Praying Through the Heart

After the many years of prayer and seeking God, I discovered that there are many things that clutter our hearts. I am beginning to recognize that following Jesus means dealing with this clutter.

Prayer is seeing God in our heart. It is a careful attentiveness to the One who dwells in the center of our being and allowing Him to take total possession of us. We allow God to enter every heartbeat and every breath. God enters our thoughts, emotions, seeing and hearing. (adapted, Henri Nouwen; The Only Necessary Thing)

When we look for God in our hearts we discover the clutter that stands between Him and us. What we realize is that when we are fearful we are looking at the clutter and not at God. We lose touch with Him and lose touch with our hearts. There are fears that lie hidden and waiting in the depths of our hearts: fears of failing and letting God down or letting people down. There are fears of people, fears of the dark and fears of me {that if people knew me, they will not like me}. So we think we need to be outgoing, happy, always up, giving an apt answer and strong. The anxiety from all of this spreads over our lives like Noah’s flood.

When we decide to truly seek God in prayer, He pulls back the coverings of our hearts. We will not believe all that still hides there that is not of Him. The black spots dot the landscape as far as our eyes can see. These are the places, incidents, and emotions that I am afraid to trust God with. They are dark spots within my heart that God cannot fill without my permission.

Prayer is returning to our hearts and allowing God to take control of these fears. In prayer we find that God looks longingly into our eyes and holds out his hand for us to take. Grasping it, we know, means we will journey together through the dark blotches in our hearts. This journey through our hearts will be scary but also healing.

Will you in faith in Him, stretch out your hand, take His and allow this journey to begin? There is God’s divine life on the other side.