Martin Luther | Anita Mathias: Dreaming Beneath the Spires

Analysing my Experience of Prayer over the Last 19 Years

So I come to my time of prayer, and I am dry and distracted. My thoughts are whirling; I cannot hear God speak, and I have nothing to say. My spirit feels numb. Prayer?

It’s as if you are having coffee with a friend you haven’t seen for a while, and you are so out of touch with her life, and she with yours, that you don’t know what to ask, don’t know what to tell, don’t know what to talk about. The conversation is leaden; you want to escape.

Keeping in touch is a sure way to better conversation, whether with God or a friend.

I pick up my pen. Since my mind cannot focus on ethereal prayer, I will write my prayers. Write my worries, my plans, and my fears. Check in with Jesus about each of them. That pathway into prayer–writing my prayers–never fails.

* * *

I write. I think. I pray. I sink, absorbed, into the quietness.

I had come to prayer so distracted, so out of touch with God, with nothing to say, my thoughts and emotions whirling restlessly.

But I had forced myself into the boat of prayer, and Christ and I together had pushed far away from shore.

It got quiet. It got peaceful. Long, still sheets of water everywhere. Slowly, a fish plopped up. A worry.

My writing?

I take that worry to God.

I don’t hear anything.

I ask the question again. So Lord, will I have a writing career, of sorts? And wait.

Slowly, clarity emerges.

I go back to my origin story. The clear call of God to write one day in 1983. A call which, for too long a time in my life, I have not been faithful to.

I will return to that. I will be faithful to my call. I will leave success and failure to him. I will keep writing. I will keep reading. I will study the craft as time permits. I will get better, that is certain. He will use my words to reach others, of that too I feel certain. I will run in my lane and leave the results of my race to him.

* * *

Other fish poke their heads out of the temporarily still sea. Our family business, and how to make it grow? My daughters’ future.

Ideas come, reassurance. Some questions remain question marks, of course. Not every answer is given in every session of prayer, but they are now question marks bathed in golden light.

I grow still and quiet. We have rowed so far from shore.

I had 36 minutes free, and so I set a timer.

When the timer goes, it is a wrench.

I have been in another country.

Without being too fanciful, I have felt the heavens part; I have felt grace rain down. I have felt the Spirit. Something has shifted in my soul. Its molecules have changed, its water become wine. I feel an expansive peace. Something of God’s life, of God’s love for me has entered into and enlarged my soul.

* * *

I have been mostly disciplined in prayer since a dark patch of disappointment in late 1996. I had been led on by an editor of a leading publishing company, who I had thought had given me a verbal assurance that he would publish my book. I had a leading agent, I thought–though we hadn’t signed.

The book I wrote was a disappointment to both of them, and, if I look at it now, will, almost certainly, be a disappointment to me. But it was written through pregnancy and early motherhood…in blood.

When, after revisions, it was still turned down, I flung myself facedown on the carpet and thought, “I want to die.”

* * *

“I am sick,” I then said to myself. I am spiritually sick. And Jesus said he was the Physician. I need him.

And having a wee bit of a practical streak, I thought: How much prayer and Bible study do I need to have the life of God course through my soul? And that is a question Scripture is silent on. It can only be answered by trial and error, and the answer can vary. On busy days, Martin Luther said he needed three hours of prayer (rather than his usual two). I needed to find my own answer.

So I set a stopwatch, prayed and read my Bible until I was bored, and then stopped. I was not at peace, but I was growing distracted. I was discovering my baseline for prayer, just as when I began the discipline of exercise, I walked until I was tired, wrote down my distance and speed, and then began to increase both (and am still increasing them, oh yes!)

When I was 17, I wanted to become a nun, and I did for a while, joining Mother Teresa. This was the discipline of prayer there: you didn’t prolong prayer, because you found it sweet, otherwise you would soon burn out. And you do not cut it short, because you were bored, otherwise, you would quit before you got quiet, got still, repented, heard God, tasted the sweetness of it all.

The next day I set a timer for the time I had spent, and just a minute more, and went on, adding a minute a day, dividing my quiet time between prayer and Bible study. I stopped at 90 minutes–45 minutes for prayer, 45 minutes for Bible study (though, in fact, now that the girls are older, I often end up spending even longer than that in spiritual disciplines! My soul needs it!)

