Pondering the joy of a Prayer.

I love to pray. I have discovered that while it is not uncommon to meet people who pray, it is a rare pleasure to encounter another who truly loves to pray; whose heart rejoices at the idea and delights in the privilege of speaking with the Lord. I once had someone say to me, “I wonder what the rest of us are missing?” And I thought I would attempt to write a little bit about what prayer has looked like in my life...not that I know the answer to the question, but maybe I could give a glimpse into my oddity.

Growing up, I remember two things about prayer being emphasized:
1) The Lord’s prayer was sufficient and it was prideful to think I needed to pray anything above or beyond those words, and
2) Matthew 6:6 was taught repeatedly when the topic of prayer arose, “But thou, when thou prayest, enter into thy closet, and when thou hast shut thy door, pray to thy Father which is in secret; and thy Father which seeth in secret shall reward thee openly.” In other words, you talk to God alone and quietly.
Don’t get me wrong, I was told TO pray. But my experience with prayer growing up was limited to the prewritten prayers in the back of our hymnal that were read every Sunday.

The main reason I left my childhood church was because I knew there was more than what I was being taught (not just surrounding prayer). I found that as I sought the Lord alone, reading my Bible and seeking His face, I was overwhelmed with a joy and hunger that left me thinking, “What am I doing wrong? A Christian walk is a sobering and serious thing, what is this joy and life I feel?” But I knew it was real, I wasn’t the one creating it in me; and when I met a person whose eyes and life resonated with the joy and hope I felt, my heart leapt that the Lord had opened the door into the “more” I knew existed...and I ran through it.

My first encounter with prayer when I entered into this new and exciting chapter of my walk with the Lord came when I joined a small group of women for a bible study. On my very first visit, they went around the circle and asked for prayer requests. This surprised me, and I remember marveling that these women who didn’t even know me wanted to pray for me. And then God sort of just tossed me into the deep end; the women split up in pairs to pray together. I had never prayed out loud before and I had never prayed WITH anyone before...and yet, I didn’t run away. The Spirit tugged at my heart and I knew that while I didn’t know HOW to pray, I just wanted to do it. I wanted to be a part of this marvelous thing called prayer, and so with both feet, I leapt into the waters of prayer and never looked back.

I see the invitation to pray as possibly the sweetest extension of love in the bible (second only to salvation in Christ). God Himself, perfect and holy and mighty and majestic, has asked us to sit with Him and commune with Him; He has extended His ear and the pleasure of being heard by the Creator God; He has invited us to approach Him with boldness and in an unceasing fashion...how can we resist such a marvelous hand reaching out to us?

To me, prayer is as close to the relationship between God and man as we see in the Garden of Eden that we can experience this side of eternity; where God and man walked and talked side-by-side, and where humanity was “naked and unashamed” in the presence of the Lord. Let me try to explain this: To me there is great freedom in prayer. Psalm 139 states just how thoroughly God knows me as it speaks of God knowing all of my days before i even existed, how He knit me together in my mother’s womb, how He is with me no matter where I go, how He knows my thoughts and words even before I speak. To me this reality of being so fully known brings about great freedom in my prayer life. It was only after the fall into sin that man and woman hid themselves...we were not made to be hidden from the eyes of the Lord; and for me, prayer is me simply walking and talking with God...raw and unhidden and utterly free. He knows everything about me--my failures, my triumphs, the deepest longings of my heart--and He wants to be with me anyway. For a girl who grew up feeling as though I was always on the outside of relationships looking in, this knowledge that God has invited me into a relationship with Him--not out of convenience, pity or obligation, but out of love and desire for me--is almost too overwhelmingly sweet. I get to be with Him...and in prayer, I get to talk with Him and hear from Him.

Earlier this year i had the urge to write down a few of my favorite verses on prayer; verses that fuel, encourage and uplift my spirit right into the throne room of God. I shared a few with my life group and they probably thought I was a little loopy as I giggled my way through the loveliness of God’s invitation and promises. But the appearance of loopiness is not enough to stop me from sharing several of these life-changing verses with you:

Lamentations 2:19: “Pour out your heart like water before the presence of the Lord”
Unfiltered, raw, real...God knows the reality of my heart (with it doubts, fears or faith); and brother and sisters, I truly believe that it is honoring to God to trust Him with our mess. Poured out in His presence, could there be a sweeter way to live?

