Blog 9

Class this week has been both challenging and thought provoking, an overall fascinating examination of the implication of the words of the Lord's Prayer. While it is a prayer that most Christians recite word for word at least weekly, it's words are often quoted quite thoughtlessly. Of course, this does not mean that they should not be said just because they are not understood, but taking the time to analyze each phrase is certainly not something I have ever done. In doing so, I am beginning to think that each word could lead to a hundred different theological discussions, and in combination, an infinity of possible insights. When Jesus told his disciples to pray using these words, how much did he intend for us to extract from them? The words are a formula, but are they a rule of prayer or a strict theological teaching? I am brought to the question of discrepancies between our purpose in prayer and God's purpose for our prayer. How in the world do we discriminate between our own wordly definitions and interpretations of God's desire and God's true desire? The boundaries of our human theological thought processes are overwhelming, and lead me to intense "head-hurting" moments, as Randy would call them. However, it is when I get caught up in my own ponderances, trying to understand, that I become the most confused. There has to be some sort of balance between our desire to understand God and our ability to be satisfied with mystery. I think God wants us to try to understand--if we don't, we are in a sense avoiding truth by denying our intelligence. It seems like an insult to God to pretend that we humans are too human to understand God--God did create us afterall, and I am sure that God created us with the ability to understand as much as we needed to understand to get through life on Earth. Even now, however, I speak of God and God's intentions and desires, and the only way I am able to do so is in the language terms that I have learned. How is it that we can get to the point of reconstructing our image of God in our heads, abandoning the language that refers to God as a thing and accepting God for what God is--that God is (at least, that is as much as God told Moses).
These classes have me thinking more deeply about the trouble of words and expression and truth in relation to prayer than I think I ever have. At the same time, however, I have found it even more difficult to pray in the last couple of weeks. While I think this is a common experience, I wonder why it is that the more I have been thinking about prayer, the less I have been doing prayer. I have to be careful not to become so philosophical or intellectual about it that I distance myself from what it really is, which is a communication with God that I am required to partake in and should enjoy, without worrying about whether I am doing it right or it is being heard, whether God is disappointed in my prayers or I am doing them with the wrong intention.
The idea that the law of prayer is the law of belief has me challenging both my prayers and my belief. I say that I believe, but does my prayer life reflect that? Do I choose to believe in God? Does one choose to believe in the Truth? I don't choose to believe in things we commonly know as true, I just do because they are--so do I have the same perception of God? How do I avoid creating God in my own image for my own convenience, and if I don't, how do I find rest in the idea of forgiveness and salvation?