A Praying Life
(Connecting with God
in a Distracting World)
by Paul E. Miller
Reviewed by Pat Beaty
This book blew me away, or, in my antiquated vernacular, it
knocked my socks off! In the author’s introduction, he tells us that this treatise
was written, “for Christians, for those struggling to do life, who pray badly
yet long to connect with their heavenly Father.” He frames his efforts by relating his experiences in praying
for his family; and this turns out, in my opinion, to be an excellent
idea. In his recounting the
prayers for and by his family members, he emphasizes that “prayer is not the
center of this book. Getting to
know a person, God, is the center.” He says that, even though we like to think
we are independent, “dependency is the heartbeat of prayer.”
Early in this text, the author correctly remarks, “It is
hard to pray.” He then refers to Matthew 18:3, “Unless you turn and become like
children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.” Shortly thereafter, Mr.
Miller explains that we must pray just as directly and fearlessly and “mess-ily”
as we can. He emphasizes that “the only way to come to God is by taking off any
spiritual masks. The real you has to meet the real God. He is a person.” “Learning to Play Again,”
and “Learning to Babble Again” are the two small sections of this work that
will surprise and delight the reader.
The author refers at times to what hinders prayer (and there
are a lot of things). He also
explains many things that can help our praying life. He lists a number of Paul’s prayers from the New Testament
and points to the way this Apostle wants the church to pray as he mentions “continuous
prayer” twelve times.
During a large portion of the last part of the book, the
author explained at length cynicism and how one must “abide” in order to pray.
He points out that praying is hard, and he explains at length how he uses 3 X 5
cards and a prayer journal to help him in his requests to the Lord. He warns against over-spiritualizing
our prayers and explains how Jesus Christ is “real” in his prayers.
This author explains his feelings about prayer by using the
team story, as in: God is weaving a pattern in the story of this apostle or
that Christian, and this reviewer finds this to be another excellent way to
explain the points that the writer wants to make.
Finally, this work is more lengthy than many readers are
used to, but rest assured it will be worth your time to read it from start to
finish.
From the author, “Don’t be embarrassed how needy your heart
is and how much it needs to cry out for grace. Just start praying.”
