When we pray
Neither Death not Life …
Romans 8
26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God …
37 No, in all these things we are more than conquerors through him who loved us. 38 For I am convinced that neither death nor life, neither angels nor demons, neither the present nor the future, nor any powers, 39 neither height nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord …
When we pray, it can be about specific things. … for healing and comfort for people who are close to us, who we love and care … for decisions that we have to make.
I was really pleased when I came across the readings for this week. The more I looked and thought about them, the more I saw in them … the way that I have known prayer … where prayer, love and God situate themselves in my life and in this complicated and challenging world.
The groaning …
Paul talks about the ‘groaning’ that can be involved in prayer.
Those times that can go beyond words, specific hopes, requests.
Times that we leave a space, that is beyond words – space that leaves room for God to move in our hearts, in what is going on for us and our spirit.
The Spirit call us to experience prayer as honesty … living with the doubts that are inevitable … “Am I talking to myself …?” We yearn for a place to breathe, to be truly open … to bring the yearnings, for ourselves, for those who we love, for the world … before our God.
Underneath …
I’ve found it helpful in recent times, to think about what is coming to the surface at these times, my hopes for myself, and others in my life. Prayer can leave room for the hard things that sit underneath, driving our prayers … hurt, pain … loneliness – even when we are in relationships … turmoil … grief.
Bringing these before God and sitting with them. Not looking for answers. Maybe healing.
This can be an act of desperation, but at the same time, an act of faith and hope …something tells us that we can do this safely … in the presence of a loving God.
Bunjil
In working with my close friend and spiritual brother Mark, a First Nations man who managed the rehab I worked at for many years, we sometimes invited the men to reflect on, … what would be the Bunjil-eyed- view of their lives … what would be the Bunjil-eyed view of our lives?
Bunjil is creator in the form of a wedgetail eagle – soaring above our lives, looking down at the layout of what was going on for us. What would Bunjil, our creator spirit, see? How might our creator understand what is going on for us, in the way that no one else would know or even be able to understand? What is important to us? The successes, the quiet failures, the yearnings of our heart.
The good thing to know is that we are not alone in these things.
More than meditation
I have found some meditation practices helpful, and those practices involve some similar understandings … leaving spaces in our busy lives to stop … to sit, wait and see what comes to the surface.
As followers of Christ, of spiritualities that have brought us here together this morning, we have the confidence to know that the Spirit is moving within us, when we pray – calling forth our prayers, words, hopes … but also those, at times, ‘deep groans’ beyond words.
Romans 26 In the same way, the Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. 27 And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.
We can know that our creator, is not looking down on our lives … but is here with us, bringing forth what God wants us to bring forward … the desire, or desperation, that is calling us to pray, is in itself the Spirit at work in us.
And it is the presence of a loving God that is at the heart of heart-felt prayers …
We are reminded that the presence of love, in its most refined form, is the presence of God.
Prayers for others are an expression of love. When our prayers speak to our love and concern for others, we know that God is present with us, and in our relationships with those for whom we pray.
And Grief is painful, because of the presence and contribution of loving relationships to our lives. We only know what loneliness is, because we have known in some way of what it is to be not lonely.
In our prayer, we are bearing witness to experiences of love, grace and blessings.
Prayer in a continually failed world
It can be argued that our western culture, spurred on by the limitations of the Renaissance, has come to believe in the ceaseless forward march of civilisation.
But our national and international community does not feel like that, because it is not like that.
How can we keep faith hope alive at such times, with honesty and integrity?
In these times, it is hard to be optimistic, and the pain that is caused to countless many will never be undone.
These accounts of prayer in the scriptures, are themselves sandwiched between accounts of death and destruction. John the Baptist is beheaded. Chistian tradition holds it that all but one of the apostles died violent deaths. The birth of Christ was accompanied by a massacre of infants.
So where is God in these things, in ancient times, and today.
But what we know, is that our God is Love, … and that love will stay present in the world … in the lives of those close to us, and even amongst the suffering of the powerless.
Our prayers pleading for peace are a reflection of our love, of God’s love, holding out for peace, in the wider world.
The movements of God’s spirit are revealed to in the continuing wonders of our planet … in the actions of champions for justice and service … in the programs that we support here at our church and at the Caulfield South Community House … in the quiet acts of care that are part of our little community every week … that will continue in families, communities, churches, movements of political resistance and peace in this world and going forward into the future.
The spirit, and the movement of the spirit through prayer, is the yeast that works its way through our understandings … of who we are as people, bringing forth those parts of ourselves. The spirit is calling us to a full experience of life and God’s hopes for us …. To be the kind of people, we are called to be, in God’s image … full of love and grace. And not just as individuals sitting in our pews, but together in this community … praying together, groaning together.
Neither death nor life
And as we are looking to be faithful, distracted by the things of this world, yet continuing to pray … yeast moves in us, helping to transform us to become something different to who we were yesterday … for our little community to become something different to what was yesterday.
Seeking to diligent in being open to serving our God, witnessing the presence of a loving God in our own lives, in pursuit of love for each other and the world … for fullness of life and justice and respect for all peoples.
Greg Smith