Dallas Willard's Divine Conspiracy: Reflections on Prayer

Recently I have read authors citing Dallas Willard. Most specifically, I read a book by John Ortberg, a book that promised a great deal but mostly didn't deliver, except when referencing Willard.

As a result, I went to my bookshelf and pulled out this book, which has sat there for years, unread. It's a big book, and I don't know why I bought it, but it was time.

Willard is speaking about the greatness of God, who we are in Christ, and what our role is in the Kingdom of God. As I read, I hear echoes of N.T. Wright, April Yamasaki, Ted Dekker, Scot McKnight, and Barry Jones.

Reading without talking about what I read, particularly when there are so many connections to other authors whose words I value, is challenging. How can I synthesize unless I reflect? How can I remember? How can I grow?

That is the reason for this blog.
Btw, I remembered why I don't blog. It takes a crazy amount of time to say the things I want to say the way I want to say them. I don't know how I would ever do this if I were teaching.

Ah, but I do miss writing.

This morning I finished Chapter 7, which is about prayer. I generally take about three days to finish a chapter. They are long, and I don't want to rush. Sometimes I journal a bit afterward, as I did yesterday. I thought about blogging then, which would have been good and I would have remembered what Willard said that prompted me to think about prayer in this particular way, but my journal was near and my computer was across the room and the dogs were snuggled next to me and I didn't want to disturb them.

Willard's discussion about research on prayer, the role of prayer in our lives, and the benefits of prayer prompted me to consider the role of prayer in my own life.

Last spring, when I thought Duane might be fired (long story, not for this blog), when he was struggling with his health (also long story), I prayed frequently throughout the day. I needed comfort, peace, hope.

Right now I pray less than frequently. Every morning. Sometimes in the evening as I fall asleep. Rarely throughout the day.

Prayer is part of walking with God, abiding or resting in God (John 15), forming community with God. It teaches me to remember God's greatness, who I am in Him, and how I should live. When I am connected to the living God, I overflow with love.

Why don't I pray more continuously?

• I'm not desperate like I was last spring. Everything's going fairly well right now.
• I feel more self-sufficient, and I have forgotten how much I depend on God. 
• I may be reluctant to give God control over my life. 
• I get busy, focused on the things around me, the things that have to be done. 
• My kingdom feels more important to me than his, and I don't see my role in that kingdom. 
• I may be reluctant to give God control over my life, preferring autonomy. (If I am thinking that I may be, I probably am.)

Willard's book is about living in God's kingdom, now, and prayer is about actively living connected to God right now. Now is part of eternity, as Willard, Dekker, and Wright emphasize continuously. 

Prayer is about remembering who God is, who were are in God, and then living in a way that honors that understanding. Too often our view of God gets warped, causing our view of who we are in God and with other people to get distorted. 

Willard notes that at times we may "project upon God the sadistic tendencies that really are present in human beings. . ..  One of our worst thoughts about God is that he . . . enjoys human suffering" (267). This reminded me of my own view of God many years ago. 

I was the little mole in a game of Whack-a-Mole, and God was the whacker with a giant mallet. I pop my head up, and God whacks it down, to correct me to guide, to make me more godly, something. 

It's like I can't win. Any time I try, God whacks me. The thing is, that's not God. Prayer, real prayer, looking into the face of Jesus, shows us that. 

Willard asks, "Is it any wonder that Jesus told us to forget everything we think we know about the nature of God and lose ourselves in his picture of our Father, the one in the heavens? . . . Prayer is the revelation of a God who loves to spare his children and who will always do it upon request unless he has something better in mind, which he rarely does (267-268). 

How do we pray? We become like the disciples, who ask Jesus to teach them to pray. We use the model Jesus gave, the Lord's prayer, or the Disciples' Prayer, as Wright calls it. Willard offers it as a model or a "framework of the praying life." He describes how he repeated the prayer mindlessly in his youth, but then God taught him to use the prayer in a new way, "taking each phrase of it and slowly and meditatively entering into the depths of its meaning, elaborating within it important details of [his] current life" (268). 

He models this in his last section. Interestingly, Wright does this in The Lord and His Prayer, and April Yamasaki does this in Sacred Pauses. Reading these books made that idea come alive for me, and reading Willard reminded me of what I often forget. I need to pray, frequently, not just at the beginning of the day or as I sleep.