Clay in the Hands

I hit my Pandora radio limit yesterday – and it was only the middle of the month.  Pandora is an online music site that allows you to set up an account and then set up different “stations” based on the genre of music you like.  Last month they announced that they were going to limit the amount of time you could stream music.  Once you hit your limit, you could pay $.99 for the remainder of the month and keep listening.  So what did I do?  I did what any music lover would do in that situation – I opened iTunes, clicked on the radio button and went back to listening some stations I used to listen to before I discovered Pandora (Club 977 the 80’s channel was the choice of the day).

As I listened to the station, I was reminded that they play good music too.  I had just moved on to newer, cooler options – but the old faithful was still there.

In our spiritual lives we are always looking for new and fresh – creative ways to grow spiritually – to “be fed.”  But I want to challenge you today.  There are old, tried and true practices that still lead us to the heart of God.

How many of you, when I mention centering prayer, meditation, the Jesus prayer or Lectio Divina think “Oh yeah, I forgot about those things?”  Most of us on the Protestant side of things are somewhat unfamiliar with these practices.  In fact, some may even cause you to raise an eyebrow of suspicion thinking these practices might be an infiltration of “new age” meditation practices.

But in reality, these practices are as old as Christianity itself.  The desert fathers and mothers used these hundreds of years ago.  So new and fresh isn’t always the ticket.

I am not knocking contemporary trends, in fact, I love them.  But I am saying that we also need to look at age old practices that work.  The good thing is that we have been away from them for so long, for most of us they are new and fresh – now isn’t that interesting!

Please comment and / or contact me if you would like more information on spiritual practices and disciplines – there is a whole new (old) world out there.