Paying no attention to The Man behind the screen…
I think one of the things God must truly loathe about being God is all of the Sonic orders and WalMart lists He gets.
This occurred to me recently after I heard someone pose this question, “What do Calvinists pray for? Since they think everything is already set in stone, what in the world do they ask for?” While that’s interesting to ponder (what do Calvinists pray for, really? Since they believe His will is already ironclad, asking God to intercede in any given situation seems sort of silly.), it draws attention to the fact that most of us as Christians are still in our infancy. Our conversations with God have yet to evolve from “I need…I want…Give me…Bless me…”
Why do we think praying is only about asking for stuff? We’ve diminished speaking with God to the level of conversations we have at drive-thru windows or WalMart lines.
“Cookie. Now.”
Consider the evolution of relationships between parents and children: at first, little Johnny can’t speak mommy and daddy’s language at all. He just cries, coos, and grunts. Then, he discovers mommy and daddy can be manipulated with his pudgy little index finger and an ear-piercing scream. Mommy and daddy let that go on for about half a second if they’re smart, and then little Johnny learns his first word, the all-powerful “NO!” Even after little Johnny has full fluency in mommy and daddy’s native tongue (which comes from hearing them…), their conversations center largely around what Johnny wants, and when they’re going to get it for him. Johnny may love his folks, but that love is largely based on the fact that they provide for his needs, not because of the human attributes they possess.
But, Johnny grows up. And if he’s gained any wisdom or thoughtfulness, when that happens, he’ll see that his folks are people with layers. He’ll see they are people who struggle, fear, love, laugh, dream, create, and wonder. It will freak him out at first, but if he loves them, he’ll make the effort to work through that. And if Johnny loves them, he will want to know them for who they are, not for what they can do for him. In fact, Johnny will really be a man when he starts doing things that will please them, without them even having to ask, and when he begins talking to them about their lives, their hopes, their dreams and he finds he no longer needs to be the center of their universe, he’ll have the opportunity to have a real mature relationship with his parents. The bravery and honesty required to get to this place is nothing to gloss over. It’s huge.
Our relationship with God is sort of like that, but the analogy is off, because God is supposed to be father/friend/husband all at once, which is really a diffcult thing to get a handle on, especially when one gets out of the drive-thru line and looks in the window.
Prayer is a conversation, an exchange of thoughts and ideas, hurts, victories, struggles, griefs, dreams. It’s a deep meditation, a personal minefield, a terror, a quiet. At some point, the relationship should evolve past “Lord, please bless this food and my job and my family and help me win that bid on Ebay. Amen.” Intercessory prayer is a whole other level of prayer, and, then, there’s a very sacred personal level of prayer where there are no words at all.
Sometimes, though very rarely, because I’m still growing, and it takes time and a level of personal discipline I’m still far from, we just sit quietly together. No words. Just sitting still, considering in awesome wonder the worlds His hands have made. Then sings my soul…with His.
Thy power throughout the universe displayed….