Mark Driscoll of Mars Hill Church in Seattle was recommended to me a couple of weeks ago and not till recently did I decide to give him a try. The reason for listening to podcasts at all is to really push in to my spiritual side and to LEARN more which I haven’t done much of since coming home. Truthfully, indulging on my faith will only keep my mind on God rather than other things, and hopefully make me live more Christ-like which it’s all about.
I’ll be writing on part two of Mark’s prayer series which is on the Lord’s Prayer. As I just stated, I’m quite new to Mark Driscoll, but so far I think he’s great and I think you should take a listen to him as well. A link to the Mars Hill site will be posted below!
Right off the bat, Mark hits you right in the face by saying not to look to religious people for help on prayer. I get that because it’s God who you should pursue, but religious people can help and am I not doing that very thing, “going to” Driscoll for advice. Mark gets this from Matthew 6:5 if you were wondering. I actually don’t like the term religious people or religious person. I’m religious and I’m a person, but am I a hypocrite? Of course not! Well, I can be hypocritical from time to time, but I get what Mark is implying by the term. I just wished he stuck with “hypocrites”. “Religious people” is a more sexy choice of wording though, say for nonbelievers. Anyways, I find it very encouraging to know that I don’t have to pray in front of the masses to get myself heard. No, it’s not wrong to pray in front of people, but all I’m saying is that I don’t have to go scream at my roommate, Takashi, chanting and jumping around to call myself a believer. Of course I’m exaggerating! In all honesty though, I struggle with this very idea. As Shakespeare would say “therein lays the rub” (or something along those lines)! It’s no secret to anyone that I’m pretty socially awkward and it is quite humorous that I somewhat struggle to talk to people (don’t get me wrong! I love talking to people, but sometimes I struggle stringing sentences together…) and how, naturally enough, I struggle to talk to God as well! It’s only fitting that I struggle to talk to God in front of people too, right haha? I shouldn't though, well, I shouldn’t be self conscious about it ‘cause that defeats the whole purpose. I should have stated that earlier, but that is why I chose this podcast over the others. In the grand scheme of things, I find myself improving prayer in my daily routine drastically and that’s what is really key. If I had another Shakespeare quote, I would enter it here... maybe “Eureka!” or something like that. But yeah, whether it’s praying in my head during a lecture or praying out loud in my dorm room, I find myself constantly speaking to God. It’s awesome man because it keeps my mind off the little struggles that I’m going through and if I do think of those struggles, it's only when I’m praying about them. Do I struggle still? Yeah, but just looking where I was a month ago, I just feel so much stronger!
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