I’m sitting here this morning looking at my wife’s beautiful Christmas cactus. It’s full of blooms. It sits there all year waiting for mid-December to bloom. The blooms last a little while. Then it goes dormant again.
It’s kind of like us. How many years are we dormant most of the time, then bloom in December with the excitement of Christmas (carols, talk of peace, remembering Jesus, buying gifts for others), then the blooms die in January with the Christmas tree we pitch out on the street.
I’ve been reading 14th Century mystic Walter Hilton–“The Ladder of Perfection”–where he talks about how to cast the spiritual eye of your soul on Jesus. He writes some chapters about how hard that is for humans to do constantly. You slip, think about physical pleasures or pressures.
Hilton suggests praying the Psalms. But praying them in the soft voice of Jesus, not the “high-pitched voice” of men trying to impress. Put yourself in an attitude of communicating with God and then begin to pray the Psalms.
That sounds like a good idea. Many years ago I read a book by German pastor and theologian (and political activist) Dietrich Bonhoeffer where he called Psalms the “prayer book of the “Bible”. Let’s see if that gives a focus to our prayer life.
Tags: attitude, Prayer, Spirituality
Faith Venture 
Leave a comment