Prayer that does not move outward dies. When I hear this, I am haunted by the thought that unless I am hurried and harried by my efforts to do good, my prayer life must be dying. It is more along the lines of saying, "To breathe, you inhale and exhale." There is a necessary rhythm to prayer that follows Jesus commands: "Love God and love your neighbor."
Similarly, Moving Upward comes naturally to Moving Outward. Foster quotes from Bernard of Clairvaux about the relationship between Moving Outward and Moving Inward and Upward: "If then you are wise, you will show yourself rather as a reservoir than as a canal. For a canal spreads abroad water as it receives it, but a reservoir waits until it is filled before overflowing, and thus communicates, without loss to itself, its superabundant water. In the Church in the present day, we have many canals, few reservoirs." (Prayer Treasury, Foster, p. 168) Now I find I can practice what Jesus told his disciples to do, "Freely you have received, freely give." (Matthew 10:8)
ASKING A GOD WHO WANTS TO GIVE FREELY
Praying the Ordinary, Petitionary Prayer, and Intercessory Prayer form the beginnings of giving. All of them serve to keep me giving along with God rather than in my own strength with my own resources. Praying the Ordinary takes brings prayer into my life "by turning ordinary experiences into prayer, . . . seeing God in the ordinary experiences of life, and . . . by praying throughout the ordinary experiences of life." (ibid, p. 169) In asking for myself (petition) and for others (intercession), I can ask for God to supply of the things I have let go and I ask freely from a God who wants to gives freely.
Giving deepens through Healing Prayer and the Prayer of Suffering. The strength of the cross is that it promises both healing and the redemption of suffering. Resurrection is the ultimate form of healing and the hope for which all healing points to. As for suffering: "George MacDonald notes, 'The Son of God suffered unto death, not that men might not suffer, but that their suffering might be like His.'" (ibid, p. 322) Both prayers for healing and in suffering are based in giving from the strength and hope that God gives.
GIVING REQUIRES COMMUNITY
Authoritative Prayer and Radical Prayer address healing and suffering through command rather than request, and in community rather than solitude. "In the power of God we learn to take authority over everyday issues like our eating habits and and our sexual fantasies and our fears and our failures." (ibid, 237) In these prayers, I feel God has wanted me to learn how to identify more deeply with Christ by not merely asking, but speaking out his will in community.
As I spend time with my family or go to church or even go to work, I sometimes dream about what it would be like to be in a world or community where such giving was typical and not extraordinary. What would it be like to live where prayer was as natural as complaining is now? Blessing as easy as cursing? Healing as pervasive as hurting? This will be the case someday. By God's grace my heart and my life will be ready for it.
Lord, teach me not to hold my breath, trying to hoard in all your blessings, goodness, and knowledge that you give so freely. Let me breath out with prayer, kindness, and service, sharing your gifts freely as you have shared them with me, knowing that you will always share more. Let my prayer not become a time when I gripe about how bad everyone seems, but rather a time where I can hear you speaking through other people's lives. Amen.
