Spiritual Solutions

“Teach us to pray!” the disciples cried out Jesus.

In our modern day and times we still have that same request on our hearts and minds. We look to God, we look to teachers, we look to the presence of the living Christ within, to teach us to pray. We want to know the way to pray.

We all have different forms of prayer and different purposes of prayer. Today I’m inviting you to look a a specific purpose of prayer; this purpose is to draw us into the experiencing of God’s very presence in our lives.

It has been said that God is a sphere whose center is everywhere and whose circumference is nowhere.

Since we are made in the image and likeness of God, so of our own selves, too, it can be said that our center is everywhere and our circumference is nowhere.

When we begin to relate to, turn to, focus upon, and establish ourselves in that center of our own being, we find that we are in the divine center of God’s presence.

So the prayer that I invite you to work with and focus upon today is the journey to the divine center of our being, where we are at one with God.

Jim Rosemergy, in his book A Closer Walk with God, says that all religious teachers from the past have always focused upon the idea that “Teach us to pray” really means “Teach us to wait.” Waiting is the essence and the root of prayer. We must learn to wait; we must learn the skill of patience in prayer. We learn lots of skills, but the greatest skill on the spiritual path is to learn to wait.

It is much like the servant in the parable told by Jesus. In the parable the servant had to wait for his master to come home; his master was expected but didn’t return home until after midnight. The servant stayed awake, and when the master finally returned he made that servant the master of his whole household.

The parable is a wonderful analogy for the spiritual necessity of waiting, waiting upon the Lord, waiting upon the presence of God for whatever length of time it takes so that we may feel and experience God’s presence.

TEACH US TO WAIT

Not easy, is it, to wait? We get caught up in lots of business we’re involved in during our daily lives. The mind wanders, and that’s the tremendous challenges of trying to wait. The mind wanders, it gets caught up in our everyday activities, it gets caught up in the things we feel we ought to be doing, or what we think about ourselves or about someone we’re close to. We think about our to-do list or people who are on our mind, people we want to pray for.

It’s hard to let go of doing things in prayer. So we try to put effort into it; but in waiting, there is no effort involved. We cannot really bring God’s presence into our consciousness through our own efforts.

We can get to a certain point, we can move in a certain direction, but we cannot move into a consciousness of God’s presence through effort. We have to move to a point of waiting. Then when we wait, the Spirit that is within us lifts us up and carries us into an awareness of God’s presence.

The fruits of waiting are wonderful. In Isaiah 40 we find this great promise that comes to those who wait: “But they who wait for the Lord shall renew their strength; they shall mount up with wings like eagles, they shall run and not be weary, they shall walk and not faint.”

The Hebrew word “wait” also has the meaning of “to bind together.” So, in a very real sense, waiting on God’s presence means a divine union, a binding together in our oneness with God.

DENIALS AND AFFIRMATIONS

In Unity we often use denials and positive affirmation. Sometimes they are thought of as mind-conditioners, to help us think positive thoughts instead of thinking negative thoughts.

Certainly in our beginning steps in the study of Truth we use denials and affirmations in that way; we deny the power of a situation over us, we affirm the truth of the situation even though we cannot see it in the outer, and we try to condition our minds to change the negative thought to the positive realization of God’s presence and power. We may affirm that certain employment is coming our way, that healing is already taking place, that prosperity is ours right now; it’s as though we are conditioning our minds.

Jim Rosemergy, in his book A Closer Walk with God, says that one day when he was at a retreat and working with affirmations and the teacher was using that idea of conditioning the mind, the thought came to him, “I don’t have to condition my subconscious any more.

He stopped in his meditation as he was hearing that thought within him, and he listened further. The next realization that came to him was “You have the mind of Christ.” He was picking up on the words of St. Paul, in I Corinthians, when he said, “We have the mind of Christ.”

So Jim realized he did not have to condition his subconscious, and that’s not really what affirmations and denials are for. They are really to lift us to that point where we’re able to wait to realize God’s presence, just as happened to Jim.

I remember when my wife Kathryn and I were in ministerial school; a wonderful minister and teacher by the name of Dr. Sue Sikking came to give a talk to us. She said, “One of these days, you will not use denials and affirmations in the way you use them now.”

My mind closed out that part “in the way you use them now.” I thought she was saying “you won’t use denials and affirmations.” I thought, “Gosh, will there ever be a day when I don’t use those?”

Of course, she was not saying that we would not use them at all but that our consciousness about them will change. Instead of using them as so-called mind-conditioners you will use them in relation to realizing the truth about God’s presence within you, such as when you say, “The Father and I are one,” “I am one with the presence of God,” “I dwell in the heart of God.” That kind of affirmation is what you will use.

So it’s a different kind of focus altogether. It focuses upon bringing us to a point of waiting. That kind of prayer is an active prayer, an affirmation that can bring you to the point where you have to let God take over.

It can be a prayer that you say over and over again as long as it’s not what Jesus called “vain repetitions” where you’re just saying it without thought, but where it’s bringing you into a consciousness of oneness with God.

You can align this sort of prayer with your heartbeat; you can say it on the beat of your heart so you get into the feeling of it, like this:

“Be - still - and - know - that - I - am - God,” or, ”I - and - the - Father - are - one.” Get in the feeling of it.

You can even do it when you’re walking. But get into the rhythm of it; that’s an active prayer. It’s a positive affirmation, and it’s what can be called an active prayer.

Blessings to you,

Rev. Alan A. Rowbotham

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In “Teach Us to Pray - part 2″ we will look at a prayer that takes us deep into the silence and how to deal with the wandering thoughts that come up. Be sure to check back to the blog for this next installment.

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