I was challenged recently by a meditation on prayer that was based on some of Eugene Peterson’s thoughts in “The Contemplative Pastor.” It challenged me to think about the place from which I pray. Peterson identifies 3 places, or positions, for prayer – Passive, Middle, and Active.
Passive prayer is when we believe that we are acted upon. We can ask God for things, but whether the prayers get answered or not are really not in our purview. This is a fatalistic view of God, who is seen as capricious and unknowable. God answers prayers in the way God wants without much concern for us and our participation either with Him, or with the prayer.
An active prayer posture assumes great power in prayer, to the point where it is our effort that determines the answer. This is a pagan view of God, who can be manipulated and coerced to listen to us and answer. If you prayed for healing and weren’t healed, you didn’t have enough faith, or you should have fasted, or you should have fasted longer or more severely. If you are praying for a financial need and seeing no result, you are probably doing something wrong. We attempt to manipulate God into doing what we ask. In this posture, we struggle to understand what we did wrong if our prayers were not answered the way we wished.
But what we need to find is the third way, the middle posture of prayer, where we are in deep relationship with God, and we are working together in prayer. It is a co-laboring activity – me with God and God with me. I seek first to have the mind of Christ and discern God’s will for a situation, and then I pray into that. This requires relationship, and as we all know, relationships are a lot of work. This is not the flippant prayers of duty or desperation. This is a constant intimacy with the Creator God who loves you and those for whom you pray; who is intricately involved in the events of the world and deeply cares on both a macro and a micro scale.
This is the goal – prayer that is communion with God, who calls you Beloved. It may be more work than throwing up “Hail Mary” prayers in times of need, but it is so much more rewarding. It is participating with God in making the Kingdom come and God’s will be done on earth, as it is in heaven. It is what Jesus had in mind when He taught us to pray. Don’t sell prayer short. This is Kingdom work, friends. It is worth doing well.