A Life of Prayer – My Testimony

 

 

Before I share some of my testimony, a couple of comments. I am not very keen on teaching methodologies of prayer because “how to” approaches can become rote, legalistic, and are not, I think, relationally natural. If God is our Father, and if Jesus is our Elder Brother, and if the Holy Spirit lives within us, then conversation and communion with God and prayer in its many forms, is essentially organic. That being said, the Psalms provide 150 invitations to participate in prayer, along with many other prayers in the Bible. Also, as noted previously we have centuries of examples of prayer which are also invitations. The Scriptures ought to be our nexus for prayer, most Scriptures can be prayed in some fashion.

 

There are indeed principles in prayer, and models, Jesus speaks of these, but they are not mechanical but found in the context of filial relationship and servanthood.

 

Andrew Murray has two devotional books on prayer, each consisting of 31 days, With Christ in the School of Prayer and With Christ in the School of Intercession. These books contain daily Scripture readings with Murray’s reflections on how they speak to us of prayer. Because they are rooted in Scripture and point us to Jesus, they are foundational. Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence presents an organic and relational approach to praying as a way of life.

 

Now I want to share just a little about my life of prayer, and I’m going to use the workplace as my setting. Let me first say that I am a very imperfect person. I can be harsh, I can be angry, I can be abrupt, I can be sarcastic, I can be a real jerk. Thanks to the grace of God and the Holy Spirit I know what it is to apologize and ask forgiveness in the workplace. As I look back over my life in the workplace, I see times when I should have apologized and asked forgiveness but didn’t, I see things clearer now with advancing age. I see so many times I failed to abide in the Vine and missed opportunities to be a blessing to others and be a better testimony for Jesus.

 

Yet, I truly loved my people, both my direct reports and the people who worked for them. I loved my coworkers, and I worked with contractors whom I loved and had great affection for. I often took opportunities at large employee gatherings to not only share Jesus, but to tell my people that I loved them. I prayed with many people I worked with and received prayer requests from many more. It got to the place where folks expected me to pray for them when there was sickness or tragedy in their families. I have now been retired from business for over seven years, and I still receive prayer requests from former coworkers.

 

When a contractor’s father was in the hospital, I visited him and prayed with him. When another contractor was in the hospital for heart surgery, I was there to pray. When I visited apartment communities, it was not unusual for me to pray with my managers and others in their offices, and pray with residents of the communities, or with contractors doing work in the communities. When people had needs, I prayed. Sometimes I took their prayer requests, and other times we prayed on the spot.

 

I believed that my first calling was to be the Presence of Christ and to serve those around me.

 

I would pray for all the people in the office I worked in by visually walking down the hall and going into each office, I’d visualize the person and pray for him or her. I would also pray for their families and any specific needs I knew about. This is a practice (a method I guess!) that I used for decades.

 

If I had special meetings scheduled on a particular day, I’d pray for those meetings ahead of time, asking for wisdom, asking for help in preparation, asking to be a blessing to others in the meetings. During meetings I would also pray, asking my Father and Lord Jesus for wisdom, for peace, for grace and favor.

 

I had some particularly difficult clients, and meetings could be tense and stressful, but Jesus was always with me and I was always communing with Him during my meetings – this was my way of life in Him. I wanted my work to glorify God, to serve my clients, to serve my company, and to bless my employees and residents.

 

I worked in some fairly dangerous areas in housing, places where there was significant drug dealing, where people were shot and killed in broad daylight. I prayed for my people, the residents, and for my own safety when I walked those streets. Once, when I was inspecting a property with staff members and a representative from a state housing agency, we sought refuge in a vacant townhouse because of gunfire, gunfire which killed a drug dealer in a spot I had just walked by not less than 5 minutes before.

 

I was never afraid for myself, I was cautious but not afraid, my life belonged to Jesus. I was, however, often fearful for my people…and I prayed and prayed and prayed for them, and for the residents. Most folks living in difficult places are fine people, people who love their families and who do right by their neighbors, often working 2 or 3 jobs – it is a tragedy that they are marginalized by others in society and in the professing church. Shame on us.

