Praying In the Place of Least Distraction (PrayerLife)

Cemetery, Princeton University

When I pray, I go away from my home, office, or car. Instead of going to these familiar places I find the Place of Least Distraction. Yes, I can and should pray in familiar places. But these call for my attention. They define me, to some extent. They praise and blame me. They can cover over who I really am and who God intends me to be. 

Praying in the familiar place is not true solitude. It's different thing to be praying alone with God in the Place of Least Distraction. Ruth Haley Barton writes:

"Solitude is the place of our own conversion. In solitude we stop believing our own press. We discover that we are not as good as we thought but we are also more than we thought." (Ruth Haley Barton, Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership: Seeking God in the Crucible of Ministry, p. 51)

Today I will pray in the Place of Least Distraction, the place of change, the place of my conversion, the place of my breaking and re-making.