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| (Sunset at Maumee Bay State Park, Ohio) |
(From my book Praying: Reflections on 40 Years of Solitary Conversations with God.)
Praying is Inter-asking
N.T. Wright believes that “we are people who live at the interface between God’s world and the life of this present world. We are people who belong in that uncomfortable borderland. We are called to stay at this post even when we have no idea what’s actually going on.”
To stay at this post is to be a praying person. Praying is the act of interfacing this world with the kingdom of God. Praying is a relationship occurring where heaven and earth intersect.
In conversational praying, I confer with God about what we are doing together. This viewpoint radically changes a traditional view of prayer as only “petition,” or “asking.” Instead of sending prayer requests up to heaven, heaven meets earth in the place and act of praying. Praying includes asking, but is more than that. It is interacting. Praying is inter-asking.
As you pray you interface with the Maker of heaven and earth. This is important. We are given the location of the God-conference, which is: the intersection of heaven and earth. Praying is the place where God and humans meet. Prayer is the point where God and I converge. The moment of praying is when the rule of God (the “kingdom of God”) invades this present darkness.
