Secret Garden
Psalm 61; Matthew 26:36-45
October 19, 2008
Let’s begin with a contemplative reading of this familiar passage. Listen for a word or phrase that seems to shine or resonate for you; listen, then, for a word from God:
Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane; and he said to his disciples, ‘Sit here while I go over there and pray.’ 37He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and agitated. 38Then he said to them, ‘I am deeply grieved, even to death; remain here, and stay awake with me.’ 39And going a little farther, he threw himself on the ground and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.’ 40Then he came to the disciples and found them sleeping; and he said to Peter, ‘So, could you not stay awake with me one hour? 41Stay awake and pray that you may not come into the time of trial;* the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.’ 42Again he went away for the second time and prayed, ‘My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.’ 43Again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy. 44So leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words. 45Then he came to the disciples and said to them, ‘Are you still sleeping and taking your rest?’
What did you hear?
As I was contemplating contemplation last week I kept returning to this passage. In this scene of extremis, Jesus does what a faithful person, a God-oriented person does when facing a time of great trial. He prays.
Perhaps more to the point, first he merely stays awake. Peter, James and John cannot keep their eyes open. To be faithful, then, means first to be awake, to be attentive to the signs of the times around you.
Jesus retreats to the garden to pray, but his contemplative prayer is not an escape from the world but rather an awakening to the world and God’s active presence in it.
It seems to me that this is the heart of contemplative prayer, and that, therefore, contemplative prayer is at the heart of Christian life.
I don’t know how many of you noticed it this morning, but Karen Kimmel created a beautiful wall hanging for the narthex that reads: “enter to pray, leave to serve.” That rhythm of prayer and service, worship and action, praise and struggle is the joyous dance of the people of God.
So, what is this thing called contemplative prayer that is so crucial to faithful living?
Trappist monk Thomas Merton described it this way: “Prayer is then not just a formula of words, or a series of desires springing up in the heart – it is the orientation of our whole body, mind and spirit to God in silence, attention, and adoration. All good meditative prayer is a conversion of our entire self to God.”
Contemplative prayer, then, is about personal integrity, about our wholeness, about, that is to say, shalom. It is, as Jesus’ prayers in the garden demonstrate, about aligning our lives with God’s active will in the world. It is, as Jesus clearly understood, about finding stillness in the midst of the craziness of the world so that the still, small voice of God can echo in the chambers of our longing hearts.
In that sense, contemplative prayer is about unplugging from all the usual outlets that bind our time and lives into perpetual busyness, and plugging into God.
When I put it that way, I realize quite quickly what a challenging practice contemplative prayer is. Like most of you, I live a pretty wired life. Some folks speak of giving their lives to God; I feel more often like I’ve given my life to Google. Rather than searching my soul, I search the world wide web. Rather than set aside time for prayer, I open my Google calendar and find my time filled with all manner of activities. And when the busyness ceases for a moment or two, rather than seek God in nature or in scripture or in holy conversation, I collapse in front of my computer screen and seek escape on YouTube. I wonder if any of you share that feeling from time to time – whatever your particular means of escape.
It’s telling that the Chinese characters for busyness can be translated as “soul killing.”
I want to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, but I find myself thinking, “it’s no wonder the disciples fell asleep.”
While they certainly didn’t have the panoply of consumer distractions that fill our days and empty our purses, the feeling of distracted busyness is nothing new under the sun. We may have perfected it to the point of “entertaining ourselves to death,” but clearly Jesus’ followers had a hard time staying awake to the presence of God as well.
So, what are we to do?
The great wisdom teaching of 12-step programs reminds us that the journey toward wholeness begins in recognition of our brokenness. That’s why we’re focusing on Christian practices this fall, and that’s why we’ve shaped this worship around silence and contemplation – stepping into the experience can remind us both of its absence in so much of the rest of our lives, and also provide us a bit of experiential learning of a few prayerful practices.
That’s why we lit so many candles this morning: to lift up the practice of finding a focal point for your contemplations and the practice of holding our concerns and our celebrations in the light. That’s why we’ve sat in silence together this morning: to remind ourselves of the deep human need for stillness, and of the trust in community required from us in order to sit together quietly. That’s why we engaged in a bit of lectio divina, or divine reading, of the Gethsemane story together. That is an ancient monastic practice of Bible study as prayer – listening for a word from God in scripture.
In the days and weeks and months ahead, we will continue to pray together, to study together, to seek God in the quiet beauty of this place and also in the work that we do together to be God’s hands in the world breaking in the kingdom of God one bag of groceries at a time, one shared meal at a time, one song at a time, one moment of silence at a time, one prayer at a time, one step at a time.
Jesus understood the wisdom of working, eating, praying and studying together. One imagines that, as a good Jewish man, he would have turned often to the psalms for inspiration and consolation – in other words, in prayer. So, as we try to be faithful followers, as we try to stay awake in the world, let the words of the psalmist be our affirmation and our amen this morning.
Psalm 61 is printed in the bulletin. I invite you to find it now and we will read it together, with men reading the odd verses and women the even verses:
1Hear my cry, O God;
listen to my prayer.
2From the end of the earth I call to you,
when my heart is faint.
Lead me to the rock
that is higher than I;
3for you are my refuge,
a strong tower against the enemy.
4Let me abide in your tent forever,
find refuge under the shelter of your wings.
5For you, O God, have heard my vows;
you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name.
8So I will always sing praises to your name,
as I pay my vows day after day.