 

Praying during conversations with others was a way of life for me, I was always asking my Father how I could be a blessing to the other person, how I could share the love of Jesus. O for sure there were times I missed opportunities. Sometimes I realized missed opportunities immediately, other times not until I’d arrived home. I can be dense and stupid and self – centered. When I am tired, I am more likely to miss a nice pitch over the plate than when I’m fresh. When I am in a hurry, I am more likely to miss being a blessing because I can be caught up in my own agenda rather than God’s. When I am stressed I can be particularly self-centered and not be attuned to the needs of others. All the more reason to live a life of prayer, for when my communion with God is interrupted by my foolishness, I am more likely to quickly sense it and ask God for help.

 

I believed the Trinity lived in me because this is what Jesus teaches in the Upper Room. The workplace was where God had me, and He had me there to serve others and be His Presence. I was willing to be misunderstood because of my rather simple faith, and I was also willing to take the heat for refusing to lie or place spin on problems and insisting on treating everyone with equity and respect, including paying them decent wages. I have put my job on the line for my employees more than once over the years – after all, I was in the workplace not to be served, but to serve.

 

I had a successful career, and better than that, I had a good testimony within my industry. My peers respected me and trusted me and honored me in a number of ways over the years. Of course, had the quality of my work not been superior, had I not offered my work to God, the story would no doubt have been different. My work was a form of worship, and the workplace was a place of spiritual formation to me, and then it was a place of witness for Jesus. God was always forming me into His image at work, and He was always using me as His Presence in the lives of others.

 

Since we have this treasure in jars of clay (2 Cor. 4:7), I realized that there was no need for me to pretend to be something I wasn’t, I could trust God to make it clear that any success I had was to His glory…and as I wrote above, I know what it is to apologize and ask forgiveness at work. When I made a relational mess of things, I saw it as an opportunity to make amends, to ask forgiveness, and to show the world that in Jesus relationships can be restored – the world does not see that very often. I do not recommend that we deliberately make asses of ourselves in order to share what reconciliation looks like in Jesus, but if we do make asses of ourselves, let us not waste the opportunity to be witnesses for Christ, to show others Jesus as the better Way to live.

 

I spent my days at work speaking to our Father and listening to Him, praying for others and looking for ways to serve them. I loved being with my people and coworkers. I loved being part of a team. I loved watching people grow.

 

I have had many people influence my understanding of our abiding in Christ, many of them lived long before me, and a few I have personally known. I am convinced that Jesus’ relationship with the Father is to be our relationship with the Father, I hope we are seeing this as we travel through the Upper Room, and I sure hope we see this when we move into the Holy of Holies of John Chapter 17.

 

There is no joy quite like the joy of praying with friends, where one minute you can be talking and the next naturally praying together. I have been blessed to have friends like these, even though with advancing age more of them are moving ahead of me into the City – but what shall it be like when we are all there! I trust those who have gone before are continuing to pray for me, I surely need it.

 

If we are going to spend eternity with our Father, doesn’t it make sense to spend our days with Him now? In much the same way, I once sensed our Father saying to me, “Bob, instead of thinking in terms of a prayer life, wouldn’t it be better if you learned to live a life of prayer? Instead of thinking in terms of intercessory prayer, wouldn’t it be better if you learned to live an intercessory life?”

 

Of the many influences I’ve had in my life of prayer, outside of the Bible Francois Fenelon may be the most vital, and since he influenced Andrew Murray this gives Fenelon a place of double honor. Fenelon’s life and writings speak to me many ways and continually bid me come up higher and deeper into Jesus. Fenelon is a great model for people in leadership in business, education, politics, and of course the church, for he served in the court of the Sun King, Louis IX, and influenced many at the pinnacle of power in the French court.

 

Fenelon was banished to his diocese for his refusal to abandon his friend, Jeanne Guyon, and his refusal to deny his understanding of our life in Christ. We must be willing to follow the Lamb wherever He goes, including in rejection (Hebrews 13:13). If we are not willing to be sacrifices for Christ and others we’ll never truly witness and our faithfulness to Jesus will always be contingent on ourselves – an unstable foundation, don’t you think?

 

Fenelon taught me to pray and listen to God while in conversation with others. I don’t recall how it began, but now it is as natural as breathing and I have not thought about it for many years, it is just what I do. I find great joy in listening to others and listening to God at the same time. We all do it, the question is how we do it. We’ve all been in a restaurant and engaged in conversation with a friend, while at the same time listening to a discussion at an adjacent table. Might it be more fruitful to listen to our friend and God?

