The edge of a raft is fun if you are a kid playing with friends on a summer’s day. It’s scary if your ship just sank and you are being tossed by wind and waves.
Shortly after I finished my last blog post, Life pushed me out on to the edge of the raft. All of my plans for writing fell apart as my energy has gone into clinging to the raft. Perhaps the subject of that post was part of the reason.
Another reason was that my denomination decided that the stuff that divides us is more important than the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit that unites us.
Of course, we did it “prayerfully.” We all prayed for months before the big meeting. The meeting began with a day of prayer and worship.
That kind of praying reminds me of a story that was often told in the first church I served after graduating from seminary:
In the 1920’s, two of the most powerful laymen in the church disagreed about an important issue. The disagreement grew uglier and uglier. Finally, the pastor and other lay leaders prevailed upon the two men to kneel in prayer at the altar rail and to ask God for guidance.
After a few minutes of prayer, one of the men rose to his feet and announced:
“God has answered our prayers. We are going to do it my way.”
This is in contrast to the story we always tell about Jesus on Thursday of Holy Week. After he celebrated Passover with his disciples, he went out into the garden to pray. He knew what was coming. He asked God to somehow let it pass from him the way the Angel of Death once “passed over” the homes of the Israelites.
However, at the end of this prayer he said,
“Nevertheless, not my will, but Your will be done.”
The older I get the less I know about prayer.
But I do believe this:
- If I get off my knees with the same conviction I had before I prayed, I did not pray.
- If I am not more open to some other possibility, I did not pray.
- If I do not love my adversaries, I did not pray.
- If I do not understand them better, I did not pray.
- If I do not find it in my heart to forgive, I did not pray.
I haven’t prayed much in my life because I’ve done most of my praying in church or during what people in my tradition like to call our “quiet time.”
- These prayers ask God to bless the paths we have already chosen.
- These prayers ask God to change someone else’s mind and heart.
- These prayers thank God for the ship we are on.
- These prayers assume that the ship is headed God’s way.
I am learning that the best place to pray is on the edge of the raft.
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I’ve been on the edge of the raft since Jim smashed his wrist. But we’ve all been heading in that direction for a while. I love your prayer honesty. These days I’m reduced to Anne Lamott’s “Help!” “Please!” and “Thanks.” Often a prayer is just, “O God!” Or “Jesus!” sounding sometimes a little like swearing. But I don’t worry about how God understands my pleas; the older I get the more grateful I am to be alive and to be myself, and feeling sometimes remarkably at one with the Creator and the creation. Love you, Roger. —Cathy
Thanks, Cathy.
Thanks much for your comments on prayer. They are “right on.” Perhaps another way of saying it is that when we go to prayer we should listen rather than talk.
With regard to the recent action by our UM General Conference, I must admit that I had a little comeuppance when I realized that I would have been okay if “our” side had won and “the others” felt that they needed to leave the UM church. I’m not even sure how gracious I would have been in dividing up our vast resources, including such things as our publishing house and pension funds.
But if there are those who feel they must leave the UM church, do I want to join them on the basis of my faith or do I wait and see what would happen to our pension funds? Maybe it is “listening prayer” that I need most of all.
Peace, Duane
Duane, My apologies for not replying to this. Thanks so much for your comments. I think. That last paragraph raises some uncomfortable questions that I don’t want to ask myself.