Hebrews 4:16: “Let us therefore come boldly to the throne of grace, that we may obtain mercy and find grace to help in time of need.”
What I love about this verse is the boldness that should accompany our need. I often hear people talk about “God helping those who help themselves” (which totally removes God from the picture, by the way) and think of this verse. No, God knows our every need and tells us to boldly approach His throne and find in Him all we need to help us. Boldly seeking grace and mercy. Yes, let us, a desperately needy people, boldly seek grace and mercy at the foot of His throne.

Daniel 9:18: “O my God, incline your ear and hear. Open your eyes and see our desolations, and the city that is called by your name. For we do not present our pleas before you because of our righteousness, but because of your great mercy.”
The book of Daniel bowls me over, it will teach you so much about a correctly positioned prayer and what true confidence in the character of God looks like. It is totally worth your time if ever you will stop to wring it out. These words melt me as Daniel pleads with God for vividly undeserved mercy for a rebellious people, not one ounce of his prayer banks of the merit of man but instead on the great measure of the mercy of God and the faithfulness of His character. You must read Daniel’s prayer in chapter 9. Knowing the character of God makes all the difference in a prayer life, the Bible is where God tells you who He is, what He is like and His promises to you. I cannot tell you enough how utterly important it is to read and know the revealed word of God.

1 Samuel 12:23a: “Moreover, as for me, far be it from me that I should sin against the LORD by ceasing to pray for you.”
God wants me to pray for others, and He desires it to such an extent that it is as sin to me to neglect such a call. Prayer is a way to intentionally seek the good of another, and the fact that God calls us to bring others before His throne should bring us to our knees to lift them up.

Jeremiah 33:3: “Call to Me, and I will answer you, and show you great and mighty things, which you do not know.”
Oh, such lovely words. He will answer my call and He will show me great and wonderful things; sometimes He directs me through His word or reveals His truths in visions or comforts my heart through a song or speaks a word into my heart or lays out His purposes through my pen...But whatever way He chooses to reveal Himself, He never fails to share with me depths of the greatness and the wonder of Him that I have not known. Prayer brings about revelation of the heart of God that we would be hard-pressed to discover any other way. I desperately desire to know His heart, and so, I pray.

There are more verses, if you want to hear them, ask. I realize that words and time are far too limited to adequately describe my thoughts on prayer, but if this would encourage your voice to be heard in heaven or your ears to open to the voice of God, I am grateful to have taken the opportunity to share even this small amount.

The bottom line is this: God has extended to you and to me an invitation to enter His presence, to be heard by Him and to hear from Him...and there is deep joy (and yes, deep sorrow...my forehead wrinkles are actually prayer lines) that awaits you in stepping into His Almighty presence and resting at His feet.

the Spirit's whispers

Today I sat in a coffee shop with the Lord and my journal, and as I poured my heart out before Him through my pen, I found this: I have definitely been threatened by doubt lately. Why doubt? Childlike faith has always been my mark--simply taking God at His word--how could I doubt? How could I, with the life I have lived and the vibrancy of God’s hand though it, doubt? Then I looked as a group at the verses that the Lord had given me over the last several weeks, that I had somehow feebly written down in the dryness of my days, and tears streamed down my face as I saw the verses He had been whispering in my ear:

Psalm 119:14: In the way of Your testimonies I delight as much as in all riches.
 

Psalm 139:17-18: How precious to me are Your thoughts, O God! How vast is the sum of them! If I would count them, they are more than the sand. I awake, and I am still with You.
 

Ephesians 5:14b: “Awake, o sleeper, and arise from the dead, and Christ will shine on you.”
 

