Using our imagination in a storm

Over the past year or so there have been a few storms in our lives – don’t you agree?

Here, in the second of the four sessions exploring prayer we look at opportunities to use imagination in our prayer. To rediscover prayer in the ordinary, making it very personal and enable that dialogue with our loving God.

Prayer Exploration Session Two : Praying with our minds

Welcome to this second of four short sessions exploring prayer. Last time we looked at where and when might we pray. Hopefully we saw that, although we are not nuns and monks – just checking, we are inclusive here – our opportunities to pray go outside of the what some would call the Chapel and the Cell. We saw that prayers do not need to well crafted but can be ones of anger, sadness, compassion, love and joy, but be short, even silent. And, it was a dialogue, a loving conversation with God. 

So just a quick opportunity to check on last week, if they wish to tell. How have you fared with the homework: that of seeing whether you could find such opportunities to speak with God, listen to God throughout the day? Again, if God isn’t someone you resonate with, that’s fine.  Were you able to identify what brought life to you?

A Dialogue

So in this session we are looking at exactly that: an opportunity to converse. Now I want to take you back to a time when you might have been a church and the sermon was droning on and on – if this was last Sunday I do apologise – and we have lost track of where they are going, or as they introduce a passage we might hear our internal voice say “oh I know this one backwards” – well here is a possible solution.

When we listen to a passage we stand on the outside, looking in. We might see the characters within the passage, those who have a speaking part, but may not see the background. It is like going to a theatre without the backdrops and scenery. It’s very distant, possibly even unrelated to us – we are a mere passer-by in this conversation.

Holiday Cruise

There’s a lovely story of Jesus on his holiday (more background detail is available here). He may have booked Cunard – other providers exist – but on this occasion his mates are driving the boat. They have been busy working with folk on one side of the lake and Jesus wants to go to the other side. A small flotilla of boats join them but soon a storm is seen on the horizon, and we are still some distance from the shore – any shore. And that lad Jesus is asleep…on a pillow. The disciples shout at him

“Is this nothing to you that we are going down?” 

Let’s join them in this passage/boat

Let’s take us back to the start of this story so we can join them in the boat.

May I invite you to find that comfortable spot on the settee, bed, chair, bus stop – wherever you are, taking note from our first session – and listen to your breathing. This is just so that we know that we are in this story, we can feel ourselves here. May be plant your feet firmly on the carpet, floorboards, pavement. You don’t have to close your eyes – I’ll leave that up to you.

We are on the shore, the water is lapping the stones as each wave comes in. We might be able to hear that noise as well as the hubbub of the conversation of the disciples as they prepare their boats. We might wish to move closer to the main boat, the one which Jesus is hopping on board. Do we want to get on board that boat or another boat? 

The sun is setting and we can feel the breeze on our back. If you need a tablet for the boat journey, I’d take one now. We rock gently to and fro with the pull of the oars, the creaking of the hull beneath our feet. We try to get comfortable. Our boat is within the main throng of the other boats.

The sky is turning strange colours: mainly black and orange as the storm approaches – what colours can you see?

The waves are starting to get a little frisky now, breaking across the boat, periodically soaking us. The disciples are getting agitated. They are pointing at the approaching storm and then at their destination – well they could if they could see it… They are shouting now “Is this nothing to you that we are going down?” – it is directed to Jesus.

Jesus awakes and moves to the bow of the boat. “Peace Be Still” and then returns to the stern of the boat. The wind has piped down, the sea is calm – we can safely row now.

Eventually we reach our destination and disembark. We stand gingerly, our sea legs still making us quake a bit. Jesus is next to us “How are you doing?” he asks. What does he look like? What might we say to Jesus now?

What questions, of that trip, do we have for Jesus?

Life throws us many storms which we have to face, some minor squalls others like thunderstorms or worse. Jesus says that he is with us come what may. Do we get agitated as did the disciples upon each storm or can we recall this story and trust in Jesus?

Speaking openly, honestly, what might we wish to say to Jesus now?

We bid our farewell to Jesus but this isn’t the last opportunity to chat with Jesus. Wherever, whenever.

So let’s return to our room, or the bus stop – there’ll be another bus shortly if we missed that one. 

What’s next?

What we have done is to focus upon one passage of the Bible – I took the passage from the Message Bible, available at all good book retailers and of course at Bible Gateway dot com. I invited us to journey in the passage as part of the story, to experience what it might have been like, but then to have that conversation with Jesus- for that is prayer.

We might do this if we create that opportunity to read the Bible, or we hear a Bible passage on the Sunday read to us but really we want to be part of it. We might also write a familiar passage in our own words, in our own imagination and speak with Jesus in that scene. 

Ah what if I don’t read the Bible or hear a passage? Ok, what about a time when you were at work, in a shop, had a discussion with a neighbour and the situation didn’t fare very well. Our words, actions, the words and actions of the other could have been possibly reconsidered – without being self-guilty, re-run the scene and imagine Jesus is a bystander – what might Jesus say to us and importantly we say to Jesus? How might we reflect upon that past event now?

So over to you now. An exercise for you this next week – you can see how I liked being a teacher – “Homework time!”

Could we take a few moments to picture a Bible scene or an event in our life over the next week where we take time to ponder with Jesus what happened. It might take the form of silence as well as include words. Let God’s love and peace flow. Here’s another Bible scene which you might wish to use, and a YouTube link to another.

Let’s pray:

Loving God, thank you that you journey with us, through life’s storms. No matter what we face you are with us. Help us to take that opportunity to speak up, to converse with you, hear your response, know that you are with us – come what may. And that our faith may rise as we look back at what storms you have carried us through. We thank you for this time

Amen

Go with God’s blessing of peace today, and in the days ahead.