Over the years, I found peace. I found serenity. I got to know Jesus a whole lot better. In prayer, God suggested ways to move from Williamsburg, Virginia, where I wasn’t particularly happy, to Oxford, where I am happy. In prayer, I “heard of” a business idea which changed our lives. In prayer, I “heard” God suggest blogging, which I so love. I prayed for my dream house with a very specific wishlist, and I stumbled on an ad, and God revealed ways to just about afford it.

But all these are side effects. My character began to change, molecule by molecule, and that is one of the gratifying side effects of a life of prayer. I became a kinder person, more empathetic.

My life of prayer is not a story of remarkable worldly success. And so I cannot recommend prayer as a way to become rich, become famous, become a great writer. To take up a discipline of prayer for the worldly advantages it might confer is like marrying only for money, or only for sex, and we know all how that works out, don’t we?

T. S. Eliot looking back on the first twenty years of his life as a writer says,

Twenty years largely wasted

Trying to learn to use words, and every attempt

Is a wholly new start, and a different kind of failure.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, that’s how I feel as a writer and as a pray-er.

But then, what Stephen King says about writing is equally true about prayer.

Writing isn’t about making money, getting famous, getting dates, or getting laid, or making friends. It’s about enriching the lives of those who will read your work, and enriching your own as well. It’s about getting up, getting well, and getting over. Getting happy, okay? Getting happy. Writing is magic, the water of life. The water is free. So drink. Drink and be filled up.

Prayer is everything Stephen King says writing is, and more.

It is not a sure way to worldly reward, though it has brought wealth and success to some, according to the plan of God for their lives

However, though material rewards are not guaranteed, as Jesus said, rewards are guaranteed. We pray for the fun of hanging out with Jesus, to get his take on things, to see life with his eyes, to absorb his wisdom. We pray because with the discipline of prayer comes lightness and joy. With the discipline of prayer and obedience comes peace and calm, wisdom and guidance. Water for a parched soul. Sanity. We pray so we can be enlarged by loving something larger than ourselves, and that is the Lord Jesus himself.

We pray because it is our daily bread. Jesus may choose to give some of us nutella too, and I still pray for metaphorical “nutella”, and grilled cheese and homemade blackberry jam, and according to the lane he has marked for me, the work he has given me to do in the world, and the people he has given me to influence, he may well give me some of these things. Or he may not. But tasting Jesus is fun, and joy and wisdom, and for these gifts from the discipline of prayer, I am grateful.

Making a Difference Through Prayer and Writing: In Praise of Julian of Norwich

By Anita Mathias

I read the papers and stress rises. So much injustice! 21 million people enslaved (14 million of them in India), land-grabbing, starvation, destruction of ecosystems, precious species going extinct, the restavek system in Haiti, slavery in Qatar, and the plight of the Palestinians.

My heart sinks.

I am just one girl of limited energy. I could push against one or two of these things, but it would take all my life, and I might barely dent it.

I do have a handful of causes, which I tweet about and financially support. That’s like returning just one starfish to the sea, but it makes a difference to that starfish as Loren Eiseley wrote.

* * *

The path of an activist, of a world-changer, is admirable, but it is a calling. If you embark on it without being called to it by God, and being continuously renewed by him, you risk burning out and becoming embittered. I know I would.

Fortunately there are other ways of making a difference in the world, which are also callings.

“If you want to change the world, pick up your pen and write,” ―Martin Luther.

Can so pleasant a thing be a calling?

I see my calling as “a contemplative in the world” and a writer. When I compare it to real heroes like Simon Guillebaud, this seems like a bit of cop-out call, but it is, none the less, the call to which God has mercifully called me.

* * *

I am today thinking of a real contemplative, Julian of Norwich, who was an anchorite. Anchorites were, on request, formally bricked into their cells by the ecclesiastical authorities. Once walled in, they were no longer permitted to leave.

Julian of Norwich lived bricked into a cell attached to Norwich Cathedral. One window looked onto the Tabernacle of the Cathedral; another window faced the outside world. Through this, servants brought food and removed waste, and people from every level of society, including her fellow mystic Margery Kempe came seeking advice.

And that was Julian of Norwich’s way of making a difference in the world. Read, pray, contemplate, write.

It was arduous. My head would feel ready to explode if all I did was read, think and write, if I could not go on longish walks, putter around my house and garden, see friends, go to a small group, go to church. I love contemplation and writing—but in the context of community and of physical movement.

