prayer – Syncopated Hustle

As I engaged in morning prayer, I was sieged by the truth of the scriptures and the love of God. It never ceases to amaze me how God can love a prideful wretch such as myself. His enduring love is a “majestic negotiation” with the soul. If I tried describing just how great this dude is , I am not sure if I would be able to capture the fullness of his character. Understand when I was in the midst of sin he cared enough to chill with me. When I was in the midst of chaos, he cared enough to bring shalom. How much more can he do to display his love for a person?

It is an endless pursuit that was initiated by him toward me. He chose to initiate his love toward a person who actually dissed him. Peep out Proverbs 8:22:

“The Lord possessed me at the beginning of his work, the first of his acts of old.”

God had me in mind when he was creating this world. I was intelligibly created with a promise and purpose. I was not a haphazard thought that stumble upon the Earth. God systematically,calculated the intent of my surroundings and then placed me there to effect or to be affected. He then proceeded to bomb me with his love…

Seeking Shalom

I am convinced that we have camouflaged reality and sold it off as creativeness. We have taken the pride of being authentic and sold it to the highest bidder for a “sparrow and 2 cents.” Life has recollected the sewage of our experiences and put them on display for unscripted laughs. We are left to re-define the meaning of value and truth.

What is important? What is life really about? Here are existential questions that Paul Tillich would deem brings about “existential doubt”-doubting for the purpose of trying to understand. It is such basic questions that have left us in a query. A brother and myself wrestled answering the question: What can I be in prayer about for you? A simple question you would think one could garner a quick response but it troubled us to answer.

Though, I responded fairly quickly, my mind really did not register the magnitude of what he was asking. We have used the term with such ambiguity that the very essence of its meaning has been aborted as useless rhetoric. But as I wrestled with the thought, long after our conversation, I was amazed at how superficial many have made prayer- that intimate interconnected space of convening with God to engage in dialogue.

I concluded that we really do not have a problem with prayer or God but we have a problem with ourselves. It can be a scary thing to find out that you are really not all that and prayer is just the place where that happens. We have grown accustom to noise in order to drown out the sounds of our souls that scream with anguish because of our maltreatment toward ourselves. Noise, that allows us to escape the reality of life and become an imaginary member of the Kardashians.

But what is lost in the noise is the meditative soothing of the soul in quietness-that peace that passes all understanding. Noise has become so normative that quiet eludes us with leprous intentions to evade. But it is the still, quiet that God begins to really unearth and chisel at the hearts of men. It is in the quiet where the monologue of self transforms into dialogue of love and God becomes real. There is no need to view reality because you experience it in the quiet.