GROWN-UP PRAYING
Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Matt. 6:10.
"Dear Jesus," the sweet young voice pleads, "bless me today, and make my puppy come home." Meanwhile her mother is praying, "O Father! You are welcome in my heart. May I be more secure in Your love, and thus less defensive."
As we mature spiritually, our manner of speaking in the Father's presence will change. There will be less begging for blanket blessings, more aligning with His will. The difference comes from our deepening knowledge of who the Father is. Instead of seeing Him as an ordinary dispenser of blessings, we increasingly see Him as the author of wisdom, the designer of ideal patterns for living. We grasp more fully the inherent wisdom of those ways, and see that our problems do not stem from God's reluctance to give blessings but from our reluctance to walk in the paths of blessing.
It dawns on us that the purpose of prayer is not to change God's posture toward us but to change our posture toward God. There is no need to beg or grovel before Him, no need to persuade Him to recognize problems He may not know. Such would be insulting--to both of us. When we see how good God has been to us, begging gives way to praise.
Jesus taught us to pray "Thy kingdom come." Later He said, "The kingdom of God is within you," which means that the truest essence of Christ's kingdom is not its physical location but the ideals and values by which its members live. To pray Jesus' prayer, then, is to make a conscious choice to let our minds and values be brought into harmony with the mind and values of God. This represents submission in the highest sense of the word. It represents not a fearful cowering in the face of superior firepower but an intelligent aligning of the mind with superior wisdom.
At this point many of the blunt imperatives of our prayers begin to fade into other forms. Rather than praying, "Bless me today," we might pray, "I give You permission to nudge me should I begin to walk outside the paths of blessing." Instead of "Bless Uncle Charlie," we will likely pray, "Lord, I am willing to be used by You as some means of bringing joy and healing into Uncle Charlie's life."
And isn't that how we would expect two intelligent persons to converse?
Thy kingdom come. Thy will be done in earth, as it is in heaven. Matt. 6:10.
"Dear Jesus," the sweet young voice pleads, "bless me today, and make my puppy come home." Meanwhile her mother is praying, "O Father! You are welcome in my heart. May I be more secure in Your love, and thus less defensive."
As we mature spiritually, our manner of speaking in the Father's presence will change. There will be less begging for blanket blessings, more aligning with His will. The difference comes from our deepening knowledge of who the Father is. Instead of seeing Him as an ordinary dispenser of blessings, we increasingly see Him as the author of wisdom, the designer of ideal patterns for living. We grasp more fully the inherent wisdom of those ways, and see that our problems do not stem from God's reluctance to give blessings but from our reluctance to walk in the paths of blessing.
It dawns on us that the purpose of prayer is not to change God's posture toward us but to change our posture toward God. There is no need to beg or grovel before Him, no need to persuade Him to recognize problems He may not know. Such would be insulting--to both of us. When we see how good God has been to us, begging gives way to praise.
Jesus taught us to pray "Thy kingdom come." Later He said, "The kingdom of God is within you," which means that the truest essence of Christ's kingdom is not its physical location but the ideals and values by which its members live. To pray Jesus' prayer, then, is to make a conscious choice to let our minds and values be brought into harmony with the mind and values of God. This represents submission in the highest sense of the word. It represents not a fearful cowering in the face of superior firepower but an intelligent aligning of the mind with superior wisdom.
At this point many of the blunt imperatives of our prayers begin to fade into other forms. Rather than praying, "Bless me today," we might pray, "I give You permission to nudge me should I begin to walk outside the paths of blessing." Instead of "Bless Uncle Charlie," we will likely pray, "Lord, I am willing to be used by You as some means of bringing joy and healing into Uncle Charlie's life."
And isn't that how we would expect two intelligent persons to converse?
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