* * *

There were remarkable medieval Christian women, saints, who played their part in the moving and shifting of Empires, Joan of Arc and Catherine of Siena among them.

But Mother Julian, all she did was think and pray and write, think and pray and write.

What could this woman who lived for decades in a single room possibly have to say to the world?

God gave her things to say.

On the 8^th May 1373, Julian of Norwich experienced a series of fifteen visions from four in the morning, till noon, with a further one that night.

They were “so compelling and so rich in meaning that Julian understood them to come directly from God and to be messages not just to herself but to all Christians.” She spent the rest of her life writing them, and “conveying her sense of their significance as it was revealed over many years of meditation” (A.C. Spearing).

Her book Revelations of Divine Love resonates 600 years later.

* * *

Here are some of her best-known thoughts, rays of light from a distant past, ancient music which still vibrates.

All shall be well, and all shall be well and all manner of thing shall be well.

And this:

“He showed me a hazel nut, lying in the palm of my hand. I thought, ‘What may this be?’

And it was answered thus, ‘It is all that is made. It lasts and ever shall, for God loves it.”

I saw three properties that God made it, that God loves it, that God keeps it. The Creator, the Keeper, the Lover. For until I am substantially “oned” to him, I may never have full rest nor true bliss. That is to say, until I be so fastened to him that there is nothing that is made between my God and me.”

* * *

Here are other insights of this woman bricked into her cell who did nothing but think and pray and write.

“The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of his love.”

“If there is anywhere on earth a lover of God who is always kept safe, I know nothing of it, for it was not shown to me. But this was shown: that in falling and rising again we are always kept in that same precious love.”

“Our Savior is our true Mother in whom we are endlessly born and out of whom we shall never come.”

“See that I am God. See that I am in everything. See that I do everything. See that I have never stopped ordering my works, nor ever shall, eternally. See that I lead everything on to the conclusion I ordained for it before time began, by the same power, wisdom and love with which I made it. How can anything be amiss?”

“And I saw that truly nothing happens by accident or luck, but everything by God’s wise providence. If it seems to be accident or luck from our point of view, our blindness is the cause; for matters that have been in God’s foreseeing wisdom since before time began befall us suddenly, all unawares; and so in our blindness and ignorance we say that this is accident or luck, but to our Lord God it is not so.”

Interestingly, the dry, crusty, cerebral T. S. Eliot was Dame Julian of Norwich’s most famous reader. He quotes her in his mysterious Four Quartets

