The Prayer of The Heart
The prayer of the heart is guided by 3 principles:
i) Short simple prayers
ii) Unceasing prayers
iii) All-inclusive prayers
Short prayers
When you pray, do not try to express yourself with fancy words, becoming distracted from feeling the depth of affection and faith in your words by a vain search for more descriptive and ‘fancier’ words. Single words tend to concentrate the mind and allow us to descend deeper into our heart. The quiet repletion of a single word helps us quieten our mind, move to the centre of our heart and create an inner stillness that allows us to encounter the voice of the Lord. Sitting quietly without this single word or phrase can mean becoming more easily bombarded with endless other conflicting thoughts and ideas. After all, the mind cannot exist in a vacuum.
Unceasing
How do I pray without ceasing when I am busy with other things?
Ceaseless interior prayer is the continual yearning of the human spirit towards God. To succeed in this, we must pray more often to God to teach us how to pray without ceasing. Pray more, and pray more fervently. It is prayer itself which will reveal to you how it can be achieved unceasingly. It takes time. To love and work for the glory of God cannot remain an idea about which we think once in a while. It must become an interior, unceasing doxology.
All inclusive
It is not just us who pray, it is the Holy Spirit that prays in us and through us. He is teaching us how to pray as we come before the Lord. Prayer creates a new sensitivity to the heart and mind of the Spirit, giving us eyes to see and ears that hear. As we lean towards Him, He leans towards us – but also directs our leaning, through Him, towards others and their needs. We begin to pray through our own heart to God, who renews our heart with His, and allows us to pray for others as He leads us and guides us. It is more than just a ‘list.’ The heart of God is the heart of rest that leans towards others with love and passion. This is a picture of how the Body of Christ both ministers to itself and to other parts of the same Body, in and through the one action of communion.
