chris erdman

“When you pray,” it has been wisely said by an Orthodox writer in Finland, “you yourself must be silent. . . . You must be silent; let the prayer speak.”  To achieve silence: this is of all things the hardest and the most decisive in the art of prayer.

So begins Bishop Kallistos Ware’s little booklet on the Jesus Prayer.  A theologian at Oxford University, Ware insightful draws the ancient Christian practice into the modern world.  I’ve written often about the Jesus Prayer or Prayer of the Heart, and commend the little book to you.

Below is an email exchange with a reader. He’s given permission to post these notes. I thought it would be helpful for you to hear about another reader’s journey into the prayer of the heart . . .

Dear Chris;

I write to say “thank you” for the encouragement I have received from your honest reflections in the downloadable eBook Returning to the Center. I sincerely hope that part 2 is available before too long. Is the entire book available anywhere? I have, so far, been unsuccessful in my web-searches I arrived at your website, and the above eBook, after reading comments about you and your work in Alan Roxburgh’s book Missional Map-Making and found that your writing spoke directly to the kind of journey I seem to be making at present. It is a journey into prayer of the heart – and I am experiencing all the many distractions, of which you speak.

Kind Regards

Peter

Dear Peter;

Thank you for your thoughtful note. Alas, part two is on hold for quite awhile. I’m working on another book on prayer now. Part two of my memoir requires some maturing before I can write honestly about the years since the first part ended. It’ll be out someday, but not soon enough for you. My advice is to simply practice the Jesus Prayer. That sounds so terribly unhelpful, I realize. There are several books that you might find helpful. Here’s a little list: Prayer in the Cave of the Heart, Cyprian Consiglio; Word Into Silence, John Main; The Cloud of Unknowing with the Book of Privy Counsel, a new translation by Carmen Aceveo Butcher (soooo excellent!); John Main: The Expanding Vision, ed. by Laurence Freeman and Stefan Reynolds, Prayer, Abhishiktananda.

The key is to simply practice what you know. Too many of us spend too much time reading and casting around for help when the help is as near as the beating of our hearts, close as our next breath. The ego doesn’t want to admit that though and will keep disturbing you. Your chief work is to simply learn to step around the ego through contemplative practice. It’ll learn to relax and “stand down” eventually. But it must learn, first that your serious and second, that stepping around it (the ego) isn’t about its destruction, but its salvation. The recitation of the Name, along with the breath, will bath your ego in love and over the long haul it’ll learn to trust that it doesn’t always have to be in charge [smile].

Blessings your life and ministry, brother.

Chris

Dear Chris;

I have simply devoured your eBook. In my imagination, and feeling similarly spread rather too thinly like butter over toast (wonderful metaphor!), I accompanied you to the Wadi Natroun, to Iona, and finally Oxford; each places of great significance and interest to me. I have not yet read Merton, though I am aware of him through other writers. I am learning from your journey that the spiritual journey is a shared one, even though the physical one may never be a reality for me. You reiterated in your email that the key was realizing that the answers were as close as “the beating of our hearts, close as our next breath.” And you are so right about the ego, with its clamouring voices, as one intentionally sets about cultivating contemplative practices. This is precisely my experience too.

Regards, and God bless you.

Peter

Continued from a previous series of posts on the stages of spiritual growth . . .

You’re sitting quietly, resting, waiting, being in the presence of God.

And now . . . when something draws you away again—and it will (for these moments of pure prayer, absolute awareness of nothing but God, are fleeting)—simply take note that you were drawn away temporarily and return to the Beloved. Open your heart to love. Become drunk with love, full of light. Your untamed thoughts and feelings will become disoriented when they encounter a soul aflame with love; they’ll recede, I promise. You’re forgetting all but Love, and Love will tame the wild beasts inside you—your mind, your commands, and your will cannot.

Wait, wait, wait in stillness until you reach the silence which is the voice of the Beloved, then on the inhale, speak inwardly, “Jesus,” and on the exhale, “Mercy,” or some other simple prayer. The grace of God will come to you on the wings of this humble, interior prayer. These words, once planted in your heart, will become the seeds of unceasing prayer. Repeat them, following your uncontrolled breath as you rest in God.

When you’ve come to the end of the time you’ve allotted for this exercise (you might use a quiet alarm so you don’t have to keep looking at the clock), simply bring your soul to an awareness of the external world outside you. Thank the beloved Trinity and re-enter the day.

To be continued . . .

The heart is like the furnace in Babylon where the three brave souls were met and sustained by the Divine presence. It is also like the burning bush from which God spoke to Moses.  Again, your heart is like the rock in the desert that gushed forth water, saving the children of Israel.

