Why I Pray

The world is filled with gossamer, shimmering beauty, as is all of life itself.  But unless I begin each morning in prayer, I miss it.  I don't know how I can be so blind as to think that I'm seeing what exists when I don't pray --- but obviously, I have spent a lot of years thinking that what I was seeing was "real," when there was so much that I was missing.

I have been reading The Shack for the past few days -- I would have finished it this morning if I had not somehow hidden the book from myself.  But still, that book has described for me so much of my own experience with the Trinity, the Three Persons in One, that I am planning to read it again and again.  Like the Gospel of John, the first reading takes away my breath in its profound revelation, but I know that it will do so again on the second, third, and fourth readings.  And just to be sure, I think it should be read at least once a year after that. 

A year ago, I had read a review of The Shack in a magazine.  The reviewer seemed to think that the book was "simplistic."  And then a friend told me that William P. Young had written the book for his "children," and as a book for children, it was a good story.  I did not know at the time, that when Young wrote the book, his children were adults and had children of their own.  So I was pretty sure that this was a book I would not ever read.  But for the past few weeks, something kept telling me to get The Shack.  I would look it up online and then decide to see if my local library had a copy -- but of course would forget about it.  A week or so later, the process would repeat itself.  Then, last Friday, while I was running errands and was at the bank, something again urged me to check out the library. 

When I got home that day with the book, I began reading and could not put it down.  What a profound treatise on the Holy Trinity that is yet "fully human" through the intimate relationship that Jesus Christ has with us!  Indeed, Young did start out to write a book for his adult children, but the book was reworked and honed to perfection with a team of dedicated writers whose souls and experience resonated with Young's story.  Anyone who has truly experienced in prayer The Father, The Son, and the Holy Spirit will recognize and rejoice in the depictions of the Three in One that Young portrays in The Shack. 

So much of the story and of the dialog is so lined up with Scripture that reading this book is a prayerful, Scriptural experience.  At one point, the Holy Spirit (a shimmering feminine character in the book, who cannot be directly viewed but who is present at "at one's side") touches the eyes of the main character, and he sees "what the Father sees," a brilliant, shimmering, world of colors and spirits.  That is what I see in prayer; every morning, my "eyes are opened," and I see what I cannot see when I do not pray.  I see relationships and energies and beauties that are hidden when I fail to pray.  I see myself as not "other" from The Three in One, but as a part of and centered in their swirling, loving relationship with One Another. 

This is what Young's book portrays:  The Three Persons as intimate to and submissive to and servant of One Another and of every detail of our human existence, in a very personal and intimate way.  They are not "out there and remote" from our existence, but "at the side of" each one of us, taking part, healing, revealing, teaching, bringing us into their relationship with one another.  Jesus said that He would send The Paraclete, the Advocate to us.  "Paraclete" is a Greek word meaning "One Who is called alongside of [us]."  "Advocate" is a legal term meaning "One who speaks for us [in a court of law], One who defends us."  The Holy Spirit is at our side, speaking always for us, in us, to us, and through us. 

William P. Young's The Shack so beautifully depicts why I have learned, through the gift of the Holy Spirit, to pray each day --- so that I can enjoy -- yes, enjoy! -- the loving relationship and fellowship of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit in every event of life, so that They can reveal to me "what's going on" in my life, and so They can show me each day the world They see: shimmering, full of beauty and color and shining lights, and the way They see the people I meet each day -- not the way I see them at all.

At Medjugore, Mary told the children visionaries: Pray until prayer becomes joy for you.  Wonderful advice!  And The Shack is a great way to begin.  In fact, the reason I did not finish reading it yesterday is that it led me so deep into adoration and thanksgiving to the Divine Trinity that I put it down and could not continue reading it.  As soon I find the spot where I laid it, I will take it up again.  But this will not be the end of the book, only the introduction to a second and third reading. 

A book for children?  Only if they already know and love the Holy Trinity, and each Person individually!  Only if they have already seen the world as it exists spiritually as well as physically!  Celia Thaxter once wrote: As I hold the flower in my hand and think of tryng to describe it, I realize how poor a creature I am, how impotent are words in the presence of such perfection.  Yesterday, I wrote about how God chooses the weak and impotent things of this world as channels of His grace.  Anyone who reads the "backstory" of William Paul Young, a very abused and neglected and emotionally scarred child, knows that only God Himself could have healed and redeemed and perfected this child as an instrument of His revelation and truth!