Up at the regular time, I did the morning routine, enjoyed some fresh coffee, and paid a few bills including the semi-annual property taxes. Instead of Morning Prayer and my daily reads, I printed out some maps of Jemez Springs to work on at the library today as I create my imaginary version called Redondo. I felt the absence of prayer, and, as I expected, somehow never got back to it during the day. My current prayer list includes slightly over one hundred people I pray for by name.
Maizie Hunt, blessed soul, taught me to pray when I paid a pastoral call at her home about 1971. She was advanced in years, perhaps in her 70s, and lived in a tiny house with little light and the slight dustiness you might expect for someone whose vision was failing. I did notice a worn spot on the carpet directly in front of the sofa; and there was a darkened, stained area on the cushion above it. I would not have asked about the stain, but I did ask how the carpet got so worn in that one spot.
“Oh, that’s where I kneel when I pray. I rest my elbows there on the sofa and sometimes bow so my face rests there. My tears have ruined the fabric, as you can see.”
Few times in my life have I had both the wisdom I asked for at my conversion (based on the first chapter of James) and simultaneously the courage to act on it. But, this was one of those few times. I said, “Maizie, teach me to pray.”
We knelt there at the sofa and she explained that for each request she made or each expression of her heart’s praise to God, she quoted aloud some verse or passage of Scripture to be sure it was within God’s will. God’s answers flowed in her daily life.
In my daily prayers I begin by reading these words: “This is the confidence which we have before Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. And if we know that He hears us in whatever we ask, we know that we have the requests which we have asked from Him” (I John 5:14-15). Then I lay before Him those things most on my heart and that I am sure are within His will. For the many I love who need Christ, I ask God to be kind to them, quoting “Or do you think lightly of the riches of His kindness and tolerance and patience, not knowing that the kindness of God leads you to repentance?” (Romans 2:4). For those facing serious afflictions of various sorts, I say “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies and the God of all comfort, who comforts us in all our affliction…” (II Corinthians 2:3-4a) before mentioning their names. I pray for church leaders with “Be on guard for yourselves and for all the flock, among which the Holy Spirit has made you overseers, to shepherd the church of God which He purchased with His own blood” (Acts 20:28). And, I pray for a long list, asking, as did St Paul, “For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, …that He would grant you, according to the riches of His glory, to be strengthened with power through His Spirit in the inner person, so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith; and that you, being rooted and grounded in love, may be able to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ which surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled up to all the fullness of God” (Ephesians 3:14-19). I usually slip my own name into that worthy request.
I mailed the bills and property tax payment, went for a walk, and wrote at the library. As I walked, I did something I knew not to do. I listened to the most recent book by Bill Bryson (The Road to Little Dribbling). I cannot read or listen to any Bryson book while in public. I burst out laughing. This makes those around me stare at me as if to verify their suspicion that I am insane. While walking it is even worse. Just as I pass a couple going the other way I break out in uproarious laughter. They must assume I am making light of something they just said. It’s all very unpleasant. Do not enjoy Bill Bryson’s writing in public (with the possible exceptions of his Troublesome Words and A Short History of Nearly Everything, both very good but not gut-busters).
I made a donation of some jeans at the thrift shop, bought a bag of feed for the ducks, and went by the grocery store for some things. The hymn that stuck in my mind today was,
To God be the glory, great things he has done;
so loved he the world that he gave us his Son,
who yielded his life an atonement for sin,
and opened the life-gate that all may go in.
O perfect redemption, the purchase of blood,
to every believer the promise of God;
the vilest offender who truly believes,
that moment from Jesus a pardon receives.
Great things he has taught us, great things he has done,
and great our rejoicing through Jesus the Son;
but purer and higher and greater will be
our wonder, our transport, when Jesus we see.
I also thought much about C.S. Lewis, the most important author in my life, who died on this day in 1963, the same day as John F. Kennedy’s assassination and the death of Aldous Huxley.