The Jesus school of Prayer

I want to go on a journey to learn how to pray. I've been troubled by this desire all my Christian life, and I've decided it's finally time to do something about it.

Those are strange words and they need explaining. After all, I'm a professional Christian, a vicar, a leader of a church. So I should be an expert on prayer, shouldn't I?

Except I know I'm not.

There have been times in my Christian life when God has been so close, so real to me that nothing else compares to the delight of knowing him and being known. At such times, there was nothing I would rather do than stay in his presence.

But they never last. Most of the time, I'm too distracted, busy, tired, lazy, or all four to lift a finger to try and find my way back to his shining presence. Then I feel ashamed of myself, and say angrily, “What kind of a Christian am I? Do I believe this God stuff or not? Why can't I make myself live it?”

That's a bit harsh. I'm not all bad. But I'm not all good either. I struggle with seeing things through. I've made dozens of fresh starts. Again and again I've said, “This time it will be different. This time I really mean it. This time...”

And what's so different about this time? Only the fact that it's public. Two years ago, I publicly committed myself to reading the Bible through in a year. And to my surprise, I did it. I managed to find time every day to read large chunks of it, even the boring bits. I think the going public helped. It gave me an accountability that I otherwise lacked.

So now I want to invite you to come with me on a journey of prayer. I'm going to be talking about seven different aspects of the God-language that I want to learn, spaced out over a year or more (I'm not sure how long it will take.) I will be introducing each aspect to my church family in a sermon, and committing myself to a series of actions that will help me explore this avenue of prayer for the next month or so. And inviting others to do it with me. During that month, I'll blog and tweet any insights, encouragements or discouragements, then report back and introduce the next chapter.

It's inspired, hopefully by God, but also by Gerard and Chrissie Kelly, who wrote a book called Intimate with the Ultimate in 2009. I'll be using their seven headings, which conveniently all begin with R. I know I'm not a real Christian preacher and teacher, because I can never get my points to all begin with the same letter. 

Anyway, on this journey we'll be looking at prayer that's

Relational

Rhythmic

Restless

Rich

Reciprocal

Rooted

Revolutionary

Come with me. Let's see where the journey takes us.