Between Praise and Repentance

As we finish up our six-week reflection on the habit of daily prayer, what do I say? Over the past few weeks, I have met with people who come for Morning Prayer to pray and get “immersed” with others in the practice. I have talked to people in my study, including a young man who came in and said, “I need you to teach me to pray.” On occasions like these, especially after six weeks of pondering the “whys and wherefores” of prayer, I feel shame because there is just so much to say and experience that I can’t gather it all up in a neat little bundle so––“Boom”–– we would all know how to pray.And yet, nothing in life is like that. With almost anything we give ourselves to in life, we find the door in and we think we’ve got it figured out. But just when we think we know everything, alas, we realize we are just in the first room of a seven-storied castle, and it will take a lifetime to explore and understand all the different rooms and floors. For example, I love to cook and, to some people, I am pretty good at cooking; and yet when I open a French Cookbook or am talking to my son James (who has far surpassed me), I realize I am like a child playing at large and wonderful things. So how does that make me feel? To think, on the one hand, that I have mastered something, and then to be reminded, once again, that I am just at the beginning of an adventure? Here is where it leaves me—somewhere between praise and repentance. I feel great thanksgiving at what I do know and can experience in my craft; at the same time, I must in humility acknowledge that compared to some, “I just ain’t that good.”I think this is a proper posture to end our meditations on. Prayer, like any subject you give yourself to, is so vast that the more you know, the more you realize what you don’t know. This is where prayer lives, not just because we know so little, but because of who we are and the subject of our quest––God! Prayer is a pursuit of God and is only made possible because of God’s overwhelming, gracious, and seeking love—Praise. And yet, I am so messed up and am such a lost sheep, I know that I wouldn’t even know God if He wasn’t seeking me, even in my sin—thus, repentance. You will never outgrow this posture, nor should you. We will talk about it on Sunday.