Whatever we inherit from the fortunate
We have taken from the defeated
And all shall be well and
All manner of things shall be well
By the purification of the motive
In the ground of our beseeching.

~~~

TWEETABLES

On making a difference through prayer and writing. In praise of Julian of Norwich. From @anitamathias1

What could solitary Julian of Norwich have to say to the world? God gave her things to say From @anitamathias1

And all shall be well, all shall be well, all manner of things shall be well. From @anitamathias1 via Julian of Norwich

When We are Caterpillars in a Ring of Fire, and Need Rescue from Above

By Anita Mathias

Image Credit

I read a striking essay this week.

Two women counsellors listened to my story. I was prayed for very gently. I was encouraged to forgive all the people I felt had done me real or imaginary hurts throughout my life. It took a long time. Eventually, I came to the last thing, and I couldn’t make a sound. I struggled for words, but they would not come out. The only way I can describe it is to say it was like labour contractions in the chest, not the stomach. I struggled to control my breathing, and eventually gasped out, “I forgive.”

The most amazing inner change occurred instantly. I have never experienced anything like it before or since. I was aware that a huge burden had been lifted. I realized that forgiveness has its own dynamic…

Wow! I emailed the author, asking for suggestions of books on inner healing through forgiveness.

But even before the reply arrived, I said to my soul, “Be still. Oh come on, Anita. It’s the end of a long academic year. Where are you going to summon up the energy for inner healing, counsellors, reading one more heavy book?”

* * *

I was wondering aloud to my husband Roy about why I have a whole lot less energy this month than when I started blogging four years ago.

And then I looked back at the last 12 months. A retreat alone at the Harnhill Centre in Gloucestershire this week last June; a family camper van trip to France, Switzerland and Italy in August, walking in Tuscany with Roy on a pilgrimage with Kim and Penelope Swithinbank in September; a week in a cottage in Cornwall with Roy and Irene in October; a week in Sicily over December with Roy and Irene; a week in the Loire Valley, France, with the family in February, (and returning to find we’d been burgled), a week in Cambodia with Tearfund in March, a week in Spain on retreat in May (just me).

Whoa! T.S. Eliot has this phrase, “Distracted from distraction by distraction.” I have a horror of living like that. Whereas normally travel increases my mental and emotional energy and my productivity, this year—not so. It has decreased it! Over the last ten years, we’ve evolved a rhythm of working hard for six weeks during the girls’ school term, then travelling over the term breaks and coming back full of bounce. This year, however, had Tuscany, Cambodia, Spain and Cirencester breaks during term which were one-offs (I think!) and too much.

I am going to Helsinki next month, and am not up to any extraordinary spiritual or actual effort until then.

* * *

Martin Luther and his great friend and fellow renaissance reformer Philip Melanchthon had a debate on the nature of grace. Melanchthon says grace is like one parent helping a wobbly toddler across the room to the other parent.

Luther says ‘No! We are caterpillars in a ring of fire. Our only hope is that someone from above will rescue us.’

When I am tired, that’s the kind of grace I need. No more DIY spirituality. Just help me, Lord!

* * *

Who, oh Lord could save themselves, their own soul could heal?

I love these words of Matt Redman’s. I hear them sung, and think, “Of course, of course.” To me, they are full of hope.

In my intense thirties, I used to pray: “Lord, I want to be twice as close to you by the end of the year as I am now.” And my game plan? Well, Bible study (45 minutes a day), prayer (45 minutes a day), giving (10% of our income), small groups, church attendance… I even tried to double up, oh yes, I did! Play the Gospels and epistles on CD while doing housework. I jest not!

(And I probably did grow closer to God because of all my striving, but not dramatically so. And, sadly, that’s because I was following the evangelical method of spiritual growth: prayer and Bible study, ever so diligently, but not the ancient, excruciating method outlined by Jesus: Love. “My command is this: Love one another.” Had I done this I would have been pushed into Jesus far sooner.)

The disciplines advocated by Richard Foster in his splendid “Celebration of Discipline”—prayer, study, worship, service, have some value. They make us more disciplined people!

But they cannot change our hearts.

If prayer, spiritual reading, Bible study, church attendance and giving could save us, we would not need God.

We’d be able to save ourselves.

But when Christians self-destruct—destroying their marriages, their ministries and themselves—it’s because of their hearts. Outwardly, we may be blameless—we read our Bibles, and lead and preach and give. Inwardly, there’s ice in our hearts and vitriol in our veins.

* * *

We cannot change our own hearts.

We cannot make ourselves love our enemies. Heck, we cannot even make ourselves love our family and our friends.

Ha, if forgiveness was a mere act of will, who would heft around the gorilla of grudges and grievances on their backs? We need God’s help to forgive.

We cannot unaided shed the envy that sends its distracting spider tentacles through our hearts; who’d choose that cancer?

