MY FAVOURITE PRAYER?

Previous Page
Who would you most like to meet? What is your favourite breakfast cereal? What is your favourite prayer? The last was a question put to me recently as part of my preparation for an Act of Worship for Infants, and it had me scratching my head! In recent weeks we had been exploring the themes of thankfulness for the goodness and variety of God’s harvest, a chance to take lots of child-friendly things like fruit and vegetables, seeds and berries and leaves of many colours, but this week were thinking about favourite prayers.

If I had been with teenagers I might simply have answered ‘Help!’ which is probably my most commonly used prayer if not my favourite. If I had been speaking to a Midweek Communion service it might have been the ‘Jesus Prayer’ from the Eastern Orthodox tradition: ‘Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy...‘
It is such a lovely prayer to use in those situations when we ourselves or someone we care for is in need, and we don’t know the answer to that need. Very often we seem to think that we know exactly what God should do about a situation (and proceed to tell him so in great detail), but at other times it is right that we simply invite his mercy and trust in his wisdom.

A great prayer, but perhaps not for teaching to Infants? So I came up with that lovely little prayer of a fisherman: ‘Protect us, O God, this day, Our boat is so small, And the ocean is so wide’ Such an evocative picture of how life can feel, whether we are in Reception Class or the University of the Third Age, reminding us of the fishermen-disciples in their boat in a storm, and the calming of the waves by the Lord Jesus.

Yet of course prayer is much more than simply saying ‘help’ for ourselves or others in more or fewer words: it is also all about praise and adoration, confession and thanksgiving, and simply being consciously in the presence of God. So that is why I ended up with what really is my favourite prayer: the Lord’s Prayer itself, in all its perspective, balance and completeness, a favourite prayer and a guide to prayer all rolled into one.

I don’t really mind what your favourite breakfast cereal is, or who you would most like to meet, but I do hope you have a favourite prayer and that you keep it well-used. And perhaps that you find someone to share it with so God can bless them too?

Every blessing,
Stephen