Considering it - pages 6 and 7 of the book

Hello, everyone,

Just musing about how prayer always has two poles, one person and then God/Jesus/Holy Spirit on each side of the cries and whispers, praising, thanking, complaining, every thought and thought we have yet to become aware of, all that is in our hearts and possible to a human being. Read this morning "The Spirit always operates in the between: between Jesus and his Abba, between Jesus and us, between you and me, between us and those to whom we are sent."
Speaking and hearing, writing and reading, prayer, Spirit, Mystery and Presence, Bonds that form community. Can our community be authentic? Will worship and thanksgiving be deeper after we have read and digested? Will we be more equipped to go to those to whom we are sent?

So here is his writing for us to reflect upon:

"Richard Armstrong and Edward Watkin tell the story of a biologist's experiment with "processional caterpillars." On the rim of a clay pot that held a plant, he lined them up so that the leader was head-to-tail with the last caterpillar.

The tiny creatures circled the rim of the pot for a full week. Not once did any one of them break away to go over to the plant and eat. Eventually, all caterpillars died from exhaustion and starvation.

The story of the processional caterpillars is a kind of parable of human behavior. People are reluctant to break away from the rhythmic pattern of daily life. They don't want to be different.

We must break away, however, if we are to accept Jesus' invitation to "go off alone" with him in prayer. We must break away and be different.

This is especially difficult in today's world. J. D. Salinger points this out in "Teddy." "I mean it's very hard to meditate and live a spiritual life in America. "People think you're a freak if you try to. My father thinks I'm a freak, in a way. And my mother--well, she doesn't think it's good for me to think about God all the time. She thinks it's bad for my health."

The decision to begin a meditation program is a deeper commitment than people realize. A story will illustrate. One day a boy was watching a holy man praying on the banks of a river in India. When the holy man completed his prayer, the boy went over and asked him, "Will you teach me to pray?"

The holy man studied the boy's face carefully. Then he gripped the boy's head in his hands and plunged it forcefully into the water. The boy struggled frantically, trying to free himself in order to breathe. Finally, the holy man released his hold.

When the boy was able to get his breath, he gasped, "What did you do that for?" The holy man said: "I just gave you your first lesson!" "What do you mean?" asked the astonished boy. "Well," said the holy man, "when you long to pray as much as you longed to breathe when your head was underwater--only then will I be able to teach you to pray."

Mark Link wrote this whole book I'm believing because he has thought a lot about prayer and engaged in it himself and probably received a lot of answers to his prayers and is passionate about sharing with other people what he has learned. If I/maybe you and me/we stick with this, maybe we will be able to feel the Spirit operating in the between--even between a writer and a reader, between Mark Link and ?, even here in cyberspace.

God's blessings to you all for a very, very precious day,
Sharon