Praying on Paper

• Posted on sdgale
• in 'CHOP Talk' Blog
• on September 1, 2014
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It’s something David and the other psalmists must have experienced. It’s one thing to pray prayers in the mind or with the mouth.  It’s another to pray them on paper, finding just the right words and phrases that capture our heart’s communion with God.

Anytime we commit something to writing it requires greater precision and thought.  We wrestle with what to say and how to put it.

But writing out prayers does not necessarily requiring wordsmithing, where we go back and revise.  Sometimes it will, particularly if we are doing it for public consumption. I’ve included an example below in a prayer of confession that I prepared for congregational use.  It takes the two great commandments to love God and neighbor and then responds with confession of sin along the lines of the Ten Commandments related to them.

Certainly, in some cases the psalmist did a bit of wordsmithing on his own.  That’s in evidence in the carefully crafted acrostic psalms, each letter of the Hebrew alphabet employed to unfurl the prayer.

But there is something to be said for free-flowing prayer, almost stream-of-consciousness that flows out through the hand rather than the tongue, capturing the mind’s reflections and the heart’s murmurings on paper.  In addition to the benefit of incarnating thoughts into prayerful poetry or prose, added benefit is found in their availability for future attention.

Part of the daily prayer found in my Community Houses of Prayer Ministry Manual involves journaling. Sometimes that journaling will record answers to prayer or prayer requests. It may include reflection on Bible passages read or something the Holy Spirit has impressed on our heart about ourselves or His workings.

One thing I frequently do in my journaling is write out prayers.  No involved wordsmithing because they are not for public consumption.   They are the product of my interaction with God—praising Him, seeking Him, confessing to Him, thanking Him—whatever is the overflow of my heart.

My focus is not the product nor is it the paper. It is the God with whom I commune.  By the process, I find myself enriched and stirred in way different from spoken prayer.

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Confession of Sin:  Matthew 22:36-40

“You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment.”

Lord our God, we confess that we have not loved you with all our heart and with all our soul and with all our mind.  You tell us to have no other gods before You, but we confess that we give to others and to things the affections that belong only to You. You tell us not to make images because You are a jealous God, but we confess that we are not satisfied with how you have chosen to reveal Yourself. You tell us not to take Your name in vain, but we confess that we use Your name casually, even blasphemously. You tell us to keep Your Sabbath holy, but we confess that we treat it like any other day, working and even refraining from worship.

“And a second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the Law and the Prophets.”

Lord our God, who has loved us with an everlasting love and who has shown us how to love in Your Son, we confess that we have not loved our neighbor as ourselves. We do not respect the authority you place over us.  We break Your commandment not to murder through our anger and hateful thoughts.  We commit adultery in our hearts through lust. We take that which is not ours, justifying it to ourselves as right.  With our tongues, we tear down those made in Your image rather than building them up. On top of all that, we grumble and complain at Your providence in our lives, not content or thankful but coveting because we do not have.

Righteous Father, forgive us our sins. Grant us grace to repent and to walk in the obedience of love.