I tried to dig down
To the bottom of God's love...
I am still digging
I'm a writer, though writing was never my career. However, it was a constant element in my life from schooldays onwards then, when I retired, I was free to do more of it. I write books. I write blogs and articles. I write poems. I write prayers. Most of what I write is intertwined with my Christian faith and, when I looked through my poems a few years ago, I noticed that many of them tracked the development of my prayer life. I realised quite early in my Christian life that, for me, prayer was not just a routine or a habit: it was a calling - but that didn't mean that I was good at it!
Deeper
The short poem shown at the top of this page was written during a Christian summer camp. I don't know when I first
started turning my pen to poetry, but this haiku NOTE 1 is the oldest poem that I retained, and it expresses the pattern
of my faith journey. I enjoy acquiring knowledge, and especially knowledge about the things of God. I trust my
life and my destiny to God's grace, but my thirst is to know Him better. I learn, and I keep on learning. I was
attracted to prayer, so I sought to pray with deeper devotion and greater effect. But my journey wasn't smooth or
easy as I struggled through various crises along the way. That's why my most popular book Is titled, "Still Digging" -
and its subject is prayer.
Magnetic
The essence of prayer is love. That's the fundamental premise and starting point for this book, which teaches techniques,
but refutes obligation. That matters, because it's easy to be put off by the idea that prayer is a duty. Are lovers drawn
together by duty? Of course not! Love is magnetic. But when we feel a sense of obligation, it saps the pleasure from
whatever task is being imposed on us. It's better to pray, not because we think we ought to, but because we want to.
Personality
Christians believe that prayer matters. Yeah right! But many admit to feeling guilty or inadequate, and struggle to make the
time, or to figure out what to pray for when they do get down to it. What's going wrong? Why do so many genuine believers
struggle with one of the first principles of Christian living? Little children seem to get it, so what happens when they
grow up? The problem may lie in traditions that emphasise forms of prayer that suit only a narrow range of personalities.
But prayer is for all of us - extroverts, introverts, active people, people who enjoy stillness, folk who love solitude,
and those who hate being alone. We are individuals, shaped by different temperaments and different life experiences. We
don't experience life identically, so why try to mould our prayer life identically? To maintain a consistent prayer life,
we need to find ways of praying that suit our own personality.
Still Digging is a book about prayer. So, what's new about that? Many people have written about prayer - but some assume that everyone can do it the way they do. Traditional prayer styles tend to come easier to introverts. I know, because I'm an introvert myself; but I recognise that things that suit my personality don't suit everyone else. It took years for me to learn how to pray in ways that best fit my life and personality. I tried to get closer to God by understanding - but I still don't understand. However, despite my limited understanding, and without logic, I have reached a level of acceptance and contentment that enables me to maintain a varied prayer habit that suits the range of needs and circumstances that make up my life. How many types of prayer are there? Well that's the point of the book.
Effective
There are many ways to pray, and they don't all work for each of us. Effective prayer proceeds from who we are, who we
live with, and what circumstances make up our life. We can all pray, but we can't all pray in the same way - at least,
not entirely so. For that reason, "Still Digging" has 80 chapters grouped within 10 sections -
Coffee
The idea of a book with 80 chapters may sound off-putting; but the book has 266 pages, which makes the average chapter length
just over 3 pages. Many readers have commented on the appeal of those short chapters. They can be read in the time it takes to
drink a mid-morning cup of coffee. One reader told me that she incorporated the book into her daily "quiet times" - one chapter
a day for 80 days. The reason the chapters are short is because they are simple, and focused. Prayer is not meant to be
complicated. It may take half a lifetime to learn our personal way of prayer, but the mountain top we approach can be climbed
one step at a time.
Poems
Did I mention poems? Of course I did, because poems were the starting point for writing this book. Poetry is a compressed
form of expression; I think of it as a way of parcelling up thoughts as presents ready to be unwrapped. Over my years of learning
to pray, making a mess of it, and trying again, I marked my steps by wrapping up my thoughts in verse. Later, I wondered what to
do with all those poems. I wondered about publishing the, but thought "nobody buys poetry books!" NOTE 2 Then I saw that I could
use these "presents" as chapter headings, then unwrap the subject more fully in prose. Each chapter of Still Digging starts
with a poem or quotation, then expands and amplifies the subject in practical language. The chapters describe options that suit
different personalities and lifestyles - and they progress from simple beginnings to 'deeper' forms of prayer - but, to quote
from Chapter 38: "Prayer is for all, but not all types of prayer are for everyone." We need to discover the ways that work for
ourselves. As the subtitle says, this book is about "scratching the surface and plumbing the depths of prayer"
Let us pray as we are (not as we are not).
Let us pray because we want to.
Let us pray anywhere, anytime, anyhow.
But, however we do it - let us pray.
