[net.religion] commonality of prayer

david@cvl.UUCP (David Harwood) (03/08/85)

	I also agree with the feeling expressed by David Sher concerning
the commonality of prayer. The only thing I would add is that it is
the spirit of God, within us, which does call us to sincere prayer,
and that while we may look for presence of God in every circumstance,
it is most important to listen to our conscience without self-
deception. In this sense, it is God who has given us His spirit that
leads us to attend the truth. 
					David Harwood

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
>From: sher@rochester.UUCP (David Sher)
Newsgroups: net.religion
Subject: Re: what does it mean to talk to God [a brief attempt at an answer]
Message-ID: <7085@rochester.UUCP>
Date: 7 Mar 85 20:04:08 GMT

I found that the article that I excerpt below is a fairly good description 
of the way I think of prayer (aside from direct references to Christ).  
I am a Jew and the author is clearly a Christian.  Undoubtably other
Jews and Christians will disagree with this article.  Never the less
I think it is interesting that at least one Jew and Christian agree on
the fundamental nature of prayer.  Is this the case for the greater
mass of monotheists in general?
-David Sher

>Now on to communication with God...  There are certainly times when God hits
>people over the head, but for most of us, most of the time, communication
>with God occurs in the context of prayer.  When I say that "God showed me
>X", I think I normally mean that I realized X when I was praying.  If you
>want to look at this from the worldly perspective, it could probably be said
>that no information actually arrives from an extraterrestrial source when I
>pray.  I think most insights could be regarded as coming from one of the
>following sources:
>
>  - considering events around me and seeing patterns in them
>  - Scripture, particularly meditating on the life of Christ
>  - the views of other Christians (or non-Christians, for that matter)
>
>However in my view, God is still responsible.  One can see something like
>this even in the case of human teachers.  I have found that it is not always
>possible to teach something just by lecturing about it.  Often you have to
>find some way of pointing to it.  Socrates is well known for trying to bring
>his students to see matters for themselves.  Nevertheless, one would still
>say that a teacher of this sort is communicating.  In my view, God has
>arranged the world, and our lives, to help bring us to certain insights.  He
>has provided Scripture to remove any ambiguity that might otherwise be
>there.  Prayer is when I take time to think about things carefully enough
>that I can see what God is trying to tell me.  (NB: This is not a complete
>description of the role of prayer.  I am completely omitting intercessory
>prayer, and no doubt other types of prayer as well.)

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