Tag: transparency

Praying Naked

On By Charis PsalloIn nature, Photography, Water2 Comments

When I was a child, I used to have a secret place where I would go to talk to Jesus. I told him things that weren’t safe to say out loud where someone might hear. I didn’t know that was praying. I thought praying was when people recited rhymes at meal times or before bed or stood on a platform and shouted at God in King James English as if he were as hard as hearing as some of the folk in the pews (who some of us thought may have been as old as King James).

I talked to Jesus because he was someone who loved the little children. I could be very open and honest with him. Somehow, I had picked up the notion that God the Father was angry and disappointed with me like so many other people in my life. I couldn’t let him see the confusion and pain in my heart. It seemed ungrateful –and perhaps dangerous.

I’m realizing, all these years later, even though I have learned that God the Father is not who I thought he was and is loving and kind and inviting, I still don’t feel comfortable praying out loud in front of people. When someone asks, “Does anyone want to close in prayer?” I’m already avoiding eye contact.

You see, when I pray, I am very aware the moment requires total transparency. I call it praying naked. It comes from a time when the Holy Spirit spoke to me while I was in the bathtub. He’s not dismayed by my many imperfections in body and soul. Other people on the other hand…

Someone, who I’m sure meant well, once told me she had heard me pray a few good prayers in an intercessor’s group we belonged to. Then she suggested I listen to some of the more well-seasoned women’s prayers to see how it was done. I didn’t know I was being graded. Suddenly I was back in Jr. High.

It was the last day of the dreaded “Extemporaneous Speech Unit” in English class. I could no longer hide behind Big Bob or make an emergency trip to the restroom. I rose. I faced the class. I pulled the topic from the hat. I spoke. I tried to be humorous. My joke fell flat. Sigh. The teacher asked me to explain it. Sigh. I did. She still didn’t get it. Sigh. Neither did the other students. Sigh. The students were invited to submit their evaluations. Can you die from humiliation?

People who know me now, can tell you I have no trouble talking about almost any topic. That’s probably because I am an introvert who learned to function as an extrovert to avoid the humiliations of youth. It’s a skill I needed when I became a singer and later a teacher. But performing can be exhausting.

Some good friends have helped me learn to pray together with them. They don’t judge. They don’t hide their weaknesses. They encourage. They challenge. They support. They give me freedom to be myself. How beautifully precious they are.

I walked down by the lake thinking about this. I love how clear the water is here. Its transparency reminds me of the hope that someday I can feel less self-conscious when praying out loud in public. I hope for unity in spirit with fellow believers who will be safe, where judgment is replaced by encouragement, where we are recognized by our love for each other, and where our focus when we pray is on God and not ourselves.

Prayer: The Secret Place

On By Charis PsalloIn Photography, Winter7 Comments

creek snow winterrs ch DSC_0069

I was thinking about the word “prayer” today when I passed by the creek. I paused and felt Jesus smile in an old familiar way.

When I was a child, I had a secret place where no one could find me. I dragged my little sled down the back lane, across the street and down into the gulley where the creek ran. That was in the days when kids could roam more freely. We just had to be home before supper – or before hypothermia set in.

In the summer the soggy earth at the bottom of the valley sucked the shoes right off your feet, but in the winter the mounds of bent grass and hummocks of earth proved solid under my feet. The sled gave me a dry place to sit among the bulrushes. Sometimes the water bubbled under the ice and sometimes it flowed through open channels. No one could see me. I sat quietly for hours, telling Jesus things I couldn’t tell anybody else.

I didn’t know I was praying. I thought prayer involved reciting rhymes at the dinner table, or at bedtime or making speeches to God in a voice loud enough for Him to hear in case he was sitting in the back row like the other people who hoped to make a fast getaway. I thought silent prayer happened at those times when the preacher told everyone to be quiet and think about what horrible sinners they were and how much they had disappointed God. Then he told us to apologize and promise to never do it again –knowing we would, because we were, as was mentioned frequently, horrible sinners with “desperately wicked hearts.”

I was afraid of that god. I assumed he was like my grandfather and always angry with me for making noises and messes. I didn’t talk to that god when I was down in the gully, but I could talk to Jesus, because he was more like a brother.

Most of the time I don’t think I said anything. I sat in my secret place and listened to the crows or the ga-bloop sound of the water trying to break free from the ice. I didn’t know that sitting still, and saying nothing, just being, was prayer.

We learn to know the Saviour in the secret place. But he is not limited to that place. The corporate knowledge of his presence is also important. Prayers in agreement with other believers are powerful. Corporate prayer is different.

As an adult I have difficulty praying extemporaneous prayers in public. I try to become invisible when someone asks “Who wants to open in prayer?” My friends will tell you I have no problem speaking in front of people but praying is different. Jesus showed me what the father was really like, so I’m not afraid of him anymore, and once I recognized Holy Spirit I love his presence. It’s the other people in the room that make me uncomfortable.

Once, a person who I’m sure was trying to be encouraging, told me she thought I had prayed “some good prayers” at our regular prayer meetings, but suggested I pay attention to a couple of star intercessors and study their presentation. I began to wonder if they were going to hold up cards with scores on them. Technique: 4.9 Artistic Impression: 3.2

I didn’t stay.

You see, when I pray I am like that kid in the gully just talking with Jesus – if that kid were naked and without protective walls. I have to be completely transparent in the presence of God because he knows everything anyway, and really, who am I fooling?

I stammer in front of people. I’m not sure they’re as accepting as he is. I can let my guard down for a while, but my hand still holds the rope and pulley that whip it up pretty fast again. I’m working with being okay with what people think and staying focused on God and allowing the Holy Spirit in me to connect with the Holy Spirit in them. Unity in the Spirit doesn’t keep score, see prayer as “work,” or seek its own agenda. Unity in the Spirit means the Spirit leads in adoration and decides the priority of needs to bring to our relentlessly kind Abba — Father.

I’m thankful for trustworthy friends who are teaching me that where two or three are gathered, there is Jesus in the midst. He is the one we are looking to. Our hearts are centered on him.

snow creek ch rs DSC_0026

But I still meet him in the secret place wherever that might be now. I don’t always remember, but I still need to withdraw from the noise and rapid pace of life to sit still in the quiet with him. Today he again met with me down by the creek, in the snow, just like in the old days.