In Constant Prayer

Robert Benson is one of my favorite authors and I read his newest book a while ago and have been meaning to you how much I enjoyed it.

I tend to read quickly--a normal book takes me a couple of hours. I pick it up, read it cover to cover, and put it down.

But I can't read Robert's books like that. Maybe it's because I've met him any number of times and have heard him read from his books. He doesn't read quickly.  

He's a great writer--and his "voice" comes through clearly. And he speaks slowly and clearly and thoughtfully.

This book is part of The Ancient Practices Series and this particular volume focuses on the idea of praying the daily office, also called the liturgy of the hours, the divine hours, and a few other things. Think nuns and monks getting up in the middle of the night to pray. But also think about normal, everyday people who have kids and jobs and lives like yours and lives like mine doing the same. Well, maybe not the middle of the night thing, but praying morning, noon, and night.

"In the simplest of terms," Robert writes, "the daily office is a regular pattern and order for formal worship and prayer that is offered to God at specific times throughout the course of the day. Each set of prayers, known as an office, is made up of psalms, scriptures, and prayers."

Part of Robert's goal for this book is to introduce people to the idea of this kind of prayer--to show normal, everyday people who think this kind of prayer is really for those who live in a monastic community that this kind of corporate prayer (done at the same time if not actually done together) is actually a tradition of the entire church, one that is suited and beneficial to all believers in all walks of life.

I have prayed the morning office with some regularity for a number of years, the evening office with less regularity, and while I keep meaning to pray the noon office, it just hasn't happened yet.

Despite that, I found lots of great wisdom in this book that applies to my everyday life. Here's just a sample of some of the things I underlined and starred and marked as I read:

I do not know if I will ever become a person of prayer. But I do know that there is only one way it will ever happen. People of prayer say their prayers--every day.

Time is the real currency of our age, and we have to manage our time in relation to our spiritual life as much as we do in relation to any other part of our lives... Our love is where our time goes... It takes about twelve minutes to say an office. "Can you not spend twelve minutes with me?"

Robert spends a lot of time reminding us that prayer is a daily thing. Part ordinary, part routine. He is a gardener, and likens the life of prayer to the life of the gardener--full of constant maintenance, made worthwhile by magic moments that happen because of the constant daily attention.

One of the reasons it's hard for us to say the daily office is that on most days, prayer is more like weeding a flower bed for the third time this month than it is some divine and mystical experience. The truth is that for most of the time--for all time, according to the ones that have gone before us--the office has a kind of mundane, everyday sort of feeling. There is a blessed ordinariness to it. The daily office is not called daily for nothing, you know.

There is a temptation for all of us to feel as though worship is not really worth much unless we are personally moved by it. If we are not somehow emotionally touched, then our worship does not seem spiritual to us. It helps to remember that liturgy is the work of the people, not the magic wand of God.

To say the office is to say that I am going to keep doing my chores. I am going to keep raking the leaves or mowing the grass or pulling up the weeds, even if it is a long time until the roses bloom. I will keep saying these psalms until the prayer of God rises in my heart. I will offer my thanksgivings even when I am not very thankful. I will offer my prayer and praise on the days when I am tired or distracted or busy or lost. This sacrifice of praise and thanksgiving is not only reasonable, but in the end, it may even make me lively somehow. Maybe even fully alive.

Sometimes it is hard to persevere in saying the office, because there is no immediate sense that anything is happening when we do. I only know this: if you want some roses to bloom, then you have to do some raking and some mulching and some weeding and some pruning and some waiting. I also know that some evening in May, when I come around the corner at dusk to check to see if the front gate is locked for the night, the breeze will be just right, and I will be paying attention enough to smell them, and the moment will be as holy as any prayer that ever rose as incense to the One who made us.

It helps to remember that we are to be about the daily; the Divine will take care of the divine.

Now doesn't that whet your appetite for more?

You can click on The Simple Wife Bookshop button over there to the right and it'll take you to Amazon. This book is listed on The Christian Life page.

Comments

[Melissa @ Breath of Life]

Why must you keep tempting me with books?!

I'm trying to set up a "store" on Amazon like you have. I need to make a button, though. Might be seeking your help!

[Meredith]

Robert Benson is one of John's favorites too, and I thought "I need to buy that book for him". I asked him last night if he knew RB had a new one out, and he already has it! Go figure.

John also told me a funny story about that book...I'll email you b/c it's LONG!

I was up in your neck of the woods yesterday. I had to get back to pick up my kids or I would have loved to have stopped to say "hi".

[francisco]

Sadly, the multitudes but serve "time" in the prison that is this world, for monies sake ;-(

Yet there is hope!

For Miracles do happen!

Hope is there would be those who experience The Miracle that is receiving "a love of The Turth" for they will take heed unto The Call of "The Only True GOD" to "Come out of her, MY people"!

They will "Come out" of this wicked, evil world and it's systems of religion!

Peace in spite of the dis-ease(no-peace) that is of this world, for "the WHOLE world is under the control of the evil one" indeed and Truth.......

The Truth is never ending.......