I've been really busy lately - worship ministry, student ministry and multimedia can do that to you in a hurry - but I wanted to share something I'm really excited about.
To be honest, I have never been a good pray-er. I've prayed almost my whole life, but I haven't spent a lot of time in prayer. The last several years, I discovered journaling, which has been a good way for me to pray and to put my thoughts down. Since I have a bad short-term memory, praying without journaling can be tough because my mind becomes very quickly unfocused and distracted, and I find myself thinking of everything but God during prayer.
My journaling has been pretty non-existent over the last few years, except for when I need to vent or rant about something. But in the last month or so, I have been spending a big chunk of time before I go to bed journaling and praying. I think partly because as a pastor in a new church plant, you HAVE to depend on God. I find myself praying a lot for His provision in our church.
I'm excited about a book that came in the mail today - called The Divine Hours - Prayers For Springtime. It's actually one of three books that go through seasons and prayer. I'm excited because just as journaling has helped me keep my thoughts during prayer together, so this book, which calls itself a "manual for prayer", will help keep me daily scheduled with times of prayer. I've never used The Common Book of Prayer, or really any liturgical forms of prayer, so this should be interesting.
Another book I recommend (and just finished) is The Sacred Way by Tony Jones. He goes through a bunch of ancient practices and shows how we can do them in our contemporary culture today. This book is what led me to The Divine Hours.
2 comments:
Sounds like a good book. I really like some of the ancient rituals...unfortunately people do them without thinking or meaning too many times.
I like to pray in the morning..my mind seems clearer and more focused.
I usually pray at night, because my mind is not clear or focused - in fact, I usually find myself saying and doing stupid things just because I'm not awake yet. This often involves coffee products, i.e. spilling on myself, putting in too much sugar or cream, getting my order wrong, etc.
So far, today I have done two of the sections for the day, and it has been really good for me. I need that kind of structure, I think.
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