How to have two-way communication with God – Praying in the Spirit, Part 3

More than praying through lists, we were built to commune with God.  He doesn’t want us to be like the spouse that just gives him a to-do list (as I mentioned in this post).  God created us for communication, for a two-way relational conversation, not just with other humans, but also with him.  He created us to be in relationship with him. 

I once saw a video of the birth of a giraffe, with its super long spindly legs.  It plopped out of its mother’s womb, landing on the ground in a messy pile of legs that looked more like a huge spider than a giraffe.  And yet, within a manner of minutes that baby giraffe was up and walking on those legs.  Minutes.  It is astounding.  How could it do that?  How does it know to do that?  It was built to stand up and walk.

Likewise, as we see with Adam & Eve in the Garden, you and I are created to commune with God.

We studied the Gospel of John earlier this year, and do you remember Jesus’ analogy of the Vine and the Branches in John 15:1-8 (see post here).  He says that he is the vine and we are the branches.  Just like a branch needs to remain in the vine if that branch wants power to produce fruit, unless we remain in him, we will not have power to produce the fruit of changed lives that he desires in our life and in others’ lives.  How do we remain in him?  There are many ways, but I believe prayer might be the greatest example of abiding in Christ.

I’ve written often about The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence, so I’m only going to briefly remind you of him.  Brother Lawrence was a monk in the 1600s, and he remained in and abided in Christ, by carrying on a conversation with God all day long.  He called it practicing the presence of God.   God’s presence is there with us, even if we can’t see him.  The Spirit lives in us, even if we can’t feel him.  So Brother Lawrence worked in the monastery kitchen, and he talked with the God no matter if he was washing dishes, making meals, or buying groceries.  But it wasn’t as though Lawrence one day decided to talk with God all day long. He writes that it took him years of practice. Learning to pray in the Spirit takes time!

How often are you aware of the presence of God with you?  In you?  Around you?  Are you giving time to communing with God, talking, listening, waiting on him, waiting with him?

When I was taking that prayer class as a bible college student, I didn’t learn about that side of prayer.  That came later.  Only a few years ago actually.  What I am talking about is meditation.

I encourage you to spend time with God meditating.  Meditation is a scary word.  Sounds like something from an eastern religion, right?   But Biblical meditation is not like that.  In eastern meditation adherents empty their minds. 

In Psalm 1, however, we are taught to meditate day and night on God’s Word.  The word the psalmist uses is to ponder, think, consider, and even, get this, growl! There is a visceral grappling that happens in biblical meditation.

Consider this viewpoint on meditation from Psalm 27:4,

“One thing I ask from the LORD, this only do I seek: that I may dwell in the house of the LORD all the days of my life, to gaze on the beauty of the LORD and to seek him in his temple.”

We can spend time in prayer just gazing on the beauty of the Lord.  That’s not emptying our minds.  That is thinking about how amazing God is.  That is asking how God is doing, and listening patiently and expectantly for his answer.  Ask him what his heart and mind is about a current circumstance you are going through, or about something happening in the world.

Photo by Pradamas Gifarry on Unsplash