2 Corinthians 1:20: For all the promises of God find their Yes in Him. That is why it is through Him that we utter our Amen to God for His glory.

binding doubt with Truth
©7-29-12 hannah mclean

such kindness
You who suffers long
pours on me.
when drying doubt
rests upon the stagnant air
of this deserted wilderness
choking out the breath
that is in me,
You whisper,
“rise, o sleeper,
awake to find
I am still with you.”

wicked doubt,
i bind you in
my Savior’s name
and cast you out.
i silence your goading voice
that grates upon my
childlike faith,
and deafen you with
testimony of the One
in whom my faith abides.
no matter where i go
He never leaves,
or where i fall
He never forsakes,
and though i fail
as many times as sands at sea
He is faithful
and innumerable are His thoughts
toward me.

oh You in whom
all promises are “yes”
i thank You for
Your rest.
You who have not withheld
Your only Son
blessed are You,
Father of mercy
Son of love
Spirit of hope.
firm in faith
i will stand in You
as one.

He has given me His best.

Today I was having a hard time fixing my heart on the Lord and in my Spirit felt that I needed to hear testimony of God’s goodness and work from the lips of another who walks with Him. I remembered that a friend had posted a link on facebook, so I watched it; it was a testimony from a man named Steve Saint, who has suffered a spinal cord injury that left him completely dependent on others for the most basic things in life. He spoke of his new position and the beauty of what he was learning from it, and in the video, he read this poem:

The Thorn by Martha Snell Nicholson 

I stood a mendicant of God before His throne
And begged Him for one priceless gift, which I could call my own.
I took the gift from out His hand, but as I would depart
I cried, “But Lord, this is a thorn and it has pierced my heart.
This is a strange, a hurtful gift, which Thou hast given me.”
He said, “My child, I give good gifts and gave My best to thee.”
I took it home and though at first the cruel thorn hurt sore,
As long years passed I learned at last to love it more and more.
I learned He never gives a thorn without this added grace,
He takes the thorn to pin aside the veil which hides His face.

I wish I could explain to you how thoroughly this melted my hard heart. For the last year-and-a-half since the birth of my daughter, I have really wrestled with God about my health. While I have never been “healthy,” the last 18 months have been particularly painful as I have regressed in nearly every area where I had--over 10 years of work, prayer and intentional care--previously stabilized.

It’s strange really, my journey with my physical health. God has used it in so many ways that it could easily make my head spin in attempts to list all of the invaluable lessons I have learned from my position of weakness. Poor health is the tool God used to bring my to Himself; it is the thing that has most vividly revealed my dependence on Him and the reality of my lack of control over even the smallest detail of my life; and while it has been a source of deepest pain in my life, it has also brought about the deepest gratitude. I have known physical strength from His hand, peace that surpasses understanding during distress, and the freedom of accepting my weakness as He has literally held me together. I have heard Him in the silence of being unable to speak, I have leaned on Him in the weakness of being unable to stand, and I have seen Him in the small details of day-to-day life that I would have otherwise overlooked. Today, as I sit in this current wave of physical chaos, weary from my wrestling and deafened by my whining, I am finally willing to just be still and silent before God...and even as I do, I have to marvel at the abundance of my life over the last 18 months, He has truly poured Himself out on me and for me in ways I have never before known.

I think what struck me the most in this poem is the line that says, “My child, I give good gifts and gave My best to thee.” After all of these years of walking with the Lord, how can I still be so blind to the truth of the Giver of all good gifts? He has given me His best.
It is not that I have just made the best of what I've been given, it is that He has given me His best. He has not withheld the ease of good health from me because I don’t deserve it (which frankly, I don’t), He has given me something better; His best.
“I learned He never gives a thorn without this added grace, He takes the thorn to pin aside the veil which hides His face.”
The greatest gift God can give me is the joy of seeing His face. As I write this, I think of the psalm that has so potently fueled my prayers for the last three years, Psalm 27, “ONE THING have I asked of the Lord and that will I seek after; that I may dwell in the house of the Lord all the days of my life, to gaze upon the beauty of the Lord and to inquire in His temple.” To know Him more, to see His face, to fix my eyes on Him, to fill myself with the glory of His presence, to simply abide with Him and converse with Him, to hear from Him and never leave His side. If it is this thorn I have needed to pin back the veil, revealing His face, I praise Him for it and overflow with gratitude that He loves me enough to give me His very best.

