(Catedral Basilica Menor de San Juan Bautista)
This past weekend I was in San Juan with my daughter and had the opportunity to sit for a while in two beautiful Catholic churches. In those quiet, cool spaces I found myself praying about some things I had been wrestling with – I asked some things of God, complained about a few things, and sat in expectant silence.
As we have been working our way through the New Testament book of Acts in our Sunday morning worship services, I have been struck at how often the early church prayed. When they were unsure what to do after Jesus had gone, the church prayed (Acts 2:15). After the Spirit had fallen on the church and they started preaching in languages they did not know, the church prayed (Acts 2:42). After Peter and John had been locked up in jail and then freed, the church prayed (Acts 4:24). When Peter was back in jail and James had been beheaded, the church prayed fervently (Acts 12:5). Before sending Paul and Barnabas on their first missionary journey, the church prayed (Acts 13:1-3).
Every time believers encountered a challenge, whether it was a crisis of faith after Jesus left, persecution and mass imprisonment, growth pains, or the murder of their leaders, the church prayed. Sometimes in large groups, sometimes individually, sometimes fervently.
What would it look like if this church faced challenges, large and small, with prayer? It might look like prayer meetings and increased personal prayer time. It might look like praying through the list of prayer requests we share weekly in the worship bulletin.
It might also look like trusting that God’s Spirit is praying on our behalf, even when we run out of the energy or words to pray. Romans 8:26-27 reminds us of this: “Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness; for we do not know how to pray as we ought, but that very Spirit intercedes with sighs too deep for words. And God, who searches the heart, knows what is the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for the saints according to the will of God.”
Prayer comes in many forms. Sometimes it is communal, sometimes individual, sometimes loud, sometimes silent, sometimes still, sometimes active, sometimes conscious, sometimes subconscious. Whatever its form, as people of God, we are invited to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17).
This week as we encounter the horrors of the news, health struggles, relationship stressors, and even joys, may we find our way to prayer – in whatever form it meets us – so that we might come face to face with a God who listens.
Blessings,
Pastor Amy
A Prayer for Today
Heart of my own heart,
be my sight,
be my song,
be my light.
Soften my heart that it would break for
your world,
lead my hands and feet to do work that is
poured out for the sake of your children,
make me brave, make me hope, make me trust,
make me love.
In Jesus’s sweet, sweet name, amen.1
1 Prayer by Rev. Mihee Kim-Kort in A Rhythm of Prayer: A Collection of Meditations for Renewal, edited by Sarah Bessey (New York: Convergent, 2021), 38.
