George Herbert on Prayer (14)

For the kingdom of God is not a matter of eating and drinking but of righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit. Whoever thus serves Christ is acceptable to God and approved by men. Romans 14.17, 18

Prayer the church’s banquet, angel’s age,
   God’s breath in man returning to his birth,
   The soul in paraphrase, heart in pilgrimage,
The Christian plummet sounding heav’n and earth
Engine against th’ Almighty, sinner’s tow’r,
   Reversed thunder, Christ-side-piercing spear,
   The six-days world transposing in an hour,
A kind of tune, which all things hear and fear;
Softness, and peace, and joy, and love, and bliss,
   Exalted manna, gladness of the best,
   Heaven in ordinary, man well drest,
The milky way, the bird of Paradise,
   Church-bells beyond the stars heard, the soul’s blood,
   The land of spices; something understood.
                                               - George Herbert

Whatever else prayer is, it is an experience. It is engaged at a particular place and time, with particular content, focus, and duration. Prayer happens. You can go to prayer and come forth from it. It’s something you do, something that takes up time and finds you occupied in peculiar ways. Prayer is an experience.

But of what is prayer an experience?

Certainly of communing, since it involves talking, if only within oneself, and a kind of listening and waiting on God to respond in some way – if only to let us know He has heard our speech and understood our concerns.

For many of us, prayer typically occurs in quiet moments of retreat and reflection. There is a time and place for noisy praying, or for participating in prayer with other people. But prayer that does not begin in and return to solitude and silence, the lonely, seeking individual before the Lord of all creation, probably will lack the depth and genuineness that sustains prayer throughout a lifetime.

So prayer is an experience of quiet, lonely communion with God. It is silent and therefore soft – separated from hard, harsh noise and the bumps and confrontations of daily life. In such prayer we may experience peace, that sense of overall wellbeing that we can’t really understand or define, but that we simply know. With peace comes joy, because the condition of peace being unshakeable, joy is the natural consequence. Peace and joy may well give rise to increased or intensified feelings of love for God, and particularly for Jesus Christ, Who is our Peace and Joy. Bliss follows as we become wholly immersed in the experience of being received into the arms of our Beloved, just as we are, bundled in His peace and joy, held in the softness of His grace, heard, received, revived, reassured, and somehow strangely empowered for whatever the day may bring our way.

Prayer, in short, is the quintessential Kingdom experience. Jesus has brought the Kingdom of God near; God the Father has called us and transferred us into it; we are now constituted as a Kingdom and priests to our God and heavenly Father (Matt. 4.17; 1 Thess. 2.12; Col. 1.13; Rev. 1.6). Most of the day the reality of the Kingdom of God is obscured, even to those who possess the most spiritually sensitive vision. It is unfolding all around us, like a growing gem of inestimable wealth (Dan. 2.44, 45; Matt. 13.45, 46), but it can be difficult to detect and seek amid the bustle and distractions of mundane existence.

But in prayer we engage the reality of the Kingdom in the very Person of the King. We are in His throne room, surrounded by the glories which there, with the eye of the heart, we glimpse and encounter. We see His face in glory (2 Cor. 4.6; Rev. 1.12-16) and we feel the Spirit groaning within us, helping us as we stammer our fumbling words of praise, thanks, intercession, and supplication.

In prayer we are in the Kingdom, in the presence of the Righteous One Who envelops us in His peace, washes us with His joy, and fetes us with His bliss. We are in the Kingdom, and in prayer we know that this place, this realm, is real and true and utterly transforming. And so we love the King and His Kingdom, and, going forth from prayer, we seek the Kingdom – to know and extend it – through every moment, every activity, every relationship, role, and responsibility of our lives.

What we experience in prayer becomes what we live. Prayer is the Kingdom-transforming context in which we know the thing we seek, and, knowing it, go forth to seek ever more dutifully, and with ever-increasing anticipation, expectation, hope, and effects.

Consider: Using Psalm 45 as your guide, pray through an experience of being with the King in His throne room. Take your time and experience all that is described in that psalm. Share this experience with a friend.

T. M.’s books on prayer include God’s Prayer Program, a guide to learning how to pray the psalms; The Psalms for Prayer, in which all the psalms are set up to guide you in how to pray them; and If Men Will Pray, a serious attempt to call men of faith to greater diligence in prayer. Follow the links provided here to purchase these from our online store.