by Rev. Steven P. Gunther
The beginning of the Doctrine of Life tells us that religion is all about life and that the life of religion is doing what is good. This is a powerful passage because for many of us religion might feel like an intellectual exercise. It’s all about reading the Word, studying the Writings, understanding what all those teachings mean and how they fit together. In all of that work, it’s easy to lose sight of the reality that all those things we read and study and understand actually all point back to the way we are supposed to live.
A related teaching comes in Arcana Coelestia 1618 when it says, “a person is worshipping all the time if love and charity abide in them, external worship being only the outward expression of it.” This also seems to fly in the face of our common understanding. Worship feels like it’s supposed to be a special event. We go to church on Sunday because that’s worship. We go to chapel at the beginning of our school days because that’s worship. It feels like worship is something we can put on our calendars and devote a specific time and a specific place to do so, and yet the Writings are telling us that worship is really all about living the life of charity toward our neighbors all the time.
So, the big spiritual question that all of us spend our lives working through is this: How do we take religion and worship out of the realm of simple intellectual exercise and nicely coordinated pre-determined time slots in our weekly agendas and instead incorporate it meaningfully into our daily life? I could write entire books about that process and everything involved in it, but for this Pastor’s Box, I’ll offer one thing that can help us in this endeavor: talking to the Lord.
The Writings tell us that prayer is simply talking to God (see Arcana Coelestia 2535). We are probably all comfortable with saying the Lord’s prayer in a worship service or before bed, but how often do we take time to just chat out loud with the Lord about what’s going on in our lives? Our prayers don’t have to have eloquent words and special phrases (in fact, the Word counsels directly against that notion). What really matters to the Lord is that we are inviting Him into our daily life.
So, I would encourage all of us to take time this week and just talk to the Lord. Set aside ten minutes. You could do it while you’re driving in the car running errands, or before bed, or you could grab a piece of paper or a journal and write down your thoughts. If you have no idea what to say, just try imagining that the Lord came and sat down next to you and you had ten minutes of uninterrupted time with Him. What would you say to Him? What questions would you have for Him? You may be surprised by what you find.