Thursday, February 12, 2004

Brennan Manning quoting M. Basil Pennington on prayer

Let us suppose you give your three-year-old daughter a coloring book and box of crayons for her birthday. The following day, with the proud smile only a little one can muster, she presents her first pictures for inspection. She has colored the sun black, the grass purple, and the sky green. In the lower right-hand corner, woozy wonders of floating slabs and hovering rings: on the left, a panoply of colorful, carefree squiggles. You marvel at her bold strokes and intuit that her psyche is railing against it´s own cosmic puniness in the face of a big, ugly world. Later at the office, you share with your staff your daughters first artistic effort and you make veiled references to the early work of Van Gogh.


A little child cannot do a bad coloring; nor can a child of God do a bad prayer. "A father is delighted when his little one, leaving off her toys and friends, runs to him and climbs into his arms. As he holds his little one close to him, he cares little whether the child is looking around, her attention flitting from one thing to another, or just settling down to sleep. Essentially the child is choosing to be with her father, confident of the love, the care, the security that is hers in those arms. Our prayer is much like that. We settle down in our Father´s arms, in his loving hands. Our mind, our thoughts, our imagination may flit about here and there; we might even fall asleep; but essentially we are choosing for this time to remain intimately with our Father, giving ourselves to him, receiving his love and care, letting him enjoy us as he will. It is very simple prayer. It is very childlike prayer. It is prayer that opens us out to all the delights of the kingdom."


 

3 comments:

  1. I like that. You know all the reading I have been doing on prayer where it is so often described as warfare - and I know it is that sometimes - and I think there is no way I can pray like the "big" guys. This invites me. This kind of prayer doesn't scare me away. I don't have to be a great Christian to go and talk to God like a child. I don't have to pretend to have some great faith. He'll just let me come like I am, in my dirty clothes and all.

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  2. the simpler.....the better. I just need to learn to say fewer words and have more enthusiasm with those words I do speak.....like a 2or3 year old......dadda help.....dadda more....(not even please).....dadda i love you.....dadda up......

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  3. I must be a really nasty twisted character. It made me think of how some theology is like that childs drawing. Reality all twisted and wrong, yet some people insist it's great because it favours a liberal outlook.



    Oh well.

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