Posted on 08/25/2016 7:14:46 AM PDT by Salvation
The Lord says that we have to pray and indicates that without prayer we will give way to temptation. Thus prayer is essential for us to escape sin and keep our lives on the right path. While God offers many graces to overcome sin and live holy lives, those graces are often delivered through the doorway of prayer. Prayer is God’s way of knocking at the door of our heart; prayer is our way of answering. Prayer is God’s offer and prayer is our response. Jesus says,
Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me (Rev 3:20).
The shared meal referred to here, beyond its reference to the Eucharist, is also a sign of intimacy. While our culture is casual about eating (and just about everything else), in those days sharing a meal was not done with just anyone. Meals were shared with close family and friends. That is one reason that people of Jesus’ time were often surprised to see the people with whom Jesus shared meals. St. Peter also shocked the people of his time when he entered the household of a Gentile (Cornelius) and ate with him (Acts 10 & 11).
So, Jesus knocking at the door of our heart, seeking entrance, and sharing a meal, is a sign of reverence and intimacy. And we surely also need the food He offers: His Word and His Word made flesh.
Yes, prayer is both beautiful and essential.
Yet many Christians find prayer difficult. To some degree, our difficulties today are greater than in previous eras due to the constant noise and abundant distractions of our time. So noisy and frantic are our lives that sitting still and being silent is downright unnerving for many.
This is all the more reason that we must pray and pray well!
Learning to pray is not just a “fake it till you make it” proposition. As with any other area of life, we need to be taught; we can benefit from the experience of those who have gone before us. While it is true that prayer must be more than a “technique,” it is also true that prayer is more than a vague and purely subjective experience. Thus teaching can help us to find what is best and to avoid pitfalls that can discourage us.
Of all the books on prayer I recommend, The Fulfillment of All Desire by Dr. Ralph Martin is at the very top of my list. Anyone for whom I have been a spiritual director will attest that my first request of him or her is to obtain a copy of Dr. Martin’s book and begin reading it.
The book is valuable not only due to Ralph’s own wonderful insights, but also because he organizes and summarizes the teachings of the great Doctors of prayer (from the Catholic and Western traditions) so well. He draws heavily from St. Paul, St. Augustine, St. Teresa of Avila, St. John of the Cross, St. Catherine of Siena, St. Francis De Sales, St. Therese of Lisieux, St. Bernard of Clairvaux, and St. Thomas Aquinas.
He organizes the material along the fundamental stages of prayer: the purgative way, the illuminative way, and the unitive way. In the purgative stage we seek, by God’s grace, to identify our sins and attachments and to become increasingly free of them. We undergo basic conversion and begin to develop the habit of prayer. In the illuminative stage we see our love for and intimacy with God and neighbor increase, the virtues grow stronger within us, and our prayer become quieter and deeper. In the unitive stage, having made progress by grace, we receive a habitual, deep, and ever-deepening union with God, marked by joy, humility, and stability.
In his presentation of each stage, Dr. Martin samples richly from the writings of the saints and the teaching of the Church. He also gives much practical advice that helps to root the teaching within the setting of the modern world. He goes to the sources and brings them to us, applying their wisdom to our situation.
Simply put, the book is essential to anyone who seeks a guide to prayer.
And, dear readers, I hope you do seek a guide to prayer, for prayer is essential. Jesus said that temptation is looming, and if we don’t pray our lives can go off track pretty quickly without that remedy. But the Lord did not leave us alone to respond to so great a summons! He has sent us saints and biblical wisdom to teach us. And in our times, He anointed Dr. Ralph Martin to compile and present this wisdom to us freshly and comprehensively.
If you don’t have a copy of The Fulfillment of All Desire, go sell all that you have and buy one! 🙂
Okay intercession falls under petition, as does penitence. And wordless adoration is, or at least implies, thanksgiving.
Some of us Catholics pray almost the entire Psalter every 4 weeks. My experience, having done this for decades, is that a psalm or a chunk of a Psalm will come unbidden but aptly to my alleged mind.
So, yeah, one can and many do pray rote prayers unconsciously. “We do not know how to pray as we ought.” But I don’t think they’re worthless. I may pray distractedly today what comes to my lips with power and urgency tomorrow. (Also, passages from scripture used as hymns or prayers are part of our daily practice.)
Amazon link for: With The Church
Amazon link for: Divine Intimacy
Between the two I would pick With The Church by Fr. Goossens. His meditations are wonderful, packed with scriptural insights, and the book is small enough to carry around easily (compared to Divine Intimacy).
Thanks for the recommendations!
I ordered Divine Intimacy based on the number of positive reviews, and the fact that it's easier to get (still published).
I'm a Trad at heart, so I greatly appreciate your recommendations.
Imitation of Christ, Book 3, 50 (87) How a Desolate Person Ought to Commit Himself into the Hands of God
...Let him be a little slighted, let him be humbled, let him fail in the sight of men, let him be afflicted with sufferings and pains, so that he may rise again with You in the dawn of the new light and be glorified in heaven...
It’s a great book. Everyone needs to read it.
I’m undertaking to read one link a day.
.
Yahweh has been demolished by real Paleo-Hebrew scholars for over a decade.
Wikipedophiles are always way behind the curve of real knowledge.
Yahweh is the choice of the “Jew-a-bes” along with their other contra-biblical nonsense like wearing Kipas, and calling their nicolaitans “Rabbi.”
It lets them feel so “Jewish.” (Jewish = Phariseeish)
They forget that our Messiach completely denounced every word and practice of the Pharisees in his ministry, and declared that our righteousness must greatly exceed that of the Pharisees.
King David is supposed to be our example.
.
Jesus taught us how to pray
And still teaches us.
Try reading Andrew Murray with Christ in the school of prayer for a good Evangelical approach to fearing the voice of God in Prayer. The audio
Can be found here.
https://librivox.org/with-christ-in-the-school-of-prayer-by-andrew-murray/
Ralph Martin tends to use the Catholic vocabulary and is pentecostal in style, so might turn some people off. I haven’t read the book.
Or you could just follow Jesus' instructions:
Matt 6:5-15
5
"And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by men. I tell you the truth, they have received their reward in full. 6 But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you. 7 And when you pray, do not keep on babbling like pagans, for they think they will be heard because of their many words. 8 Do not be like them, for your Father knows what you need before you ask him.9
"This, then, is how you should pray:"'Our Father in heaven,
hallowed be your name,
10
your kingdom come,your will be done
on earth as it is in heaven.
11
Give us today our daily bread.12
Forgive us our debts,as we also have forgiven our debtors.
13
And lead us not into temptation,but deliver us from the evil one.'
a14
For if you forgive men when they sin against you, your heavenly Father will also forgive you. 15 But if you do not forgive men their sins, your Father will not forgive your sins.
NIV
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