Prayer 10: Prayer Life

Don: What does it mean to live a life of prayer? The notion of living life as a continual prayer is common in scripture. In the preamble to the parable of the importunate widow (Luke 18) which we have been studying lately, Jesus says we should always pray and never give up. In 2 Thessalonians we are exhorted to pray without ceasing. Romans 12:2 and Colossians 4:2-6 talk about being “instant” in prayer, in other words, of constantly having prayer at our side.

Many people of many faiths all over the world have taken the concept living life as a prayer in a very literal way. They cloister themselves in isolated settings free from the travails of the world, simply in order to pray and meditate in search of spiritual enlightenment.

Most ordinary Christians view the concept as more metaphorical.

We have been discussing prayer as a way of living a life with god and not just having a conversation with him. Micah was frustrated about how much prayer is needed to establish a relationship with god. In chapter 6:6-7, he asks god hyperbolically—as though god is impossible to please— how much prayer is enough:

With what shall I come to the Lord
And bow myself before the God on high?
Shall I come to Him with burnt offerings,
With yearling calves?
Does the Lord take delight in thousands of rams,
In ten thousand rivers of oil?
Shall I present my firstborn for my rebellious acts,
The fruit of my body for the sin of my soul?

God responds (verse 8) in an interesting way, which begins to shed some light on what it means to pray without ceasing:

He has told you, O man, what is good;
And what does the Lord require of you
But to do justice, to love kindness,
And to walk humbly with your God?

Qualitatively and quantitatively, prayer is not as Micah misperceived it.  First and foremost, it is not about us: It is, rather, about god. This is one of the most subtle ensnarements of prayer. Prayer that focuses on me and my needs, my health, my piety, my faith, and so on is self-centered and subtly subversive of the real meaning of prayer. In the Lord’s Prayer, Jesus distinctly avoided this trap by using the plural personal pronouns “our,” “us,” and “we,” instead of “my,” “me,” and “I.”

To live a life of prayer is to live a life in community with others and to do justice and to love mercy, not for our own benefit, but for the benefit of the community—of the others in the community. And we are told to do so humbly—which precludes selfishness.

Self-centered prayer tends to leave us feeling like Micah: However hard we pray, it’s never enough to get god to answer our prayers in the way we want him to. But a focus on others, on community and justice and mercy and humility takes the element of idolatry out of a prayer-life centered upon oneself yet it does benefit us by making us better people.

The parable of the Good Samaritan (Luke 10) was a response to a question put to Jesus about what one must do to inherit eternal life. Love God and treat your neighbor as you would wish to be treated yourself, was the immediate answer; the parable answered the next question: Who is my neighbor?

The road between Jerusalem and Jericho, where the parable is played out, is a metaphor for the road of life. On the road of life we will meet Good Samaritans, robbers, victims of robbers, and people who are indifferent to the plight of the victims. The irony is that all of us play all of these roles at some points in our lives. Each of us carries a “toolbox of opportunity,” but the tools, such as time and money and emotional energy, can be missing. Emotional energy, for example, which is necessary in playing the role of Good Samaritan, might not be there when you open up the toolbox.

I think this is OK with god who, knowing that we may sometimes be lacking in the tools, does not expect us to the right thing by everybody all the time.  The judgment (Matthew 25), which asks essentially “What did you do on the road of life?” takes into account whether you had the tools to respond in a situation demanding a response. There are people who need things we just cannot give, however much we may want to or feel we ought to. So living a life of prayer—of doing justice and mercy and humility in the community—is tempered by our ability to respond.

[Postscript by David: In transcribing the last paragraph, I was reminded of Marx’s dictum: From each according to his ability; to each according to his need.” Interestingly, as Wikipedia points out, “Some scholars trace the origin of the phrase to the New Testament.In Acts of the Apostles the lifestyle of the community of believers in Jerusalem is described as communal (without individual possession), and uses the phrase “distribution was made unto every man according as he had need“:

Matthew 25:14-30: And to one he gave five talents, to another two, and to another one; to each according to his ability. And he went abroad at once.

Acts 4:32: All the believers were one in heart and mind. No one claimed that any of their possessions was their own, but they shared everything they had.

It’s interesting, too, how Red China subverted this dictum by changing one word: “From each according to his ability, to each according to his work,” and enshrined this in the Chinese Constitution.]

Harry: To one like me, brought up to believe in but finding it difficult to practice prayer the old-fashioned way, then this is good news. Practicing prayer by contemplating and doing such acts of justice and mercy as I am capable of is something I can do and do gladly.