October 19, 2008
Let’s begin with a contemplative reading of this familiar passage. Listen for a word or phrase that seems to shine or resonate for you; listen, then, for a word from God:
Then Jesus went with them to a place called Gethsemane; and he said to his disciples, ‘Sit here while I go over there and pray.’ 37He took with him Peter and the two sons of Zebedee, and began to be grieved and agitated. 38Then he said to them, ‘I am deeply grieved, even to death; remain here, and stay awake with me.’ 39And going a little farther, he threw himself on the ground and prayed, ‘My Father, if it is possible, let this cup pass from me; yet not what I want but what you want.’ 40Then he came to the disciples and found them sleeping; and he said to Peter, ‘So, could you not stay awake with me one hour? 41Stay awake and pray that you may not come into the time of trial;* the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.’ 42Again he went away for the second time and prayed, ‘My Father, if this cannot pass unless I drink it, your will be done.’ 43Again he came and found them sleeping, for their eyes were heavy. 44So leaving them again, he went away and prayed for the third time, saying the same words. 45Then he came to the disciples and said to them, ‘Are you still sleeping and taking your rest?’
What did you hear?
As I was contemplating contemplation last week I kept returning to this passage. In this scene of extremis, Jesus does what a faithful person, a God-oriented person does when facing a time of great trial. He prays.
Perhaps more to the point, first he merely stays awake. Peter, James and John cannot keep their eyes open. To be faithful, then, means first to be awake, to be attentive to the signs of the times around you.
Jesus retreats to the garden to pray, but his contemplative prayer is not an escape from the world but rather an awakening to the world and God’s active presence in it.
It seems to me that this is the heart of contemplative prayer, and that, therefore, contemplative prayer is at the heart of Christian life.
I don’t know how many of you noticed it this morning, but Karen Kimmel created a beautiful wall hanging for the narthex that reads: “enter to pray, leave to serve.” That rhythm of prayer and service, worship and action, praise and struggle is the joyous dance of the people of God.
So, what is this thing called contemplative prayer that is so crucial to faithful living?
Trappist monk Thomas Merton described it this way: “Prayer is then not just a formula of words, or a series of desires springing up in the heart – it is the orientation of our whole body, mind and spirit to God in silence, attention, and adoration. All good meditative prayer is a conversion of our entire self to God.”
Contemplative prayer, then, is about personal integrity, about our wholeness, about, that is to say, shalom. It is, as Jesus’ prayers in the garden demonstrate, about aligning our lives with God’s active will in the world. It is, as Jesus clearly understood, about finding stillness in the midst of the craziness of the world so that the still, small voice of God can echo in the chambers of our longing hearts.
In that sense, contemplative prayer is about unplugging from all the usual outlets that bind our time and lives into perpetual busyness, and plugging into God.
When I put it that way, I realize quite quickly what a challenging practice contemplative prayer is. Like most of you, I live a pretty wired life. Some folks speak of giving their lives to God; I feel more often like I’ve given my life to Google. Rather than searching my soul, I search the world wide web. Rather than set aside time for prayer, I open my Google calendar and find my time filled with all manner of activities. And when the busyness ceases for a moment or two, rather than seek God in nature or in scripture or in holy conversation, I collapse in front of my computer screen and seek escape on YouTube. I wonder if any of you share that feeling from time to time – whatever your particular means of escape.
It’s telling that the Chinese characters for busyness can be translated as “soul killing.”
I want to be a disciple of Jesus Christ, but I find myself thinking, “it’s no wonder the disciples fell asleep.”
While they certainly didn’t have the panoply of consumer distractions that fill our days and empty our purses, the feeling of distracted busyness is nothing new under the sun. We may have perfected it to the point of “entertaining ourselves to death,” but clearly Jesus’ followers had a hard time staying awake to the presence of God as well.
So, what are we to do?
The great wisdom teaching of 12-step programs reminds us that the journey toward wholeness begins in recognition of our brokenness. That’s why we’re focusing on Christian practices this fall, and that’s why we’ve shaped this worship around silence and contemplation – stepping into the experience can remind us both of its absence in so much of the rest of our lives, and also provide us a bit of experiential learning of a few prayerful practices.
That’s why we lit so many candles this morning: to lift up the practice of finding a focal point for your contemplations and the practice of holding our concerns and our celebrations in the light. That’s why we’ve sat in silence together this morning: to remind ourselves of the deep human need for stillness, and of the trust in community required from us in order to sit together quietly. That’s why we engaged in a bit of lectio divina, or divine reading, of the Gethsemane story together. That is an ancient monastic practice of Bible study as prayer – listening for a word from God in scripture.
In the days and weeks and months ahead, we will continue to pray together, to study together, to seek God in the quiet beauty of this place and also in the work that we do together to be God’s hands in the world breaking in the kingdom of God one bag of groceries at a time, one shared meal at a time, one song at a time, one moment of silence at a time, one prayer at a time, one step at a time.
Jesus understood the wisdom of working, eating, praying and studying together. One imagines that, as a good Jewish man, he would have turned often to the psalms for inspiration and consolation – in other words, in prayer. So, as we try to be faithful followers, as we try to stay awake in the world, let the words of the psalmist be our affirmation and our amen this morning.
Psalm 61 is printed in the bulletin. I invite you to find it now and we will read it together, with men reading the odd verses and women the even verses:
1Hear my cry, O God;
listen to my prayer.
2From the end of the earth I call to you,
when my heart is faint.
Lead me to the rock
that is higher than I;
3for you are my refuge,
a strong tower against the enemy.
4Let me abide in your tent forever,
find refuge under the shelter of your wings.
5For you, O God, have heard my vows;
you have given me the heritage of those who fear your name.
8So I will always sing praises to your name,
as I pay my vows day after day.
posted by David Ensign at
8:09 AM
<< Home