TO GROW AND THRIVE – IN 2025!

May God Bless you and yours as we journey together through this Pentecost Season…

May God Awaken, Inspire and Challenge you with the Surprises of The Spirit!

As we see, appreciate and embrace the Great Gift of God with us

May God’s Spirit empower us to

“expect great things from God and to attempt great things for God”…

and

May God Continue to Bless Union Church!

-Pastor Mark