 

Lives of prayer begin in the morning, when the page of the day is blank. We allow the Holy Spirit and the Word of God to make the first impressions on our hearts, minds, and souls. The only thing we should turn on may be the coffee pot as we began our daily conversation with God. No phone, no email, no radio, no TV, no news…just us and God…once the day begins this way it can continue this Way. There is only one first impression each day…ought it not be that of the holy Trinity?

 

My first mentor was George Will. George talked to God all the time, sometimes his conversations where quiet and within himself, and many times they were vocalized as naturally as if Jesus was right with us – which of course He was. He was like that in 1966 when I first met him, and he was still like that around 2012 when I last spoke with him over the phone. I imagine some folks thought him a bit crazy. Well, Jesus’s family and friends thought He was a bit touched too (Mark 3:20 – 21). Not bad company George, not bad company.

 

Much love,

 

Bob

 

“You will receive”

 

“Ask and you will receive” (John 16:24).

 

In our previous reflection we considered that in the Sermon on the Mount Jesus spoke to us of our Father in heaven, a concept alien to most folks in His time, and I think functionally alien in our time. What I mean by “functionally alien” is that while we may know the words to the Lord’s Prayer, “Our Father who is in heaven,” few of us think of God as our Father and fewer still have intimate relationships with Him, relationships which are the essence of our lives.

 

In the Sermon on the Mount Jesus speaks to us of asking of our Father and our Father giving to us. “Ask, and it will be given to you; seek, and you will find; knock, and it will be opened to you…If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask Him” (see Matthew 7:7 – 11).

 

Later in His ministry, Jesus reiterates this in Luke’s Gospel (Luke 11:1 – 13). Note the proximity of “how much more will your heavenly Father” to the Lord’s Prayer in Luke 11. Also note that in Luke 11:13 Jesus introduces another element, “How much more will your heavenly Father give the Holy Spirit to those who ask Him?” We are to be asking for the Holy Spirit (Ephesians 5:18 – 21).

 

As we see in the Upper Room, the themes of asking, receiving, the Holy Spirit, and joy are all woven together. They are woven together because this is what we experience in the Trinity, in intimacy with the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit. We see this fabric throughout Jesus’ life and teaching, from the beginning to the earthly conclusion…and beyond. Asking and receiving is inextricably woven with abiding in the Vine, “If you abide in Me, and My words abide in you, ask whatever you wish, and it will be done for you” (John 15:5).

 

While we have the privilege of asking for specific things, for the glory of our Father and Lord Jesus, and while we should glory in the answers to specific prayers, so that our “joy may be made full” (16:24), an even greater glory and joy is the deep relationship with God that we are called into. In one sense these are one and the same, in another (experiential) sense they are not; they are not in the sense that many of us cannot conceive of the deep love our Father has for us and of the deep communion to which He calls us. The greatest thing that we can receive in prayer is more of God, more of the Trinity.

 

Receiving more of God in prayer leads us to greater wisdom and confidence and trust in continual prayer, and we transition from having prayer lives to having lives of prayer. We transition from engaging in intercessory prayer to living intercessory lives (which encompasses intercessory prayer).

 

In 16:23 Jesus says, “If you ask the Father for anything in My name, He will give it to you.” Then 16:26 – 27 He says, “In that day you will ask in My name, and I do not say to you that I will request of the Father on your behalf; for the Father Himself loves you, because you have loved Me and have believed that I came forth from the Father.”

 

If we cannot bear fruit without abiding in Jesus, if we can do nothing apart from Him (John 15:4 – 5), then we must live lives of asking (John 15:5). Don’t you think so? However, our asking goes far beyond this, for in asking for fruit to bear (John 15:8) we are also asking for fruit to give to others. That is, we are asking to receive in order that we may give, not that the fruit may rot on the vine.

 

However, this goes even beyond this, for we are asking that we might live lives of loving others as Jesus loves us, and this means laying down our lives for our friends and brothers and sisters and the world (John 15:12 – 13; 1 John 3:16; John 3:16). Prayer becomes as breathing, asking in prayer becomes both conversational and deliberate and at times persistent and imploring (Luke 11:5 – 8), and at other times deeply intercessory. Prayer also includes the joy of praise, singing, thanksgiving (often sacrificial in nature) and confession and repentance. Prayer encompasses our koinonia with God and others. We grow out of prayer lives into living lives of prayer. (Of course, we still have focused times of prayer, often (I trust) intense.)

