Prayer Practice
Sometimes I play music on the guitar without really thinking about it. It just seems to flow from my fingers. Sometimes I forget how I came to this ability. I mentioned in a sermon two Sundays ago that I am helping one of our youth learn to play the guitar, and because he struggles with the simplest things, I sometimes laugh at the sounds that come out of the guitar.
I am tempted to think to myself, “it’s so easy – your fingers just go like this…”
As I mentioned in that sermon, I am trying to maintain a “beginner’s brain” and always be learning, so I’m trying to learn the guitar as a beginner. I flip the guitar around and ask my hands to do something they have no practice at. And it sounds terrible! I sound much worse than my student. He sounds great compared to my beginner’s hands.
The difference between these two guitar players within me is practice. In one position my hands have each learned their own role and how to work together and how to caress music out of a guitar. But if I switch the guitar and so switch the roles of each hand, I play like a beginner.
It’s not that in the new position I don’t know where my fingers should go. I know exactly where they should go.
It’s just so clumsy because my fingers have not practiced these roles. My hands have each mastered a different practice, one to press strings against the fingerboard, the other to pluck the strings.
But when I ask them to switch roles, even with the same brain informing them both, they are clumsy amateurs. They have no practice of embodying the art of playing the guitar. The brain has the information about location, position, and motion. But the hands have no embodied practice.
It takes practice to gain competence at the things we want to learn and the things we love to do. Flower arranging. Cooking. Reading. Drawing. Singing. Walking. They all require practice.
Prayer also requires practice. There are many interesting and wonderful prayer practices that Christians have practiced through the ages. But to become comfortable with them and to begin to enjoy communicating with them requires practice.
One of these practices is called Lectio Divina. It is a way of praying with the Bible while listening quietly and attentively. It’s much more about attention and listening and not about talking. I love it and I want to share it with you, so I am inviting you to join me on Thursday mornings at 8 am for a time of group Lectio Divina adapted for via Zoom.
The link to this and all our small groups is on the TUC website on the “Small Groups” page in the “Get Involved” menu. It requires no homework or prior experience. You only need interest and an openness to listen and receive in prayer with God.
Please join me to practice this practice. It’s an ancient prayer practice (well, the Zoom part is not ancient) that can help us experience time together in quiet before God.
If you can make it I will be glad to see you next Thursday at 8 am. I thank God for our church where we can share our practices with each other.
Warmly in Christ,
Pastor Steve