David: I agree, In trying to ritualize our relationship with god we take something that is simple and easy and written into everyone’s heart (“Behave as best you can!”) and turn it into something complicated and difficult and written (some would claim) only in the bible.

Jay: The shift from self- to other-centered prayer actually does improve the pray-er by helping him or her to be better able to meet the needs of others. It does not at all preclude one’s praying for such ability.

Ada: That is how I pray, though I do so informally, as a conversation with god, rather than as a formal, ritualized prayer.

David: Ada’s experience makes me wonder about the etymology of prayer. We tend to think of it as meaning “to ask” something, or for something. But we have arrived at the understanding that we don’t need to ask: God already knows what we need and will, for certain, give us that. That is faith. Has the meaning of “to pray” been corrupted to “to ask”? Ought “to pray” be redefined as “to behave”?

Jay: “To pray” and “to ask” are certainly used as synonyms within our religious community. The bible is replete with passage that tell us we do not need to ask for things; that god will give us everything we need. So prayer should not be about asking but about acting—about doing something.

Michael: What will our acting, our behavior, accomplish? Will it simply glorify god, or will it bring us god’s grace, which we have decided is god’s answer to our prayers?

Robin: To change from our old ways we do need to have a conversation with god.

Jay: What comes first: A good relationship with god, or a good relationship with my fellow man, which automatically puts me in a good relationship with god? Jesus’ own life seems to say that the focus should be on meeting the needs of one’s fellow man, and when one does that, one’s relationship with god follows naturally.

Kiran: Why do I need to work on my relationship with god, when he and I both know that in comparison to him, I am about as unworthy as can be? And yet… he thinks I have enough worth as to be willing to work on a relationship with me! To prove my worth, all I have to do is take care of my brother. I do so because I realize that I will receive free grace. And I realize that my duty is to share this grace with others, but I must share it humbly, or it does not count.

Don: Jesus alluded to this in Matthew 5:23, where he says that if you have a choice to reconcile with your brother or with god, first you must reconcile with your brother. So this is indeed a way of reconciling with god.

Alice: I don’t think I can have a relationship with others without first having a relationship with god.

Robin: Jesus never says “Don’t worry about it” with regard to prayer. We may pray for ourselves in the sense of asking to be made more sensitive to the suffering and needs of others, and more sensitive to the voice of the holy spirit telling us how to behave.

David: I agree with Alice that a relationship with god should come before relationships with others, but it does anyway! We are born with the inner light, the spirit, god, inside us. That relationship is. It does not require formal development through attendance at church, the performance of rituals, and so on.

Jay: In the Lord’s Prayer we pray for god’s forgiveness for our trespasses but only after we have forgiven others for their trespasses against us. You don’t need to pray for yourself because god already knows what you need; you should therefore worry about, and pray for, the needs of others. The relationship with god is already taken care of, so you can and should concentrate on your relationship with others.

Kiran: Do I attend church to improve my relationship with god, or do I come to church because of the relationship with god I already possess? I think the latter. I come to church because in doing so I serve my friends and bothers and sisters in the church. If I came to church just to improve my relationship with god, I suspect it would be very boring. A Hindu is required to work hard at improving his/her relationship with god, the extent even of climbing mountains. Christ taught me that this is not necessary, that god embraces me wholly right from the start. That changed me, and empowered me to do other things, including to help others.

Ada: God has directed us that it is practical to be amongst people at, say, church, so that we can develop our relationship with them.

Don: The debate seems to be turning on the question of whether we are already in a relationship with god­ that is so fundamental, free, guaranteed and energizing that we don’t need to work on it at all, or whether we should devote all our energies—our study, meditation, prayer—to developing relationships with others.

Kiran: Logically, the more time I devote to my relationship with god—which time is wasted if the relationship is already strong, then the less time I have available to devote to relationships with others.

Harry: I don’t think I have a relationship with god. I think he has a relationship with me. The idea that we have to follow organized religion robs us of god’s promise of justice and mercy for others. God’s will is being and will be done, regardless of what we think. The assassination of President Kennedy, a random event that could have brought us to nuclear war, made us terribly afraid. It is the randomness of life, its unpredictability, that worries us, so we create religions and ritual and formalized, self-centered prayer to try to ameliorate our fears. Most people want that kind of prayer. They do not want the kind that says I trust god, so let come what may.

David: I find god much easier to deal with than people.

Alice: The Arabic for prayer is “salah,” whose root “silah” means “relationship.” When you pray, it is because you have a relationship. It has nothing to do with asking for anything.

Don: To be continued….

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