"Linked............................."

Sunday morning here, midpoint of a three-day weekend, the old man up early enough to go to church, but not sure my body has yet adjusted to its normal schedule being changed last night. My youngest daughter’s oldest boy was playing in the final JV tournament the last two days, about four hours from here, mom and dad there supporting both him and the team, the two youngest grandchildren staying with us. It was nearly two when I carried Noah out to Melissa, a bit later than my usual time to crawl under the covers. Don’t know about other people, but, around here, life has a way of hindering any sort of scheduled prayer closet. Shoot; in truth, it is difficult to find some secluded uninterrupted spot, period. One learns, instead, to “maintain as you go”. In Luke’s Gospel, he has the disciples asking Jesus “Teach us to pray”, the Master responding with the Lord’s Prayer followed by vocal pictures of how a man’s knocking at the door with a request is answered by both a friend and a father. Matthew, however, places such example of petition within the Sermon on the Mount where, between it and the latter, several prerequisites (harboring un-forgiveness, hypocrisy in approaching the throne, the surrendered condition of our heart, unbelief, and judgment of others) are shared as detriments in so far as “making contact”. If we return, then, to the initial address of that prayer as given, we realize that it begins with “Our Father which art in heaven”, thus setting before us a great gulf to be spanned by (a) recognition of His holiness; and (b) a desire for His kingdom to come and His will to be done; and, while, to each their own, with Christ “in my belly”, that equates to me as, if all else is clear, merely surrendering myself to His wisdom, His authority, His presence as “it” comes forth from within me. If my mind is continually set on Him, if He is invited into all the details of my existence, then He can be found near at any time, indeed His reality never far from me, a companion with me in all that I do……