As part of my larger ministry, I coach several colleagues on the side. I recently e-mailed them a reminder to think about topics for which they are seeking clear answers. I feel I am most helpful to them as a coach when they can articulate their struggles and their hope for potential outcomes.
With Lent approaching, it occurred to me that God is most helpful to us when we can come to God in prayer with greater reflection and vulnerability about our struggles as we seek clear answers. Sometimes God’s answers do not seem clear because we are not clear about our true needs.
I mentioned in my sermon last Sunday that we often think of prayer as being about what we want God to do. I then said that fundamentally, prayer is first about making ourselves available to God in order for God to use us for God’s good purposes. I ended the sermon by giving us all two minutes of silence to first come before God and gain clarity about ourselves and our questions and our role in the answers. When we come to God in this contemplative (more silence, listening and being) prayer, we enable God to be a more effective coach and partner for better answers to our prayers.
We enter the Lenten season next week with Ash Wednesday worship at 7 p.m. with the imposition of ashes. May the pressure of that finger on our foreheads remind us to pause for 40 days, be still and wait with our heavenly coach who will surely be with us. Thanks be to God!
Connecting God and Grace to Self and Community,