We cannot get rid of the spiders of fear than lurk hidden in the recesses of our minds, that crippling rejection-sensitivity. Who wouldn’t want sunlight and bravery?

If self-help could save us, Christians would be the happiest and healthiest people in the world.

* * *

We are caterpillars in a ring of fire, but we often forget this because we are rather clever caterpillars, all bristle and camouflage and colour and potential.

And if the definition of insanity is to do the same thing we did before and hope for a different result, we are insane caterpillars, trying to change ourselves by the strategies which failed every time.

* * *

But remembering that someone can lift us caterpillars out of the ring of fire is the true magic of the spiritual life.

And the theological word for this magic is: Grace.

* * *

Self-effort cannot save me. If it could, I would have attained perfection decades ago.

But what if God watches all our busy-bee effort to save ourselves with a sad smile, knowing he can put on all the lights in our soul, can change its deep structure, accomplishing in a moment what we have toiled at and failed at through all our decades of spiritual effort.

* * *

In future, I am not going to try to save myself before I have asked for just one touch from the King. He may touch me and change me in an instant, or he may decide it’s best I grow strength through many sets and repetitions.

There is a short-cut between heaven and earth, fingers which can lift the caterpillar out of the ring of fire—or, better still, metamorphose her into a butterfly.

Lord, remind that my first course of action should be to ask you to lift me out the ring of fire in every challenge I face.

Come, Holy Spirit.

Why I Am No Longer a Roman Catholic

By Anita Mathias

I was brought up Roman Catholic, was taught that missing Sunday Mass was a mortal sin, except when you were sick. (And a mortal sin meant you would burn in hell, for eternity, unless you confessed it, and were absolved.)

How could I have believed that? Children believe what they are taught.

It’s taken me years to learn not to accept other people’s theology, but to question everything, including other people’s interpretations of Scripture. (As I’ve blogged in Inerrancy and Me, I’ve been to Catholic, Presbyterian, Baptist, Charismatic, Anglican and non-denomination churches. They all believed in inerrancy, and all taught different things.)

* * *

The first time I skipped Church (to study for an exam!) I was 21. And—incredibly–I wondered if I would go to hell if I died before I went to confession. (The whole system–missing Mass is mortal sin; we are only forgiven through confession–of course, bolsters the power and authority of the priesthood. But I didn’t see that then.)

And then, after skipping Mass again, I realised that since I was so often excruciatingly bored by the ancient words of the liturgy that I knew by heart, it was extremely unlikely that a just and merciful God would send me to hell for missing Sunday Mass.

Or that he would forgive me upon the say-so of a priest, when I wasn’t truly, truly sorry. Or that he would not forgive me without formal confession, if I were sorry.

Being a Catholic Charismatic had me reading Scripture, and Scripture did not say that missing Sunday Mass was a mortal sin.

And so I didn’t go the next Sunday, or the next…

In fact, because of memories of almost unbearable boredom during 21 years of Catholic Masses, I simply cannot force myself to go to a Catholic Mass now, even when I visit parents, in-laws, Catholic relatives or friends. (A minor case of post-traumatic stress syndrome, I suppose!)

* * *

As Martin Luther discovered, once you start questioning the extra-Biblical doctrines of the Catholic Church, there is no end to it. I questioned other things.

An aspect of my family’s faith which annoyed me was their large donations for masses to be said for dead relatives to spring them from purgatory. My mother still pays for masses for my little family, so let me not totally discount any spiritual blessing from this, because we have certainly been blessed.

I thought of Sister Josephine in school, who told me that she loved me best of all the students she’d taught over 40 years, and would use her discretionary “pocket money” to buy masses to be said for me in perpetuity in Rome. I would look at the Mass cards dubiously, and wish she had bought herself (or me!) chocolate instead.

But she would be delighted with the woman I now am, the life I now live, and my durable faith, so perhaps her intention of buying prayer for me was honoured by God—or perhaps there are still priests in Rome praying for me. Perhaps.

* * *

The shawl of faith kept unravelling.

Come on, did the words spoken by a priest change the host to the very Body and Blood of Christ? If it did, if I were indeed eating GOD, wouldn’t I be radically changed?

But after Mass, I, and everyone else at boarding school, was as bitchy as before. I mentioned that to Sister Josephine, and she said, “But how do you know what you would have been if you had not received Holy Communion?” And that indeed, who knows.

Nah, didn’t believe in transubstantiation any more. We do it in memory of him, that’s all.

* * *

Gotterdamerung. The Twilight or Destruction of False Gods. It’s very sad, very stressful, very painful—and very liberating!

And what was all this praying to saints? Wasn’t Jesus, God himself, who died to atone for our sins enough? Who could have enough devotion to pray to Therese, Catherine, and Francis in addition? To Anthony when you lose something, Jude when the cause is hopeless, Monica when your children are wayward? And why, why, why pray to this crowded communion when you can go up the waterfall, through the veil, to the presence of the Most Holy God himself?

