The presence of the Father #01
The presence of the Father #01
I always beseech the God of our Lord Jesus Christ - the Father most glorious - to give you a spirit of wisdom and penetration through an intimate knowledge of Him.
Eph 1:17 Weymouth
A praying man will by his prayerful stance be brought into the presence of the Father. A praying man is carried, by the fundamental function of prayer itself, carried into the embracing arms of the Father. Prayer opens the realm of fatherhood. Prayer is no less but a returning to the Father. In the simplicity of the dynamics of prayer man will find the full force of living, existence at its edge. Prayer holds the answer to the most profound existential questions. In prayer the mystery of life is to be found, its explanation as well as its reverential blessedness.
The kneeling man, the kneeling Christian, has found grace to make the necessary turn and to take the only possible position in which the true glory of fatherhood is recovered. The Spirit of penetration uses man's waywardness and distress to clarify and necessitate the absoluteness and majesty of God, the Father. Darkness is but the point of beginning on a journey into the heart of the Father. Blessed are the poor in spirit, for to them belongs the Kingdom of the Heavens. The poet states perfectly to the point: "God is always before". God is the initiator, God is there and He is not silent. God speaks penetratingly about fatherhood. He cares for children of grace. His heart is already open. Ours need to melt and to reform.
Helplessness and distress provokes a turning for home. Without penetrating experiences of the lack and loss of fatherhood there will be no miracle returning home to find the Father waiting, no tears of relief, no glory, no true glory. The grain of wheat lies ready to spring forth in glorious growth unto harvest in every obstacle, in every difficulty, in every impossibility.
Every man carries the art of prayer in his heart, deep down in his innermost being. Every man will find his own personal school of prayer prepared for him, specially designed by the Spirit of wisdom and penetration. The apparent absence of the Father forces each one of us into a personal path of pursuit, the very real sense of a deficiency of the functions of fatherhood drives us to ask for fathers to come. The Father will answer by taking us by the hand on a journey into His heart.
Lars Widerberg
