You mean I haven’t talked about that before?

14May
by Jon Swanson

I really wasn’t planning to plunge into a series on prayer.

Next week I’m teaching about prayer at a denominational conference. To help me think, I went to the group I teach on Sunday mornings and began exploring this question: 

What does it mean that so many people end prayers with some version of “In Jesus’ name, amen.”? Why, really, do we do that?

It was a wonderful conversation, one that led to making two people from the class sit on chairs in front of the room so we could see the side-by-side image that showed up in the two chairs post this week.

As I’ve spent the rest of the week writing about prayer, other topics keep bubbling up in my brain and yours. I’m seeing them in the comments and in emails. And I’m realizing that there are some things that I often say when I’m talking with people about prayer that I have never written about.

  • Why do we call them “prayers”? How is that different from calling them “formulas” or “incantations”?
  • And why do we limit ourselves to the word “pray” when we talk about interaction with God when we have many other words for our interactions with each other?
  • What does it mean to pray constantly? Does the idea of “ambient intimacy”, taken from social media, help us understand what that might be like?
  • Where is heaven? Although that is a huge question, far beyond the topic of prayer, it would be helpful to know how long the string on our tin-can prayer telephone is. Or, perhaps, the imaginations that work so well in understanding science fiction literature might help us understand where heaven is.

Those are posts coming very soon. But I probably should ask, what do you wonder about this thing called “prayer”?

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If you don’t want to ask in the comments, send me an email at jnswanson at gmail dot com.

8 thoughts on “You mean I haven’t talked about that before?”

  2. Joseph Ruiz's avatar

    Joseph Ruiz

    What about prayer as thoughts? For me mental conversations can be very different than spoken ones. Sometimes that’s good other times not so much. Or perhaps a slightly different twist…Prayer as conversation both vertically and horizontally (where two or more are gathered)

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  4. Joseph Ruiz's avatar

    Joseph Ruiz

    one more thought, if we can be living sacrifices can prayer be a part of our service a way of being something offered in the conscious that moves to the sub-conscious?

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  5. Karen Marie's avatar

    Karen Marie

    I have been trying to figure out why sometimes when I am praying it feels like God is right there, right next to me…like I could reach out and touch Him. Then other times (most of the time it seems) like my prayers are just floating around in space or bouncing off the bedroom walls.
    I am gifted (by God) in Intercession and lead the Prayer Ministry (with the Holy Spirit) at our church…and have seen MANY answered prayers…even answers to those ones that seem to float around. I just wish I could always have that close intimate feeling!

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  6. Meg's avatar

    Meg

    Is it a question?

    Is it a prayer when all you can say is “please?” Does it count when you can’t think beyond the weeping? Or explain the weeping.

    And why- why does it makes me feel so inadequate?

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