Dear Ray,
Lately I have found myself wanting to become quieter before the Lord. Something in me seems tired of explaining, even in prayer. I want to give Him my attention and remain there for a little while, without feeling that I must make something happen.
I have called it a new prayer, although perhaps the prayer is very old and I am only beginning to discover it.
For so much of my life, prayer has meant bringing something to God. A concern, a request, a burden for someone, a difficulty I could not resolve. I am thankful that we can come to Him with all of these things. Sometimes I have nothing to bring but confusion, and it comforts me that He receives even that.
Yet lately, after I have spoken about what troubles me, I have felt drawn to stay. The concern may still be there. I may have no answer. But I do not want to leave simply because I have finished asking.
I want Him.
Paul’s words have been becoming more personal to me: “It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me.” The One to whom I am praying has made His home in me. His life is already present beneath all my restless thinking.
I can become so occupied with reaching toward the Lord that I scarcely notice the wonder of His being here.
Abandonment has come to mean something a little different to me. The word once sounded like something large and difficult, a surrender I would have to gather enough strength to make. Now it sometimes seems as small as leaving one unanswered question in His hands. Allowing myself to be loved while I still do not understand.
I can place something before Him and discover a few minutes later that I have taken it back. My mind begins arranging things again. I rehearse what I should say, imagine what someone else might do, and quietly resume responsibility for an outcome I cannot control.
Even then, I can return without making my failure into another project. I can turn my heart toward Him again.
Sometimes that turning has very few words.
“Lord, here I am.”
I hesitate to measure anyone’s prayer by how much they speak or how silent they become. I know how easily I could make quietness into another spiritual accomplishment.
What I long for is simpler than silence itself. I want my heart to be available to Him.
The pictures of ashes and dry bones have meant something to me here. Ashes cannot arrange themselves into beauty. Dry bones cannot summon breath. When I am scattered, weary, or inwardly empty, I do not have to conceal that condition before coming to the Lord. I can come as I am and receive what I cannot produce.
I have often expected myself to arrive at prayer already possessing the very things I need to receive there. I should be peaceful. I should have faith. I should be attentive and full of love. Then I discover how little I have, and I feel that I have somehow failed before I have begun.
My poverty is a truthful beginning.
Christ is my life when I feel strong, and He is my life when I have very little to say for myself.
I want to learn to receive Him in that simple way. To let Zoe, His divine life, have room in the places where I have been trying so hard to supply myself.
The Son who lives in us loves the Father. He rests in the Father’s love. That communion did not begin with my prayer, and it does not depend upon my ability to sustain it. In Christ, we have been brought into a love already living and moving before we ever found words for it.
When I consider that, prayer becomes much less lonely.
I am not left to create a relationship with God through the strength of my attention. I have been included in the Son. His communion with the Father has become the very life in which I am invited to remain.
And I hope this becomes ordinary, Ray.
I want it to reach the moments when I am interrupted, when I feel misunderstood, when I am tired and someone needs more patience than I seem to have. I want the communion I treasure in quietness to find expression there too.
At certain moments, worship rises so quietly. I have not worked myself into gratitude. The heart responds before the mind can explain very much.
I find myself drawn to the simplicity running through the contemplative writings we have considered: a heart turned toward God, a willingness to yield, the freedom to remain when nothing remarkable seems to happen. I would like to let them remind me to remain quietly with the Lord who already lives within me, allowing His life to have more room.
I cannot promise myself that I will rise from prayer feeling different every time. Some days I may still feel distracted or heavy. But I need not make those feelings the measure of whether Christ is present.
This is part of what I am learning: to stop examining the branch so anxiously and give my attention to the life of the Vine.
I still have many requests. There are people I love and things that trouble me deeply. I will keep bringing them to Him. Increasingly, I want to bring myself with them—the part of me that wants control, the part that is afraid, the part that keeps trying to be sufficient.
Brother, even this letter could become another explanation of something I need to live. I want these words to bring me back to the One who is already here.
“Lord Jesus, You are enough. Teach my heart to rest in You.”
Your brother,
Brent