* * *

And the dreadful Rosary, the dreaded recitation of 50 Hail Marys, 5 Our Fathers and 5 Glory Bes, which so marred my childhood with its unutterable noisy boredom, which blocked out the possibility of quiet communion with God.

Didn’t Jesus say we shouldn’t be like the pagans who think they will be heard for their many words? Instead how I suffered through the gabble, the noise of the Catholicism I was brought up in, the Novenas, the Litanies, the Rosaries, the Masses…

* * *

And all the extra-Biblical dogmas men with too much time on their hands have conjured up—the Infallibility of the Pope, the Immaculate Conception of Mary, the Assumption of the Blessed Virgin Mary into heaven, these “infallible dogmas” were mere invented ideas, conceits.

Oh, let me not get started!! Especially on the sentimental, ubiquitous, extra-Scriptural reverencing Mary. The prayers to her. Where is all this in Scripture, I used to ask? an anguished, roaring bull–knowing little of Luther, little knowing he asked the same questions 500 years ago!!

* * *

So what is coming from Catholicism to Mere Christianity like?

Imagine the Lord Jesus sitting by a quiet, still mountain spring.

You walk to him through the noise, the chaos, the cacophony, the music, the poetry, the art, the kitsch. Through all the apparitions of the virgin, dogmas, novenas, litanies, rosaries. The terracotta army of saints. The noisy crowd of witnesses . That was Catholicism for me.

And how grateful I am to the tormented Martin Luther for pointing out that a man is saved by Jesus alone, without all this paraphernalia.

We can come back to the heart of worship, which is all about Jesus.

* * *

And we must make sure we ignore the moneychangers and those selling doves in Protestantism too, steer clear of the noise of too many festivals, conferences, retreats; celebrities, big name speakers, big egos, all flogging their course, book, blog, their way to the Way. Their Latest Greatest Shortcut to Heaven. For the house of prayer always risks becoming a den of thieves.

But you, Man and Woman of God, flee all this, and come back to the Jesus you’ll encounter in the Gospels, those simple sparse first century narratives. Come back to the heart of worship.

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A Richer Palette for Your Prayer Life: Martin Luther’s Advice ( A Guest Post by Gary Hansen, author of “Kneeling with Giants”

By Anita Mathias

I am honoured to host this post from Gary Neal Hansen, author of the marvellous book, Kneeling with Giants, in which he offers practical ways to apprentice ourselves to history’s great pray-ers, Benedict, Luther, Calvin, Ignatius of Loyola and Teresa of Avila, among others.

background-72245_640 Martin Luther, the catalyst of the Protestant Reformation, needed a shave. And his barber, like the one I had when I had hair, liked to talk. Master Peter the Barber’s question was something like “Dr. Luther tell me: how can I improve my prayer life?”

The sharp blade scraping his neck might have put some pressure on for a clever response, but Luther’s advice was the same as he gave to theologians, ministers and parents: “Pray the Lord’s Prayer.” His full answer came in a lengthy letter, a little book actually, translated as A Simple Way to Pray.

His passion for the Lord’s Prayer knew no bounds. In a preface to his Small Catechism he wrote that if ministers won’t make good use of it “we deserve not only to be given no food to eat, but also to have the dogs set upon us and to be pelted with horse manure.”

Well, Dr. Luther, tell us how you really feel.

Maybe you are thinking the same thing my students say whenever I teach about Luther’s way of praying: “But I already pray Luther’s way! We say the Lord’s Prayer every Sunday in church.”

For Luther, the Lord’s Prayer is not merely “a prayer” to be recited and be done with. The Lord’s Prayer is a list of topics that we are invited to pray about; commanded to pray about, actually. It is an artist’s palette, a full range of colours for our prayer life — more than the monochrome we find when guided by personal interests.

So how does Luther’s method really work? I say a lot about this in Kneeling with Giants but here’s the short version:

I recommend writing out the Lord’s prayer on an index card, no matter how well you know it. Hold it so your thumb is on the first line, and spend a few minutes talking to God about that first topic; then move your thumb to the next line and spend a few minutes on that; and so on.

What might you pray for in these almost too-familiar words?

Praying “Our Father in heaven” you can thank God for adopting you in Christ as a beloved child, and praise the mystery of God who dwells in light inaccessible.

Praying “Hallowed be your name” you can intercede for the Church and the world — God’s name is indeed holy already, but we ask God to help his glory be known.

Praying “Your kingdom come” we ask God to truly reign in our own lives, and in our families, and in our churches, and in all the world. God’s kingdom won’t be complete until he comes again, so here we also pray with the early Christians “Come Lord Jesus!”

Praying “Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven” can lead to confession: we all have ways of resisting God’s expressed will for us. This can also be a great tool for intercession: when praying for a sick friend we can remind God that the Gospels show Christ’s will is for healing.

