...more and more

God who made us, Christ who calls us,

Breath who guides from deep within,

may our lives of mumbled praying

end with Heaven’s clear “Amen.”

---Terry W. York, 2006

In this beautiful new hymn, which guides us into worship with an invocation of the Trinity—God, Christ, Breath—we are called to consider the deep mystery that is prayer. Well. At least, to me, prayer is often deep mystery. I think I am clear on some differences between prayer and wishing, and prayer and magic…although I am certain that in moments of crisis I might act less on points of clarity and more on base instinct.

When I think of magical prayer, I think of the now-famous instruction Dorothy was given in L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel Wonderful Wizard of Oz:

Then close your eyes and tap your heels together three times. And think to yourself, there’s no place like home.

As for the power of wishing, who doesn’t immediately burst into song on hearing the lovely waltz from the 1950 Disney animated film Cinderella?

            A dream is wish your heart makes

            when you’re fast asleep.

But prayer must hold more for believers. More than lining up words in some incantational magic, more than wishing and dreaming what will delight us. The prayer I aspire to is the dynamic partnership between our searching and God’s guiding, a holy hide-and-seek where God will always intend, more and more, to be found.

More and more.

40 days, wild animals: Lenten Journey

And a voice came from heaven, "You are my son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased."
And the Spirit immediately drove him out into the wilderness. He was there forty days, tempted by Satan; and he was with the wild beasts; and the angels waited on him.
---Mark 1:11-13

Lent. Forty days (plus Sundays) of reflection leading to Easter. But why forty? The passage above, detailing the aftermath of Jesus' baptism in the Jordan by John the Baptizer, provides our model. I have always been fascinated with Jesus' fully human state --- feeling the things we feel, experiencing the gamut of our experiences. The old court hearing question --- "What did you know, and when did you know it?" --- seems to me to apply to Jesus' life. A human like me, would Jesus have doubted his readiness for his calling, questioned his life's meaning, wondered where he fit into the grand scheme of things, been confused or afraid? To me, these are essentially human questions.

So, after hearing that he was indeed claimed by God as Beloved Son, Jesus was 'driven' into the wilderness. Have you ever had those times in your life where you felt 'driven' to ask the hard questions about yourself and your place in the world? Have you come to places where to compromise something essential in yourself seems to be the only way to accomplish your goals? Have you been tempted to give up on something good to accept something adequate? Looked for shortcuts to good ends? Wondered, "Why me?"

Here, then, is your wild place, your forty days to ask the hard questions, to find out what you believe about yourself and your relationship with God and this world, to reflect on what it means to be 'beloved' of God.

And the 'wild beasts'? That is a fascinating mystery to me --- important to the story (else the succinct Mark would not have wasted space on it in his slim Gospel), mentioned in the same breath with the angels that attended him. My immediate reaction to the phrase --- 'wild beasts' --- evokes snarling, predatory danger. But then I think, could those beasts have been a benevolent part of this episode? What could Jesus have learned from the beasts of the field, the fish of the sea, the birds of the air? We know the stories of Jesus that are preserved as parables are full of animal examples of how the reign of God looks. I have to think that every part of this wilderness period of Jesus' life deepened his understanding of who he was, and what was to be his journey.

May our journey be blessed, by knowing our belovedness, by searching, by angels attending, maybe even by the company of wild beasts.