The Contemplative Crisis

Tomorrow is Trinity Sunday. It’s my turn to preach and so I have been mulling over the sermon throughout the week which will be about the trinity. This morning I was ruminating on the wooden box (on which I sit to pray and meditate most mornings in my bedroom), how the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit are often described in Scripture as doing the same work, such as in the creation of the world and sustaining it.  We notice that the attributes of one member of the trinity and also their work can also be seen in another member (of the trinity), which leads us to confess that God is one substance in three Persons. So for example, the Father (1 Cor 8:6),  the Son (Jn 1:2; Col 1:16-17), and Holy Spirit (Ps 104:30; Gen 1:2; Job 26:13, 33:4) are all involved in the work by God of his creation.  I then turned my mind to how we pray. The Holy Spirit helps us in our prayer by interceding for us (Rom 8:26-27; Eph 6:18, Jude 20), as does the Son (Rom 8:34) and that we direct our prayers to the Father (Matt 6:6, 26:42, Eph 3:15-16). Prayer is a trinitarian act of grace.

Thinking about the inter-related way in which the trinity helps us pray, reminded me of the time when Moses was interceding for the Israelites as they fought against the Amalekites in Exodus 17:8-16. As it was the custom to raise the hands when praying, Moses stood with his hands raised, interceding for the Israelites. While he held them up, the Israelites would be winning the battle.  But when he became tired and lowered them, the Amalekites then began to prevail.  Aaron and Hur saw what was happening and came alongside him, sat him down on a rock and held his hands up, so eventually the battle was won.  For me this was a great picture of how the Holy Spirit comes alongside of us on one side, encouraging us and strengthening us by holding up one of our hands in prayer and the Son comes alongside us on the other side, holding up the other hand by interceding for us.  In all, with the Spirit on one side and the Son on the other  as we face the Father, I felt enveloped in the trinity.  Prayer is our movement into the life of the trinity and the life of the trinity working deep within us praying.

Ps  141:2 highlights that the Psalmist would pray with their hands raised high:

“Let my prayer be counted as incense before you,
and the lifting up of my hands as the evening sacrifice.”

This is a good prayer to use sometimes as we settle into the presence of God and with a picture in our mind of the Spirit one side and the Son on the other, holding up our hands as we bring our prayers to God, I hope you will be encouraged to pray a little bit more and a little bit more often.