Prayer - but not as we may know it!

This week our church, along with the two others in our Ecumenical Covenant, has been engaged in a Week of Accompanied Prayer.  Every day people from our congregations have been meeting members of The Team who have been accompanying them on what is basically a ‘retreat’ in everyday life.

Alongside this our church sanctuary has been turned into a sacred space full of ‘prayer stations’.  These have been beautifully and imaginatively prepared.  Each station invites us to spend time ‘praying’ in a multitude of ways.  It’s been a space open to all and some have called in a number of times.

I ‘visited’ a few of the stations on Sunday, Tuesday and today.  One was a Scrabble board, full now of words of faith made up each day by those who sat at that table and pondered what was important to them.  This morning I lingered at the ‘Spirit’ table and drank some of the fruit juice that represented the ‘Fruit of the Spirit’ I most longed for in my own life.  At another table, full of broken pieces, I learnt of the Japanese tradition of valuing a broken pot that had been lovingly put back together again – and in so doing, to appreciate that it’s often in our own ‘brokenness’ that we learn the most about God, others and ourselves.

These ‘stations’ have been a real blessing and a wonderful gift to many of us this week.  Just another example of the breadth of prayer in which we can all engage. 

There is no one way to pray – I realised that yet again as I moved from table to table in our Sanctuary this week – appreciating that each one was ‘holy ground’.