Prayer and reflection take us down paths of our own humanity and vulnerability to places where we meet God.

We are not perfected to pray; we are being shaped toward a limping perfection through prayer where God invites and we come.

We are not good at it. The men and women of the bible were not great at it, but they were honest and that honesty developed through and into faith, and that faith pleased God.

Lament. That is sometimes the dark starting place.

Lamenting over the magnitude of injustice, oppression, and wickedness was leading the troubadour to despair. He recounts the agonizing moments that were not left to dangle in meaningless resignation and then, he declares,

" …But when I thought how to understand this,
it seemed to me a wearisome task,
until I went into the sanctuary of God;
then I discerned their end."

(Psalm 73:15-17 ESV)

" When my soul was embittered,
when I was pricked in heart,
I was brutish and ignorant;
I was like a beast toward you."

"Nevertheless, I am continually with you;
you hold my right hand.
You guide me with your counsel,
and afterward you will receive me to glory.
Whom have I in heaven but you?
And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides you.
My flesh and my heart may fail,
but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever."

(Psalm 73:21-26 ESV)

We live from our guts.

Gut wrenching emotions, laid bare before God, are prayer.

Ancient peoples believed that the gut was the seat of emotion so that to love from the heart indicated intention but "bowels of mercy" spoke of warmth and compassion – emotional responses to humanity. We make lots of choices from the gut and we believe our "gut feelings."

The psalmist prayed from the gut – tough, agonizing prayer – engaged and real:

"Save me, O God!
For the waters have come up to my neck.
I sink in deep mire,
where there is no foothold;
I have come into deep waters,
and the flood sweeps over me.
I am weary with my crying out;
my throat is parched.
My eyes grow dim
with waiting for my God."

(Psalm 69:1-3 ESV)

Yet, God has spoken and lifted high a standard for us. It is not as if all is open-ended and centered around our preferences, pains, and proclivities. 

We have Torah, the reed, the measuring stick of life, a law against which we can measure our own lives.

We have taken the law, written once on stone, and broken it.

There was much we could not understand and, in our weakness, much we felt, we could not do. Nor could we seem to restrain ourselves at the place of prohibitions.

The law on stones is broken, but God invites us again to provide the stones.

"At that time the LORD said to me, ‘Cut for yourself two tablets of stone like the first, and come up to me on the mountain and make an ark of wood. And I will write on the tablets the words that were on the first tablets that you broke, and you shall put them in the ark.’ So I made an ark of acacia wood, and cut two tablets of stone like the first, and went up the mountain with the two tablets in my hand. And he wrote on the tablets, in the same writing as before, the Ten Commandments that the LORD had spoken to you on the mountain out of the midst of the fire on the day of the assembly. And the LORD gave them to me. Then I turned and came down from the mountain and put the tablets in the ark that I had made. And there they are, as the LORD commanded me.”"

(Deuteronomy 10:1-5 ESV)

This same God will rewrite that law so that we will understand.

We look and find no suitable stones as Moses did.

However, if we will bring our stony hearts to the mountain. He will write His covenant and law there and our hearts will become softened and enlightened and we shall be transformed through truer, deeper knowledge and understanding of His ways.

This is a gracious and, sometimes, a painful process as we are etched and re-etched. 

It is how we learn, grow, and are transformed from what we were to what we are becoming. Hard times bring us to our senses and awaken our dissatisfaction. We see an invitation to come to God for help.

We come and are delivered — again and again.

" You have made your people see hard things;
you have given us wine to drink that made us stagger."

"You have set up a banner for those who fear you,
that they may flee to it from the bow. Selah
That your beloved ones may be delivered,
give salvation by your right hand and answer us!"

(Psalm 60:3-5 ESV)

What are these times about? Are these utterly unique days or are we repeating an historic pattern of unrestraint?

If it feels good, we do it.

If it seems true, to us, we say it.

Such is the unrestrained life.

Such is not the disciple life.

It walks over people and offends God.

If that does not bother you; go ahead and live that way. There will be consequences, but that is your choice.

It is just good to be reminded that we are making that choice lest we feel righteous in our slander and consider it something other than sin. I like to know I am sinning before sinning. It makes the choice clearer.

Sometimes I kid myself.

“You give your mouth free rein for evil,
and your tongue frames deceit.
You sit and speak against your brother;
you slander your own mother's son.
These things you have done, and I have been silent;
you thought that I was one like yourself.
But now I rebuke you and lay the charge before you."

(Psalm 50:19-21 ESV)

Oh God, who sees me, knows me, and loves me while seeing through my pretensions,

There is nothing I can tell you about myself that you do not already know.

I am laid bare by your penetrating gaze and your Word divides by thoughts and attitudes, sorting them out in ways I cannot even comprehend.

You know all about me and still I have the urge to hide and cover myself with the leaves of shame.

Crack my facade, dissolve the masks I wear.

Give me the grace to be real today, real and vulnerable, and open and compassionate with myself and others.

Your love validates my existence and your mercy gives me courage to embrace the ugliness I see in myself, the impurity of my motives, the haughtiness of my words, the impulsiveness of my poor choices.

They are a part of all I have been and am becoming and I am not stuck in them, nor do they define me.

You define me and in freeing me to be me and become more, Your message from Jesus to me and through me that there is a possibility of joyous repentance and kingdom purpose ring true.

You know me and yet you choose me, in love, to be one of yours! I cannot wrap my mind around the grace of it, but I receive it that I may give it.

Make me, like Francis, an instrument of your peace today.

I am not worthy, but I am available.

Because I follow Jesus, I ask this in His Name.

Amen.

Pray where you are, who you are to the One who IS.