Good morning…
As we walked our dog along the bank of the Chattahoochee River, my husband told me about a Richard Rohr meditation that helped him visual prayer in a helpful new way. At my request, he shared with me Rohr’s writing, and now I pass the important portion along to you.
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Excerpt from Richard Rohr’s morning mediation Transforming Our Pain, September 18, 2020
People who don’t pray can’t live the Gospel because the self is not strong enough to hold the anxiety and the fear. If we do not transform our pain, we will always transmit it. Always someone else has to suffer because we don’t know how to suffer; that’s what it comes down to.
Most people are like electric wires: what comes in is what goes out. Someone calls us a name, and we call them a name back. That is, most people pass on the same energy that is given to them. Now compare an electric wire to those big, grey transformers that you see on utility poles. Dangerous current or voltage comes in, but something happens inside that grey box and what comes out is, in fact, now helpful and productive. That is exactly what Jesus does with suffering.
That is what Jesus did: he did not return the negative energy directed at him—not during his life nor when he hung on the cross. He held it inside and made it into something much better. That is how “he took away the sin of the world.” He refused to pass it on! Until the world understands that, there will be no new world.
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Pain. Fear. Anxiety. There is a lot of negative energy coming in to us from all sides. If we do not transform our pain, we will always transmit it. Will we refuse to return the negativity, holding it inside, allowing God to miraculously transform our pain into helpful and productive thoughts, words, and deeds? Following the example of Jesus, who once-and-for-all “took away the sin of the world,” will we refuse to pass along the pain, fear, and anxiety swirling madly in our world today?
It was to this that God called you, for Christ himself suffered for you and left you an example, so that you would follow in his steps. He committed no sin, and no one ever heard a lie come from his lips. When he was insulted, he did not answer back with an insult; when he suffered, he did not threaten, but placed his hopes in God, the righteous Judge.
Christ himself carried our sins in his body to the cross, so that we might die to sin and live for righteousness.
It is by his wounds that you have been healed. You were like sheep that had lost their way, but now you have been brought back to follow the Shepherd and Keeper of your souls (1 Peter 2:21-25, GNT).
Jesus did not deny his suffering. He lived through immense pain by placing his hopes in our Father, the righteous Judge. Will we follow in the footsteps of the Shepherd and Keeper of our souls?
“‘He will wipe every tear from their eyes. There will be no more death’ or mourning or crying or pain, for the old order of things has passed away.”
He who was seated on the throne said, “I am making everything new!” Then he said, “Write this down, for these words are trustworthy and true.”
He said to me: “It is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the Beginning and the End. To the thirsty I will give water without cost from the spring of the water of life” (Revelation 21:4-6, NIV).
When we feel pain and fear, anxiety and suffering, might we rest in the power of transformative prayer, trusting God to make everything new?
…Sue…
P.S. Thank you Sally Mitchell for your tender painting, a painting which whispers to me the power of transformative prayer.
