Lord, teach me. . . .

Prayer is the key of the morning and the bolt of the evening. --Mahatma Gandhi Prayer is vital to a believer’s spiritual health; I think at one point or another, we have all discovered that. Prayer is spiritual oxygen: breathing in the Presence of God, we are filled and able to exhale the Love of the Creator, breathing God’s Presence into the world. But sometimes, we have so many things in our hearts, it’s hard to focus. Or sometimes we have trouble coming up with anything we think is worth offering to God. What to do, what to do. There must be some way to help us organize our minds as we come to prayer time. . . . Years ago, someone suggested to me using the fingers of one hand when praying, as a mnemonic device of sorts. This is helpful in a number of ways. On the days we come before God with a basketful of requests and needs, limiting ourselves to a handful of thoughts reminds us: we cannot change the whole world. We can, however, focus on our corner of it....

We can be certain that God will give us the strength and resources we need to live through any situation in life that God ordains. The will of God will never take us  where the grace of God cannot sustain us. –Billy Graham We had the pleasure recently of attending an Interfaith Passover Seder meal at a local Jewish temple. We met up with several hundred friends we hadn’t met yet to take part in some of the rituals of the celebration. We asked the Four Questions, awkwardly sang and prayed in Hebrew, and sampled the traditional, symbolic foods of the Seder. We came away feeling like we had truly experienced something special, and like we knew a little more about Jesus the Jew. And we also learned about dayenu . Dayenu captures the idea that God is so generous, so gracious that God provides so much more than we need—and less would have been enough . Had God only led the Hebrews out of Egypt— dayenu. That would have been enough to bring us to gratitude, but God d...

Growth is painful. Change is painful. But nothing is as painful as staying stuck  where you do not belong. –N. R. Narayana Murthy Remember way back when you were in kindergarten, and you planted that little bean seed in a clear plastic cup for the first time? The teacher would help each child push the seed down into the dirt, and talk about what that seed would need to grow. First, we learned, the seed needs soil to grow in. And water, but not too much water, so it could draw the nourishment it needs from the dirt. And the third thing every seed needs to grow—is light. So let’s pretend for a minute that we are all like little bean seeds, and imagine what we need to grow spiritually: Soil . Something to ground ourselves in, a place to put down roots. Something—or someplace —that will provide us with nourishment and support as we go through periods of change or reorientation in the way we view the world. For many folks, this may be a church; it could also be a...

I used to play God, but I can’t do that anymore. I used to believe that pagans in far-off countries were lost . . . if they didn’t have the gospel of Jesus preached to them.  I no longer believe that.   –Billy Graham The world lost a terrific man recently. William Franklin Graham, Jr., aka Billy, died at age 99. His whole life seemed to be focused around God’s return and reign in the world. His revivals filled football stadiums and auditoriums across the country, bringing hundreds of thousands of people firsthand knowledge of the Love of God. In his death, the world lost a good one, and God lost a faithful earthly spokesperson. One thing I admire about Billy Graham is that he was always learning, always thinking—and always willing to reexamine his faith beliefs. We can all learn from him in that regard. When was the last time you reexamined a cherished belief? When did you last take your Bible down off the shelf and look for yourself to read what th...