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10 But God has shown us these things through the Spirit.
The Spirit [or, spirit] searches out all things, even the deep secrets of God.11 Who knows the thoughts that another person has? Only a person's spirit that lives within him knows his thoughts. It is the same with God. No one knows the thoughts of God except the Spirit of God.12 Now we did not receive the spirit of the world, but we received the Spirit that is from God so that we can know all that God has given us.13 And we speak about these things, not with words taught us by human wisdom but with words taught us by the Spirit. And so we explain spiritual truths to spiritual people.14 A person who does not have the Spirit does not accept the truths that come from the Spirit of God. That person thinks they are foolish and cannot understand them, because they can only be judged to be true by the Spirit [or, spirit].
*I Corinthians 2.10-14
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What is prayer? Prayer is much more than many persons assume to be Prayer in its totality. And Prayer changes shape as the person is formed progressively into an interior relationship in the Divine Spirit.
For most persons, Prayer is sharing of ideas with God in the form of words. This sharing is by intercession, petition, thanksgiving, and praise. In intercession we offer requests for others or ourself. Petition includes all other requests. In thanksgiving we give gratitude. To praise is to give adoration.
All these forms of Prayer are based on a belief about God. So, our theology is essential to right Prayer, including the trust required to experience Prayer in more interior ways. In this process Prayer becomes the communication of the human spirit and the Divine Spirit at subtle levels progressively removed from the sensory and psychological levels.
William Law (1686-1761), in The Spirit of Prayer (4th Ed), spoke of the character of God and the consequent design for the human person and community.
"The Goodness of God breaking forth into a Desire to communicate Good, was the Cause and the Beginning of the Creation. Hence it follows, that to all Eternity, God can have no Thought, or Intent towards the Creature, but to communicate Good; because he made the Creature for this sole End, to receive Good."
God as the Good, the perfection of Grace, can only will to give good, to bless creatures with what is beneficial to each one. We are formed to receive this good: that is our destiny and our end for joy.
Law continues by linking the Good with Love, a Love that Law rightly notes is God ~ for God is Love:
"This is the amiable Nature of God ... the Good, the unchangeable, overflowing Fountain of Good, that sends forth nothing but Good to all Eternity. He is the Love itself, the unmixed, unmeasurable Love, doing nothing but from Love, giving nothing but Gifts of Love, to every Thing that He has made; requiring nothing of all his Creatures, but the Spirit and Fruits of that Love, which brought them into Being. ... All the Mysteries of the Gospel are only so many Marks and Proofs of God's desiring to make his Love triumph, in the Removal of Sin and Disorder from all Nature and Creature."
As we grow more intimately with the Triune Mystery, we begin to experience a growing desire for more interior Prayer. We are able to sense and receive more the Divine Presence through our inner spirit, before the body and mind. This prayer arises as a growing communication based on the prior communication of the Divine Presence. This Good, this Love, draws us into a desire to know this Beauty more directly, and more richly.
Prayer we learn over time is more about the communication of the self with the Self of God. As two humans in love are seeking by words to convey their feelings, we grow to experience words being the means of much more subtle feelings. Then, as two persons can grow to enjoy communicating the same Good and Love through simply an open presence with each other, without talking, we do the same with Christ.
The spirit does, indeed, "talk" in this interior Quiet, but the communication is subtle and, thus, more honest and vitalized than much of our prayer in words. At more subtle levels of communication, we are praying from a level closer to the pure Energy level of the Christ Presence.
For Brian's on-line audio sermons, go to www.wherethelightshines.org and select Pastor's Corner; on the following page is his weekly sermons given at Christ United Methodist Church, Punta Gorda, FL.
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For replies and biographical information, and submission to "The Light Shines" daily devotionals ~ a ministry of Christ Community United Methodist Church, Punta Gorda, FL, see next page:
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