I have been reading Dave Tomlinson's How to be a bad Christian (Hodder, 2012). It has some really good and interesting advice about down-to-earth Christianity - but I was particularly interested in some of what he says about prayer. Prayer is the way in which we engage with God. It is how we communicate - the expression of the relationship. Tomlinson makes the point that God can cope with how we are feeling - "Sometimes prayer means having to shout at; at other times, someone to lean on; most times, a mixture of both." Another time he says: "Prayer is one of the most democratic activities I can think of. No one owns prayer. No one can dictate how prayer should be offered, or by whom. Anyone can pray: anywhere, anytime, and in any fashion they choose." And one more comment - "I think most of us already pray quite often, whether we think of it as prayer or not: the stammer of pain at someone else's pain; the sparkle of joy at someone else's joy; the silence within when something very beautiful is happening, or something very bad; whatever it is we feel when we sense deep longing or deep happiness. All this in its own way is prayer - the soul talking."
The wonder of prayer is that God is really interested in what we have to say!
