So, Alexis told me that the Haystack prayer meeting happened in nearby Williamstown! Looking forward to visiting it soon… Here is an interesting link to more information about what happened at Haystack:

http://wso.williams.edu/~dchu/MissionPark/meeting.html

Apparently this event is quite well known - illiterate me!

Anyway, although the students were meeting regularly for a twice-weekly prayer meeting, I guess the pivotal prayer meeting, “the” haystack prayer if you will, happened in 1806. Which means that this year, this summer, is the 200th anniversary of that prayer! Pretty cool!

From the reckless to the brutally mundane…

So I have been noting with growing resignedness the sheer number of white hairs proliferating in my hair, my beard, my sideburns. I’m getting old, and looking it

This morning, though, I was shocked to find that I had a white *nosehair*.

Yewww!

The idea of reckless prayer is not new - here is an amazing precedent set in Exodus. Immerse yourself as an observer in the scene about to ensue, Moses having a heart-to-heart with God:

Thus the Lord used to speak to Moses face to face, just as a man speaks to his friend. When Moses returned to the camp, his servant Joshua, the son of Nun, a young man, would not depart from the tent.

Then Moses said to the Lord, “See, You say to me, ‘Bring up this people!’ But you Yourself have not let me know whom You will send with me. Moreover, You have said, ‘I have known you by name, and you have also found favor in My sight.’ Now therefore, I pray You, if I have found favor in Your sight, let me know Your ways that I may know You, so that I may find favor in Your sight. Consider too, that this nation is Your people.”

And He said, “My presence shall go with you, and I will give you rest.”

Then he said to Him, “If Your presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here. For how then can it be known that I have found favor in Your sight, I and Your people? Is it not by Your going with us, so that we, I and Your people, may be distinguished from all the other people who are upon the face of the earth?”

The Lord said to Moses, “I will also do this thing of which you have spoken; for you have found favor in My sight and I have known you by name.”

Then Moses said, “I pray You, show me Your glory!”

And He said, “I Myself will make all My goodness pass before you, and will proclaim the name of the Lord before you; and I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and will show compassion on whom I will show compassion.”

reckless, reckless prayer! But prayer that knew and touched the heart of God.

It’s amazing how therapeutic it is to just write down my thoughts on my junk - I feel like I’ve literally dumped it off my heart and I can walk away from it now.

But I’ve done that many times before - and this time I feel Christ gently nudging me to take action, to keep working through this junk with people I trust. The stakes are too high for me to leave this stuff unaddressed, especially the bitterness and negativity.

So I will … [deep breath] … obey.

So, I’m struck today by my impurity and junk. There are a variety of issues and garbage in my heart that need to get addressed during my reckless journey of faith in Christ. Some of them include:

• Bitterness and negativity in my heart toward Christian church culture, especially American Christians. Some of it is well-founded, some of it stems from gross exaggerations, some of it is simply lies, and some of it is sheer cynicism. None of it is godly or productive. This bitterness has to be healed, has to be addressed at least, before I can begin encouraging others in their love pursuit of Christ and his Kingdom. And it looks like God is serious about rolling up his sleeves and walking me through the process of cleaning up this sour river that bubbles tepidly in the depths of my heart. But do I trust him enough to begin? (more…)