Learning to Pray

I think all of us must have had at some moment in our lives an encounter with God.  God is He Who from the beginning has revealed Himself to mankind -- and whatever He DID, He continues to DO, because He is eternal.

We read about such encounters in the Bible:  God meets Abraham; He meets Jacob on his journey, Moses, and Joshua.  He meets Mary.  And we tend to think these are unusual -- but I rather think these meetings are not unusual, but the common event for all of us.  And the encounters are all different, depending on the nature of the man himself.

God has a passion for communicating with us.  He wants us to know Him -- and the only way that can happen is for Him to reveal Himself to each one of us.  Our response to that revelation is prayer -- adoration, worship, thanksgiving, petition, intercession.  So many times, we try to pray without knowing Who it is we are praying TO!  Who is this God to whom we address our prayer?  Once we address that question, we are on our way to real prayer, or "intimate conversation with One who we know loves us," in the words of Teresa of Avila.  Until we can truly say, "You are MY God," we have not yet begun to pray.

One afternoon years ago, I sat in my office minding my own business.  Suddenly, a "voice" broke into my thoughts:  "Who are your favorite people in the Bible?"  Without thinking about it at all, I spontaneously answered, "Enoch, Deborah, and Abraham."  If I had pondered the question, I may have weighed different responses -- but these names just popped to the surface without thought.  Immediately came the reply:  "Walk with Me; Sit with Me; Stand with Me."

Surprised, I then began to think:  Enoch "walked" with God until he was no more; Deborah "sat" under a tree and "judged" Israel; and Abraham --- how did Abraham "stand" with God?  Curious, I pulled out my bible and searched -- and sure enough, it says Abraham "stood" with God and interceded with Him about the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah.  And this, after God says, "Should I hide from Abraham what I am about to do?" (Gen. 18:17).

Looking back now, years later, I realize that God was teaching me how to pray.  It's not always about praying the rosary or saying novenas -- although that, for some people, is how God has taught them to pray, and St. Augustine says, "Pray as you can, not as you can't!"  That is great advice, even though I'd bet most of us lament the ways we cannot pray, not realizing that the Holy Spirit helps us in our weakness, uttering prayers with unutterable groans in us, and God hears the prayers we cannot say (Romans 8:26).

In other words, God Himself prays in us and through us; He breathes through us the prayers He wants to answer for the world around us.  "I never know what to say," said a friend of mine one day.  But maybe if we walk with Him long enough, sit with Him for awhile, and stand with Him in intercession for our friends and our cities, we'll eventually feel comfortable enough to "say" nothing at all!