I know Your mercies
come every morning
and I wake each day
with open hands
desperate for
the daily bread that sustains me

You never fail me
faithfulness springs up from the ground
as righteousness looks down from the sky

longing for a glimpse of Your face

“please show me Your glory!”
©6-2-12 hannah mclean
exodus 33:18

i want to stand in the place
where heaven touches earth
to be engulfed in the collision
and caught up in the vision
of the place You have prepared
for me
and all that now awaits me
on the other side

i want to stand in the place
where heaven touches earth
emboldened by my faith becoming sight
and darkness knowing light
You’ve told us one day we will see
Your face
i long with moses for a glimpse
of what i live for

it’s at the cross
i know
where heaven opens
wide its gates
may i wait
may i wait
may i wait
until You come
seeking till i
praying till i
hoping till i
wrap myself around You
in the place where
heaven and earth collide

An experiment in Lordship

For the season of Lent, our church collectively went through (as an individual or a LIFE Group) our choice of 1 of 6 experiments. We didn't necessarily take something away (as is typical of Lent), but more likely added something to our day-to-day walk with the Lord with the desire to become more like the Christ we worship. The experiments spanned a wide spectrum from "Abiding" to "Community" to "Giving." Below is the testimony I had the blessing to share with the church yesterday of how I was changed by my time with the Lord over the Lenten Season.

The experiment that our life group went through was one of Lordship. This was an important experiment for me to embark on because I find that it is necessary to realign myself again and again in my walk with the Lord to His will and resubmit to His authority over ALL of me.

So I came before the Lord with the question: What area of my life am I not giving you lordship over, and what do You wish for me to change that would have lasting and eternal effects on my life for my good and Your glory?

What God showed me was this: I am an incredibly self-centered person. This translates into the smallest details of my life as I am constantly aware of the most minute inconvenience to the flow of my days. Me me me...And since the whole point of the experiments is to seek to become more like Christ, I was totally humbled by how contrary to this He is. Christ gave ALL of Himself, leaving behind the pleasures of Heaven even to death, for His enemies, for the glory of the FATHER.

I ventured into this experiment with this revelation: In my self-centered world I am pretty much just gross, but there is joy in the opportunity to grow in likeness to Christ, and to therefore become something lovely.

The answer to my question of “What do you want from me?” was this direction:
Pray, praise and write.
Every day I asked the Lord, “Who do You want me to pray for?” I began my prayer with praise, looking intently at the person God placed on my heart and acknowledging His work in them, His care for them, His love and attentive heart to their every need and pouring out praise to our faithful God for them and for His care. Then I brought before Him the needs He placed on my heart on their behalf. And finally, I wrote them a letter of encouragement.

This had a profound impact on me.

As I considered what I would tell you about this, I realized the privilege God gave me through this experiment of putting others before myself, loving others as Christ loves, and not wasting the gifts He’s given me when they were intended to build up those around me...God gave me the opportunity to observe for a moment through His eyes His love and care for His own. The reality is, if you got a letter from me during Lent, it wasn’t because I am loving and was thinking of you...It was because God is loving and HE was thinking of you, and when I was willing to let Him be Lord over me, He gave me the privilege of being a conduit of His affection.

It really is an incredible thing to observe God’s heart for those He loves, to take the time to stop and tune our eyes to see His hand’s faithful, precise and subtle movements on our behalf.

Another thing that struck me during this experiment was the freedom from guilt or burden. Even in the face of failure, I never once felt like a failure, instead I found the layers of my selfishness accompanied by gentle guidance that equipped me to fight for selfless, Christ-centered living.

