Lord teach us to pray
Last year I posted a series on Tools for Prayer. This year I am working on a book on prayer entitled Return to Our Senses: Reimagining How We Pray. The focus of the book is Madame Guyon’s idea that prayer is an exercise in love as I discussed in my post Let God’s love Soak into Your Soul. The responses to these projects convince me that all of us hunger for a better prayer life and a deeper knowledge of the God who is love but don’t know how to achieve it.
The time honored ways we teach people to pray and draw close to God are not as effective as they should be. We need to rethink prayer’s purpose and reimagine its practice digging deeper into our Christian traditions and ancient practices in fresh ways for our contemporary lives. In a culture with short attention spans that applauds multitasking and encourages distraction, we need tools that sharpen our ability to hear God’s voice. And in a society that spends less and less time in church we also need to explore ordinary everyday activities that stir our imaginations and stimulate our senses to develop new ways to express prayer.
So can you help? Over the next few months I would like to explore a new range of tools for prayer. What is your view of prayer? Where do you feel most connected to God? What do you find is the most effective way to pray? Will you share with us so that others can learn from your experiences?
If you would like to contribute a post to this blog series, please leave a comment below or send an email to godspacelight@gmail.com.
16 comments
I would be interested in a post, if you would like. As I read this post, my mind instantly thought of the concept of Karma Yoga, in Hinduism, the yoga of action. I recall my prof saying the best example of this would be a Habitat4Humanity building project do in Love and Shalom.
Gene – I love the concept and look forward to seeing your post
I would like to try, what is the deadline? 🙂
Kelly, I will be posting on this topic July & August. Would like to get posts by the end of July. Email you post to msaintern@gmail.com and please include a bio, and any photos you would like included.
I’m interested, too. Do I have to have a blog? : )
Lisa you do not need to have your own blog as long as you let your friends know. Just email the post to the email above.
I’m interested as well. I’ll send something by the end of July at the latest.
Great
I was actually musing over this topic this morning on my own blog, thanks to a tag by a friend. Trying to mentally organize a more in depth post…
I look forward to seeing your post
I would love to write something related to my page and work with Prayer Labyrinths. Visit the page here on Facebook at: In His Footsteps
Wonderful. thanks for participating
I like to take 3 deep breaths, letting go of my stress, my ideas, and my agenda. Than I love to ask God to be present, with myself or us. I/we have a time of appreciation, than confession, communicate longing, and have hope. Sometimes those things are not easy, but the practice of breathing, seeing each other while together as the body, or appreciating my quiet space alone, hearing even a pin drop….I experience Gods presence and am grateful for what I have and the relationship I have with God. When I walk the streets in my neighborhood I reflect on biblical stories, current stories and listen to how God is active all around me. I hear water, trees blowing, people talking…it all brings me to a place of reflection.
Beautiful Liz thanks for sharing this. Looking forward to seeing you
Hi Christine, thanks for this. Below is a link to a poem I wrote on prayer:
http://tinyurl.com/7xe6rv9
Thanks we will post it as part of the series