Enter it.

Many today are ignorant of the treasures of Eastern Orthodoxy. But much of what I write here on this blog simply mines those treasures, making them available to modern people, and in particular, Prostestants—all who seek a deeper and richer experience of God.

In this short video interview, Bishop Kallistos Ware of Oxford, talks about what Protestants (especially evangelicals) can learn from the Orthodox, and the Orthodox from Protestants.

Ware winsomely explores our inner experience with Christ in the Holy Spirit . . . that Christianity is not an ideology or philosophical system, dogma or a list of moral rules, but an experiential reality.

You’ll enjoy this delightful little interview:

I’ve referred to Kallistos Ware elsewhere and heartily suggest his writings, especially his little book, The Power of the Name (listed here on my Recommended Books page).

There are certainly times when we tell God things in prayer.

We tell God our fears and desires. We tell God what we or others may need. We tell God of places and peoples in the world that need God’s intervention.

Many of the Psalms invite us into this kind of praying. But we while the Bible gives us a warrant for such boldness before God, we must also take care that we don’t invert the relationship. We can wrestle with God, fight with God, challenge God, but in the end we must always yield to God.

If our relationship with God were a sentence, God would be the subject performing the action and we are the object upon whom and within whom God acts. The Subject of prayer—the real Mover of prayer—is the Holy Trinity who prays in us.

So when we pray, we’re not so much working to connect with God. We are, instead, working to remove everything that prevents us from the experience of intimate union which is the goal of our lives.

This is why silence is an essential part of prayer. In fact, silence is the highest form of prayer. In silence, all that competes with God for our attention is exposed and we must confront and release everything that stands in the way between us and the Beloved. We must even abandon even our piety, for piety—even the warmest feelings about God—can ending masquerading as God, hooking us to a manifestation that is still not God as God is.

In stillness and silence we release everything that prevents us from resting in God and listening in the depth of our hearts for that Voice that cannot assure us of our belovedness until we’re no longer listening to any lesser voice or sound.

The Voice of the Beloved comes to us in the “sound of sheer silence” (1 Kings 19.12).

I’m leading a prayer seminar this Saturday in Turlock, California.  If you’re in the area, please come.

CLICK HERE for more information.

• Saturday, June 25, 2011
• 9:15am-3:00pm (registration opens at 8:45am)
• Cost $10.00, includes lunch
• Monte Vista Chapel – WJB Travertine Room

CLICK HERE to register

From my journals, Tuesday, November 6, 2007

I am again humiliated. It’s not so much my sins I see but my poverty of love. I enter my heart but find it full of pride, anger, fear, resentment. Where is my Love, my Lord Jesus, who promises to dwell there? Was he ever there? He has vanished? Or, has Love gone deeper in, leading me on, deeper, deeper, past my ego’s many layers?

So what am I to do?

Lament my sins?  The obstacles?  God’s elusiveness?  My ego’s expansiveness)?

There’s nothing to be won by this—only the spiral into real despair.

No, instead, love still more. Follow the passion of your heart. Love leads you on; your heart must find the Beloved . . . and only Love can guide you along this twisting path. The saints testify that Love is the only true guide. You can trust them; they’ve been down this path and found what you seek.

I’ve stumbled upon a book that parallels my own teaching on prayer.  And since my own book is bogged down or delayed, I suggest you pick it up.  John Main (deceased) and I’ve read much the same historical material and come to similar conclusions and practices drawn from the wellspring of historic Christian spirituality.

From the Amazon.com review:

This is his classic book on how to practice contemplative prayer, or Christian meditation. Stepping aside from the busyness of our daily lives and being still in the presence of God is the key to discovering our true selves and knowing God as ‘the ground of our being’. This book offers a twelve step programme in learning meditative prayer, but as the author says, it is not so much about mastering a set of techniques, or escaping from life’s challenges and difficulties, or cultivating a self-conscious piety. Its purpose is to teach us how to be at peace with ourselves in order that we might let the presence of Christ flood our whole lives and our relationships.

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Here’s a poem from 2008 envisioning the awakening that is prayer:

Dance With Me

And this is what I saw—

Leviathan leaping,
full length,
in radiant delight,
up from the dark depths of Mystery.

The night sky, clear;
the moon full,
casting its silver light across
the whale-fractured sea.

And then
she crashes, full length.
A million silver shards
dancing their holy glee.

As she
disappears again
into the dark, silent depths,
to soak in Thee.

Why then
pray like some dead fish
in this, God’s sea?

Dance, fly,
play, plunge.
That’s what prayer is meant to be.