I only have time to share one quick example with you: Sometimes my husband works very early hours, and I always get up to make him breakfast so he can go to work with a full stomach...it’s something small I can do to help him begin the day well. I actually enjoy doing this, feeding people is one of my love languages. But I wake up earlier than him to prepare, and often times end up waiting for him to make it down to the table 5 minutes or so before he has to leave. One morning, I found myself frustrated by this again. While my attitude had begun in a pure place of joyful servitude, it landed in a grumbling heap of “I got up early to cook for him, the LEAST he could do is come eat the food I made for him while it’s still warm...” But this particular morning as this played out, I felt the Spirit gently nudge my heart with “Hey, that’s all about you, tell Me, what are you thankful for?” And so instead of wallowing in my complaints, I started to consider my very tired husband and began to thank the Lord for him and the things he does, I thanked Him that Nathan faithfully gets up every day and perseveres through his inhumane residency, that he sacrifices his time, his social life, his health, his energies to work hard and provide; I thanked Him that He gave me a husband who not only lets me stay home and take care of Myla, but values that I do; and as I kept listing off the things I was grateful for, my heart changed. When Nathan came downstairs, the Spirit said, “Now tell him what you just told me.” It is immense grace that the Lord would take my grumbling heart and not only softened it with a spirit of thanksgiving (which is a powerful weapon of spiritual warfare we’ve been given), but turned the situation into an opportunity to encourage and thank my faithful husband.

This Lenten season, I let Him be Lord of my eyes, and the results were firstly, the praise, honor and magnification of Jesus, who loves with perfection, for things I would have overlooked and through means I would have otherwise wasted; secondly, the encouragement of at least 35 people other than me (that’s how many letters I sent); and thirdly, what is hopefully an eternally changed woman who is looking at Christ and continually seeking to love others through His eyes and with the gifts He has given.

1 Corinthians 13:1–8a "If I speak in the tongues of men and of angels, but have not love, I am a noisy gong or a clanging cymbal. And if I have prophetic powers, and understand all mysteries and all knowledge, and if I have all faith, so as to remove mountains, but have not love, I am nothing. If I give away all I have, and if I deliver up my body to be burned, but have not love, I gain nothing. Love is patient and kind; love does not envy or boast; it is not arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way; it is not irritable or resentful; it does not rejoice at wrongdoing, but rejoices with the truth. Love bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never ends."

Serving and receiving

John 13:4-17  [Jesus] rose from supper and laid aside His garments, took a towel and girded Himself. After that, He poured water into a basin and began to wash the disciples’ feet, and to wipe them with the towel with which He was girded. 

Then He came to Simon Peter.
And Peter said to Him, “Lord, are You washing my feet?”
 

Jesus answered and said to him, “What I am doing you do not understand now, but you will know after this.”
 

Peter said to Him, “You shall never wash my feet!”
 

Jesus answered him, “If I do not wash you, you have no part with Me.”
 

Simon Peter said to Him, “Lord, not my feet only, but also my hands and my head!”
 

Jesus said to him, “He who is bathed needs only to wash his feet, but is completely clean; and you are clean, but not all of you.” For He knew who would betray Him; therefore He said, “You are not all clean.”
 

So when He had washed their feet, taken His garments, and sat down again, He said to them, “Do you know what I have done to you? You call Me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am. If I then, your Lord and Teacher, have washed your feet, you also ought to wash one another’s feet. For I have given you an example, that you should do as I have done to you. Most assuredly, I say to you, a servant is not greater than his master; nor is he who is sent greater than he who sent him. If you know these things, blessed are you if you do them.”
-----

Today as I was thinking about service, this passage came to mind. I have heard this passage preached on many times, most often in the context of humble service, even as Jesus took on the lowliest of servant task and knelt to wash the filth of the day that had gathered on His disciples feet. But today as I looked at this passage, I found myself instead looking at Peter.

Peter would have run to the ends of the earth for Jesus; he did things like jump over the side of a boat and walk on water to get to Him, follow Him into enemy territory after He was taken from the Garden of Gethsemane just to keep Him in his sight, and even die on a cross, upside-down, for his faith because he wanted to be with Him for eternity. There is no doubt that Peter loved Jesus. Nor is there any doubt that Peter counted Jesus as his master and Lord; he left all things to follow Him (Mark 10:28), he was the first of the disciples to acknowledge that He was the Christ (Mark 8:29), and he counted it a joy to endure all things for His sake (Acts 5:41). There is no doubt that Peter counted Jesus as his Savior and His God.

