Kneeling

I have been thinking a lot about kneeling lately. It is something that is increasingly uncommon in the Christian circles I move in, and I've been wondering why? Kneeling down in prayer or worship is the response that we should make when we think about, and focus on, who God is and who we are in relation to God. It is right to be humble before our Creator who holds all authority. And I think it is not just right but necessary for us to kneel in prayer and worship because it helps to deal with our pride and our constant desire to be self-centred rather than God-centred.


Jesus humbled Himself and was willing to even suffer and die so that we might be lifted back up from the depths of our sin and restored to be who we were created to be. It is an extraordinary gift, and the response of a repentant and grateful heart, exalts Jesus to His rightful place. The circle of gift and response continues as we become more secure in who we are, then we can properly serve others and lift them up. Such service doesn't come from low self-esteem, or a sense of worthlessness, but of wanting to offer what we have to others, because we recognise the value in ourselves. From my experience it is easier to do this from a purer motive after I have been kneeling in prayer and worship before my Lord.


So this thought is a reminder to me to keep working on my posture! 

God of this City

 

You are God of this City

I wonder – do you weep over Bristol and want to gather her people under your wings?

The smart and the driven…

                Those with stuttering steps and vacant eyes?

In the roar of life and the tides of movement through these streets
                is your prayer still that we would know the things that make for peace?
We mark out space as our own
                Our needs are met
                We conform – or not
The city spewed you out
                Your death is too big for the structures of this space
Yet walls are no barrier to you

Lord, you are in this City

                Your body scattered through our bodies
                The pulse of your blood bringing life
You are God of this City.

Learning to pray

In a couple of weeks time I will have been a Christian for 13 years. I guess I was pretty arrogant, and just expected that I would become a great Christian quickly and having done that would go onto the next thing! Growing in humility in the time since then has been one of the best and one of the hardest parts of the journey that God has me on. The last few months I have been thinking a lot more about prayer, and how we participate in God's kingdom through praying: "YOUR kingdom come, YOUR will be done", this is not something that you can say with integrity from a heart of pride. Ideally my motivation will always be seeing God's kingdom rule and reign becoming a reality around me, but the process of creating in me clean hands and a pure heart (Ps 24:4) is not complete yet! So one thing I have been learning that helps with right motivation is that Jesus wants to be engaged with us as we pray. This has been an odd revelation since it isn't like I have only just started to pray! But pausing and waiting to see what He wants to say to me or to those I am praying with has introduced a new dimension to prayer for me.

 

In my homegroup over the last couple of weeks we have been looking at the teaching of Jesus on prayer, and we did a great exercise that I would recommend to anyone. Taking the Lord's prayer in Matthew 6:9-13 as a framework, we read out each line and then each of us privately wrote our own version. It made me realise what a powerfully concise set of words it is, and helped me see this very familiar prayer in a new light. This is what I wrote:

 

Daddy of all of us, you are holy and you are in heaven watching over us...

We want things to be like they are heaven all around us

which means everyone loving you as our king and doing things the way you know is best.

Give us all we need to live well today.

As we release people from the things we think they owe us,

please take the burden of things we don't need to carry away from us.

Help us to turn away from all that distracts us from you and your plans for the world.

Your kingdom rules when we love, show mercy, act justly and walk humbly,

it is only your Holy Spirit that gives us the power to do this

and it is for your glory when people see you in us.

Thank you that you are present in every moment of time.

Amen