 

Perhaps when we place Jesus’ emphasis in the Upper Room on asking, asking, asking in the context of His portrayal of our life in the Trinity and with one another, we can better see the necessity for asking, asking, asking – for our lives are dependent on receiving, receiving, receiving…always receiving from the Father, the Son, the Spirit…so that we may give to others, thereby sharing God’s love and mercy with the Church and the world.  

 

Now I’d like to make an observation and then share just a bit about my own life. We are all different and in Jesus Christ we must find our own voice with the Father in prayer. Yes, we ought to learn from one another and be encouraged by one another, but your voice cannot be my voice, nor can my voice be your voice.

 

However, there are times that we can indeed use another’s voice to find our own voice, perhaps as a manned space rocket needs a booster to escape earth’s gravity. Our voices can blend with other voices. After all, the Psalms give us 150 voices (and more!) to join our voices to. I write “and more!” because we not only have the voice of the earthly authors, but also the voice of the Church and also the Voice of Christ. The Psalms have been the Voice of the Church since our birth at Pentecost and it is a tragedy that many of us and our movements are ignoring our membership in this heavenly choir and ongoing prayer meeting. 

This is one reason why I am insistent that we read and meditate on the Psalms every day, every single day. If we do this in Christ, the Psalms will become our own voice – your voice, my voice, the voice of the congregation, the voice of the church in our region and in our world, and of course this means that we have become the Voice of Christ.

 

Other written prayers can be quite helpful and draw us into the koinonia of the saints and into intimacy with God. I have found The Valley of Vision, published by the Banner of Truth Trust and edited by Arthur Bennett, to be a source of joy and comfort and challenge. Prayers by writers such as Francis de Sales, Francis of Assisi, Francis Fenelon, Andrew Murray, and the Church Fathers (and others) have meant much to me over the years.

 

Naturally I do not relate to every prayer in every prayer book, but even the ones that I do not relate to can cause me to ponder why I don’t – and I must remember that every prayer is an expression of a man or woman’s heartfelt relationship with our Father and Lord Jesus and the Holy Spirit. Also, I never know when I might return to a prayer in the future that I could not relate to in the past and very much need that prayer in my own life!

 

I think we must give one another room to develop our voices in prayer, and our insistence on conformity is really pretty stupid and limiting and controlling. What would we think if we had a church dinner and everyone brought the same dish? Why do we give each other more room for expression in earthly food than we do in heavenly food?

 

Let me be clear, this problem exists in highly demonstrative environments just as in highly liturgical and structured environments, we all have this challenge as far as I know – so let us not think that the problem belongs to others and not to us. This problem exists in small groups just as in congregations and denominations and movements.

 

A few years ago, an acquaintance invited me to an annual meeting of a region of his denomination in Virginia Beach. My acquaintance was the bishop of the region. I enjoyed the breakout sessions and I found the plenary speaker interesting. The plenary worship times were also interesting in that just about everyone was expressing themselves in the same highly demonstrative fashion…except me (Ha! What did you expect?).

 

During one worship time a man came over to me and asked me if I was okay. He was concerned that I wasn’t expressing myself like everyone else. Now while I appreciated the concern, and while I assured him that I was fine, in looking back perhaps he should not have been concerned that I was different, but rather that everyone else was the same.

 

Please understand, as far as I know we are all faced with this challenge of allowing one another to find our voice in prayer and worship and communion with the Trinity. For sure when we gather in large groups we want to find one voice, or various expressions of our collective voice, in which to worship and serve and edify. God is not a God of confusion, and reasonable order is important I think for edification (1 Cor. 14:31 – 33). Yet, often our Sunday school groups and small groups and other gatherings are like church suppers in which everyone has brought the exact same dish. Something is amiss with this…don’t you think?

 

Well, this is long enough, the Lord willing I will circle back in the next reflection and share a bit about my own life with respect to communion in prayer with the Trinity.

 

Are you finding your voice in prayer?

 

Has your voice changed over the years?

 

Are you discovering new vocal ranges in your voice with God?

 

Much love…Bob