Maybe that is why there was such horror in Peter’s response to Christ’s action of service? Peter must have been sitting there, watching Jesus get closer and closer to him, realizing that HE should have been washing the feet of JESUS, not the other way around, wishing his feet weren’t so desperately in need of a good scrubbing...that by the time Jesus knelt before him, he burst out with something along the lines, “What do you think you’re doing?! There is no way that I’m going to be the one who muddies Your hands, You cannot touch my filth.”

But Jesus didn’t praise Peter for his “humble” response. Instead, He stated quite bluntly, “If you won’t receive My service, you can’t receive Me.”

We can’t forget this passage is about the example of humility through the display of Christ and His disciples. Jesus served and the disciples received, and they were instructed to do so to one another. If we did things Peter’s way, there would be neither the opportunity to be a humble servant, nor the opportunity to receive service with humility. Christ was teaching both through His example.

Do you recognize Peter? Why is it that so many of us, though willing to stretch ourselves to our greatest limits and inconveniences to bless another, find it so difficult to allow another to serve us?

Several years before I was married, the Lord really shook up my independent spirit. I had taken on the mentality that I could take care of myself from a young age, and had proven my competency (at least in the most basic sense) in doing so. I got a job when I was 15, I learned how to fix my own car, I worked my way through college, I got my own place and paid my own bills, etc. And then one day, the Lord pressed on me my need for move out of my own place and into a house with roommates...and in the years that followed, I learned many things, including how to be served. Setting aside my independence--whether or not I could “wash my own feet” wasn’t the point--to allow another to experience the joy of service, to not steal away another’s opportunity to exercise and grow in their personal gifting, to get a glimpse of the Body of Christ building itself up in love. The Spirit showed me the lies that made me jump back in horror as Peter did at the hands that reached out to me, and to stand in the Truth of Christ living in those around me as they ministered to my needs. I learned how to say, “Yes and thank you.” without fear of being a burden, and grew to deeply appreciate the times I myself got to hear, “Yes and thank you,” from the lips of another.

I truly believe that until you learn how to receive, you cannot serve as Christ exemplified. Jesus’ first step in teaching His disciples about serving was to have them receive His act of service, and from there, He said to serve one another with humility.

I would like to challenge and encourage you, brothers and sisters, to consider your thinking when someone offers to serve you...are you bombarded by worry and anxiety that you are an inconvenience or burden? That is from the enemy, Jesus gives you the freedom to receive service. Do you recoil at the thought because you are too proud to allow another to see your vulnerabilities? This is from the enemy, Jesus gives you the freedom to bare your filthy feet. What are the thoughts that enter in when looking down into the eyes of someone with a basin of water? Should you not feel joy that another would seek to put you before themselves? Should you not feel gratitude that Jesus uses His people to be His hands and feet, and He wishes to minister to you? Should your spirit not be uplifted and strengthened that another would seek to help you shoulder your burden?

If we want to be a part of Christ’s Body, we must learn to not only humbly serve others, but receive with humility the service of another.

my love is like the morning dew

Hosea 6:4 “What shall I do with you, O Ephraim?
 What shall I do with you, O Judah?
 Your love is like a morning cloud,
 like the dew that goes early away.” 

when i am Hosea 6:4
©4-26-12 hannah mclean

Oh Holy Eyes
that look on me
lamenting and sorrowing,
what is this flimsy love i offer
in claims of devotion?
Worthy Father,
i bend so easily
in the sway of daily life
quickly taken from
my place before You
to the nothingness
that abounds behind me.
why does my head
so effortlessly turn
and my back
so naturally follow?
i find myself
looking up to find
darkness
where only a moment before
Light had boldly shined.

i praise You
that though i cause You
sorrow
You always carry me back.
that though my frail
excuse for worship
fails to do You justice,
You hold out Your hand.
You breathe in my
fumbling prayers
as though they were
the sweetest of incense
or the loveliest aroma.

and Your answer
to the question You ponder
is to pour on me
a perfect Love
that redeems my own.

Jeremiah 31:3 "The LORD appeared to him from far away. 'I have loved you with an everlasting love; therefore I have continued my faithfulness to you.'"