Good morning,
The sun has just appeared over the horizon here at the cottage by the sea. I am in awe once again. As the song goes, “There’s Gotta be a God Somewhere.” I’ll write more later today, but I had to put that—God’s magnificence-- out there at the start of the day, and the start of this blog.
I’m just had what I call my ‘prayer nap’. Here’s how it goes. I lie on the chaise in the living room (which I call the deck) of the cottage that I’m renting. If I keep my eyes open I have a beautiful view of the ocean; but I close them and even put sun visors over my eyes. The challenge is to stop all the chatter in my head, so I concentrate on the Jesus Prayer and slowly fall asleep; miraculously that always happens. Usually after the sleeping part of my prayer nap which is no longer than a half hour, I wake up to one of my best prayer times. My mind is pretty much free of what I call “ego chatter”--planning what’s for supper—that kind of thing: and of judgments about what I think that the people I’m praying for should do. How easy it can be to let “my will done” slip in.
You may be wondering why I’m giving you all this detail. Well, it’s because I would love to hear how other people pray, what they do, what they think about, and I figure I’m not alone. There isn’t much written about this kind of thing. Even Jesus doesn’t give us much. Aside from the Lord’s Prayer, scripture tells us that Jesus went off and prayed. But what did he do, what did he say?
Finally, you may notice that I don’t seem to pray in any orthodox way. I don’t follow any rules. For example, “they” say that one should not lie down, close eyes, or do anything to encourage sleep when praying. But that pretty much what I do. Just me and God.
The sun has just appeared over the horizon here at the cottage by the sea. I am in awe once again. As the song goes, “There’s Gotta be a God Somewhere.” I’ll write more later today, but I had to put that—God’s magnificence-- out there at the start of the day, and the start of this blog.
I’m just had what I call my ‘prayer nap’. Here’s how it goes. I lie on the chaise in the living room (which I call the deck) of the cottage that I’m renting. If I keep my eyes open I have a beautiful view of the ocean; but I close them and even put sun visors over my eyes. The challenge is to stop all the chatter in my head, so I concentrate on the Jesus Prayer and slowly fall asleep; miraculously that always happens. Usually after the sleeping part of my prayer nap which is no longer than a half hour, I wake up to one of my best prayer times. My mind is pretty much free of what I call “ego chatter”--planning what’s for supper—that kind of thing: and of judgments about what I think that the people I’m praying for should do. How easy it can be to let “my will done” slip in.
You may be wondering why I’m giving you all this detail. Well, it’s because I would love to hear how other people pray, what they do, what they think about, and I figure I’m not alone. There isn’t much written about this kind of thing. Even Jesus doesn’t give us much. Aside from the Lord’s Prayer, scripture tells us that Jesus went off and prayed. But what did he do, what did he say?
Finally, you may notice that I don’t seem to pray in any orthodox way. I don’t follow any rules. For example, “they” say that one should not lie down, close eyes, or do anything to encourage sleep when praying. But that pretty much what I do. Just me and God.
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