Welcome to Responding with Prayer,
An opportunity to respond to the complex,
Everyday experiences that lift us up and bring us down.
My name is Jess,
And I have struggled with attending to prayer,
So I hope this little offering brings you closer to the Creator.
Today's meditation is on the need for control.
To start,
Let's take five big breaths.
Deep breathing has been studied and found to change how we engage stress and situations.
This is good for slowing down,
Preparing for prayer,
But also good practice for all kinds of situations we find ourselves in.
So just take a moment and feel your body breathe.
That was literally 60 seconds.
If your mind went to other places just now or happens throughout this time,
That's okay.
It's natural.
You're still here,
So let's move on.
We'll take one moment to identify a person or a situation you are grateful for today.
Take a moment and,
Out loud or in your head,
Express gratitude for that person or situation to God.
Control is such an important and scary idea.
For those who fight for survival,
The ability to control situations and conditions is so important.
For privileged people,
Control feels so necessary,
Even as we understand the spiritual truth that we have power over so little.
The Christian scriptures teach that God knows our lives down to the hair on our head.
So we try to trade the need for control for the assurance of trusting God.
If you're able,
Put your arms out and turn your palms up in a posture of release toward the Creator.
Our bodies are an important part of prayer.
The Christian scriptures tell us of a very practical spiritual opportunity.
Cast your cares towards the divine.
So imagine you wrote on the palm of your hands those things you are trying to control and how they make you feel.
As an act of submission,
We'll offer those to God.
So what words would be on your hands?
God,
We place into your hands these things on our hands.
We give to you the need to control and the impact it has on our life.
A lot of meditation teaches the necessary ability to release.
Let's also focus on what healthy things we put into the space of that release.
If we're releasing the need for control,
What do we need to take on?
So as you close your hands and bring them back to your body,
What accompanying things do you need as you deal with control issues in your life?
How about trust,
Faith,
Joy in the unexpected,
Or hope in trials?
The unhealthy need to control keeps us from our purpose because it focuses us on myths of safety,
Protection,
And production.
However,
In prayer,
We slow down and make commitments to our core foundations.
Spend a minute expressing to God how control is impacting your life and what freedoms you want to live in.
God,
We accept the freedom that comes with submission to you.
We often fight against the very abundant life that you would have for us,
So we accept the grace of contentment,
Being loved,
The opportunities for faith and trust,
And your ultimate care for us.
Now,
Taking this time today did not change anything that may feel out of control.
It may have changed your orientation towards those things.
You may need to take some greater steps to address unhealthy control issues in your life.
The great spiritual writers in the Christian tradition often maintained that prayer's greatest gift is not that it suddenly changes our situation,
But that it often changes us.