Praying “Give us today our daily bread” reminds us to ask God for everything, even the food we eat — even if we don’t like to ask things for ourselves, here Jesus commands us to do so. And we can pray for the millions who do not have even bread to eat.

Praying “Forgive us our sins [or trespasses, or debts] as we forgive those who sin against us” reminds us to keep at the hard work of forgiving others, since we set up our own forgiveness as the standard by which we ask God to abide!

Praying “Save us from the time of trial and deliver us from evil” reminds us that we have struggles, whether inner weaknesses and temptations, or oppressive outer circumstances. We admit that we need God’s help to get through.

Luther did not comment on the familiar conclusion “For the kingdom, the power, and the glory are yours now and forever,” but praying it we acknowledge that God has all the power needed to answer our prayers, and that what we really want in asking is God’s glory.

Luther always had a lot to say, however, about the final word, “Amen!” He said to pray it boldly, expressing the confidence that God has surely heard us and will surely answer.

There is not just one thing to pray for in any line of the Lord’s Prayer. Each clause can lead to praise, thanksgiving, confession, or intercession, as needed at the moment. Luther’s point is to pray all the parts, and let Jesus’ own prayer stretch us to bring God everything — even the things we usually forget to pray about.

You can pray through the whole prayer at a sitting, or follow Luther’s other suggestion and sticking to one line for your whole prayer time. One clause per day will bring you through the Lord’s Prayer once a week.

Luther is right about one thing: we need something to guide us into a richly-hued conversation with God. That’s why he thought this was Jesus’ very best prayer. As he put it once, “If he, the good and faithful Teacher, had known a better one, he would surely have taught us that too.”

Give it a try. Take a week or two and follow Luther’s advice. I’d love to hear how it goes for you.

Which line of the Lord’s Prayer is most important to you — and why?
What helps your conversation with God take on more and richer colours?

Gary Neal Hansen

Gary Neal Hansen is the Associate Professor of Church History at the University of Dubuque Theological Seminary. He is the author of Kneeling with Giants: Learning to Pray with History’s Best Teachers (InterVarsity Press: 2012), winner of Christian Resources Together’s “Devotional Book of the Year” in the UK, and Hearts and Minds Books “Best Book of the Year on Spirituality” in the US. His current book project explores movements in the history of the Church whose ways of being Christian community blossomed into effective mission and service in the world. He lives in Dubuque Iowa, USA with his wife and their two small children. (Blog: GaryNealHansen.com, Facebook page: Gary Neal Hansen, Twitter: @garynealhansen. Links to Kneeling with Giants (Amazon.com) and Kneeling with Giants (Amazon UK).)

A caterpillar in a ring of fire: Martin Luther on Grace

By Anita Mathias

Brunnhilde in the Ring of Fire, Arthur Rackham

The wonderful seventeenth century theologian, Philip Melanchton and Martin Luther and Philip Melanchton debate grace.

Melanchton says grace is like one parent helping a wobbly toddler across the room to the other parent who crouches down with an apple.

Luther says No, it’s more than that!! We are caterpillars in a ring of fire. Our only hope is that someone from above will rescue us.

So, when you feel there are impassable rings of fire around you, obstacles which seem impossible to overcome, don’t look at them, and be afraid. Look at the hand above, ready to rescue you.

Luther probably got the ring of fire from the Nibelungenlied in which Siegfried leaps over the ring of fire to rescue the beautiful Brunnhilde.

Jesus is our Siegfried.

Redeemer, redeem my heart again.

Martin Luther didn’t say that, did he? Yes, he did!

By Anita Mathias

“You have as much laughter as you have faith.”

“The dog is the most faithful of animals and would be much esteemed were it not so common. Our Lord God has made His greatest gifts the commonest.”

“Be thou comforted, little dog, Thou too in Resurrection shall have a little golden tail”

“If you want to change the world, pick up your pen and write.”

“Whenever the devil harasses you, seek the company of men or drink more, or joke and talk nonsense, or do some other merry thing. Sometimes we must drink more, sport, recreate ourselves, and even sin a little to spite the devil, so that we leave him no place for troubling our consciences with trifles. We are conquered if we try too conscientiously not to sin at all. So when the devil says to you: do not drink, answer him: I will drink, and right freely, just because you tell me not to.”

“A unjust law, is no law at all.”

“I know not the way God leads me, but well do I know my Guide.”

Be a sinner and sin boldly, but believe and rejoice in Christ even more boldly.”

Spare the rod and spoil the child – that is true. But, beside the rod, keep an apple to give him when he has done well.” Martin Luther

Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.

I have held many things in my hands, and I have lost them all, but whatever I have placed in God’s hands, that I still possess.

God writes the Gospel, not in the Bible alone, but also on tree, and in the flowers, and clouds, and stars.

Work, work, from morning until late at night. In fact, I have so much to do that I shall have to spend the first three hours in prayer. – Martin Luther