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Listening to God in Prayer: Availability

Lynne Baab • Thursday February 15 2018

The contemplative prayer tradition has always emphasized listening and receptivity. Richard Foster points out the dangers inherent in this tradition. Foster believes that the most common danger is the separation of prayer from everyday life. In addition, he mentions the peril of devaluing intellectual efforts to articulate our faith and the tendency to become so individualistic that we neglect the community of faith.[1]

M. Robert Mulholland, Jr., Asbury Seminary professor, might respond to Richard Foster’s concerns this way: “A life of abiding in God is characterized by a heart whose deepest cry echoes and re-echoes through every aspect of its life –...

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Listening to God in Prayer: Ben's story

Lynne Baab • Thursday February 8 2018

Ben is 56 years old, and he works as an administrator at a university. He describes the way he learned to listen to God in prayer, and what he listens for:

In my twenties and thirties, I was a history professor and department chair. I always loved studying and learning and teaching, and I always kept very busy doing it. There simply wasn’t a lot of time for reflection. Or, to be more accurate, I didn’t choose to take any time for reflection during those years. When I’m honest about it, I can see that in my forties, I didn’t have any...

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Listening to God in Prayer: Praying the Psalms

Lynne Baab • Thursday February 1 2018

For me, praying the psalms over more than three decades has been a tremendous blessing. Psalms show me I can bring varied emotions to God. Psalms give me words to express things I feel about my life and about God. They expand my vocabulary as I praise God. They help me relax into the presence of the God who made the universe, redeemed humans from sin, and loves us through and through.

You might wonder why would I include a post about praying the psalms in a series about prayer as listening to God. In what ways does praying the psalms help...

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Listening to God in Prayer: Imagining yourself in a Bible story

Lynne Baab • Thursday January 25 2018

In Ignatian Bible contemplation, we place ourselves in a Biblical scene and try to become a part of it by using our imagination. We might picture ourselves as one of the main characters in a Bible story, maybe Peter or John in one of the Gospel stories. Or we might imagine ourselves as a bystander in a crowd around Jesus as he heals the leper or talks with the woman who had been bleeding for many years.

Ignatian Bible contemplation is another discipline in which prayer and Bible study merge together in a helpful and insightful way. In fact, some might consider...

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