Prayer and Reflection on an overcast day

Last night at Satellite we were discussing the Acolyte(connecting with God through ritual, tradition, or disciplines) aspect of Christian spirituality, and my friend Joe shared about his use of a prayer rope over the past couple of years. The repeated prayer, goes like this:

"Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner."

His story was encouraging to me. I like the idea of connecting/interacting with God in new ways.

So today, after my jog, I was trying this prayer on for size, repeating it, and focusing on the words and what they meant to me.

Then Matthew 6:7 popped into my head. So I thought "am I repeating this prayer so that I will be heard?"

Attempting to open my intentions like a book and read them, I was reminded of Proverbs 20:5 so I took my time and asked God for wisdom and candor before answering my own question. Upon exiting the hot tub(I know, I'm spoiled!) a verdict had been reached.

I was not doing the repetition so that God would hear me. I was attempting to hear God. To open a space for Him, to surrender to Him. I'm going to make a prayer rope and spin this out further. God is worthy of that, I'm sure of it. Now, what kind of rope? What size? What color? Why that color/size? What does it mean to me?

This is gonna be fun.