Living Prayer
by Lyndall Bywater (Salvationist, 13th April 2002)
The story is told of a conversation between two of the Desert Fathers. Father Lot sought the council of Father Joseph, saying:
'Father, as far as I can I say my little office, I fast a little, I pray and meditate, I live in peace and as far as I can I purify my thoughts. What else can i do?'
Father Joseph's reply has echoed through the intervening centuries of church tradition as one of the most succinct definitions of what it means to be a Christian:
'If you will, you can become all flame!'
As I speak to people about prayer, I find that many of them, like me, can relate very well to Father Lot. We do our best. We know the value of the Christian disciplines and so we make every effort to include them in our lives. We make times for prayer, for the study of the Word and for worship with other believers. And yet we feel there must be more - somewhere in us is a deep desire to live a faith which sets light to every part of our being ... to know what Paul really meant when he said: "For me to live is Christ" (Philippians 1:21 NIV).
Father Joseph's prayer life, it seems, was 'incarnational': that is to say there was no distinction between the 'sacred' and 'secular' parts of his life. We like to say the same of ourselves, but how often do we compartmentalise our lives: worship is what we do between 10 and 11 am on Sunday morning, work is what we do from 9 to 5 each weekday, and prayer is what we do for 10 minutes over a cup of tea in the morning! If we are to become 'all flame', I believe we will need to allow the boundaries to become much more blurred than that!
Scripture is full of examples of people whose prayer was incarnational, but let me call to your minds just three - who all happen to be women.
The first is Anna, the prophetess who met the new-born baby Jesus at the temple in Jerusalem. We are told that she 'never left the temple, but worshipped night and day, fasting and praying' (Luke 2:37 NIV). Prayer was not something she made time for; for her, prayer was time, and time was prayer. She was a widow, and in the midst of the suffering and loneliness of that experience she seems to have found the ultimate fulfillment of a life soaked through with prayer. What's more, had she not been so constant in her communion with God, she might have missed seeing Jesus. If we restrict prayer to a ten minute slot each day, we too run the risk of missing Jesus. Only in a life where communication with the Godhead is a round-the-clock feature will we ever stand a chance of catching everything he has to say to us.
Then there was the woman seeking healing from a chronic illness - an illness so feared in that culture that she could never have asked for help in the way others did. So she did the only thing she could: she touched the edge of Jesus' cloak, and was immediately healed (Luke 8:43-48). This wordless prayer has much to teach us, because we so easily fall into the trap of thinking prayer has to involve words, whether that be words spoken out loud or formulated in our heads. Yet certain things leave us utterly without words, and when that happens it isn't time to stop praying, it's time to find other ways to express ourselves.
Lastly we come to Mary, Lazarus's sister; a woman not renowned for her efficiency or time management skills (unlike her sister Martha), yet a woman who is mentioned several times in the gospels for her extravagant, demonstrative love for Jesus. In John chapter 12 verses 1-8 we read that she poured a pint of very expensive perfume over Jesus' feet, then dried them with her hair. Why? What was the point? How did it benefit the community at large? Those were Judas's questions, and Jesus scarcely even attempted to answer them. In Heaven's economy no justification is needed for such an action: it was an entirely appropriate expression of love and gratitude.
In a world where life moves fast and we seem to have less and less time, we can fall into the trap of treating prayer like we treat our in-trays: to be dealt with as efficiently and decisively as possible! Yet all-surpassing love calls for something more than efficiency in return. It calls for overflowing thankfulness, for unrestrained worship, and for extravagant acts of devotion. If we long to become 'all flame' then we need to practise blazing wholeheartedly every now and then!
So why not resolve to set your prayer life free this year. By all means set aside time to pray; by all means use words and by all means be efficient ... but then let prayer overflow and find its way into every corner of your being.