In between seeing a range of different (very different) folk, there's been a lot of preparation I've been trying to do.
Some of it rather urgent.
The Alpha course we're running here is into its fourth week now: tonight I was the speaker.
Why and How should we Pray? Another of the 'questions of life' which the course is seeking to address.
Well, I'm not an expert on this, of course. Who is? But maybe that's why they asked me to speak on this one. Maybe they needed a guy who's simply learning. Someone on the level with enquirers.
The speaker is meant to go by the book.
I don't mean the Bible. Well, I do mean the Bible as well, of course, because, sure it's all got to do with what the Scriptures teach. But there's a course book, and when the folk all break into groups to have their group discussions it helps if the speaker has covered the ground in the book.
So there was a fair bit of preparation today in respect of that. And even at that, there were bits that I had to miss out. It's a big, big subject, of course, and a lifetime's worth of learning on the theme is hard to pack into half an hour.
There are loads of folk who are taking the course. Something over twenty I'd have thought. It's brilliant to see all the people there, from all sorts of different backgrounds and with all sorts of different hang-ups, as well, I guess.
The course isn't meant to resolve all the questions of life that people have. It's meant, I imagine, to help them make some progress as they work these issues through, and to help them venture out on the life of faith.
Following Jesus Christ. Discovering that the Lord is for real. And that life is there to be lived, in ways they maybe never realised before.
I've prayed that tonight's half-hour talk will have helped folk on that way. Illumined their minds just a bit. Got rid of some misguided notions. Made 'prayer' a bit more real.
And fired their hearts with the longing to give this a go and to find out more and to get to know the Lord.
When I pray, all sorts of things happen!
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1 comment:
I was a teenager when I heard a very gentle and much loved retired minister - over 90 years of age - asked to pray in church. He stood up with a bit of effort and paused. Then he took a deep breath and, with every fibre of his being, he started "Lord, teach us to pray." His humility and longing for God to hear him radiated powerfully from him, and I felt glued t the spot. I spoke to my grandmother who had been with me, and when I expressed my surprise at his opening line, she smiled. She had known him from when he was a young missionary to the girls who went to the herring fisheries when she was young. She said he had always been the same, that was the essence of the man, and that it's when you're old you realise how much you need to be taught to pray. So your position in the 'learner' stakes is normal and we won't be here when we're no longer learners. And I pray for you to enjoy as long life of learning as that minister enjoyed, and that God will use you as powerfully then as now. Jane
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