[Thanks to Pat at Transfigurations for posting this and drawing it to my attention!]
Dr. Ephraim Radner has a must-read essay on prayer “Alone with God” in the Living Church magazine.
Here’s an excerpt:
The Church has always taught that prayer lies at the center of human life itself, and of the Christian vocation in particular. I have failed too often, as a teacher of teenagers and confirmands and new members, by neglecting this reality in favor of teaching about “doctrines” and “ministries” and the rest. But prayer! The prayer that constitutes “being with” the Life of our life, with God, as our marrow and fatness. Speaking to him, face to face — that is necessity.
An old professor of mine, Louis Dupré, wrote a small book, The Deeper Life, which is destined to become a classic. He outlines the way in which, in this radically secular world we live in, even our “faith” is something compartmentalized — to church, to special study times or worship times and so on — while the bulk of what we do remains engulfed in the vain play of work and responsibility that is basically godless. And so, of course, at the end of our lives — or even before — when so much of this “usual stuff” of life is stripped away, then we find ourselves sitting in very “empty” rooms.
What then shall we do? Dupré says that we must “turn inward” — indeed, learn to pray — in such a way that we rediscover the Person who lies at the root of our own selves. “My soul clings to you,” the Psalmist writes (63:8). My “soul”! A ringing affirmation of and direction toward the renewal of our lives — which is the life of God already at work within us. “Behold, you were within me, and I outside,” writes St. Augustine, as he wonders at all the years he spent aimlessly wandering in an existence devoid of meaning and hope. You are alone? Look inside — in the prayer that moves you toward the center of your being.
Where, after all, does courage come from? And hope? And all the things that make a person someone who illumines the world? (Take up your cross and follow!) Courage, hope and all the rest come from within, not as something gained by will power, but as the receipt of a gift offered from the source of life that undergirds us, as the apprehended assurance that “God is in the midst” of the soul and it “shall not be overthrown” (Psalm 46:5). No matter what. “My soul clings to you; your right hand holds me fast.”
But it is not enough to affirm it, verbally: we must actually “experience” it. Practice it; that is: turn inward and see with the eyes of the spirit the very Person of God. And by “practice” I really do mean the constant, regular work of praying to God out of the sheer love of his presence. It isn’t enough today, in this world where we end up too often alone and bitter, to say, “Well, I say a prayer now and again.” We need time; quiet; practice. “I meditate upon you in the night watches” (Psalm 63:6). Night after night after night, inwardly speaking to the Voice before our voice.
Life’s eagerness, beauty, strength and hope derive from this practice. It isn’t some leisure activity of choice.
The full essay is here.
Posted by anglicanprayer 
