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Quotations I love: moving from intending to pray to actually praying

Lynne Baab • Friday September 30 2016

“There is a moment between intending to pray and actually praying that is as stark and silent as any moment in our lives. It is the split second between thinking about prayer and really praying. . . . How easy it is, and yet – between us and the possibility of prayer there seems to be a great gulf fixed: an abyss of our own making that separates us from God.” – Emilie Griffin [1]

It is no accident that throughout history, Jews and Christians have prayed at meals and at bedtime. Humans are creatures of habit, and we do anything more...

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Quotations I love: Eugene Peterson on paying attention

Lynne Baab • Thursday September 22 2016

"I think the pastor's chief job is not to get something done but to pay attention to what's going on, and to be able to name it, and to encourage it – nobody else is going to do that." – interview with Eugene Peterson [1]

When my kids were in elementary school, I read a book on parenting that made an interesting suggestion. The author wrote that compliments should focus on what the child had done, rather than just saying, “great job” or “beautiful painting.” Compliments like this would help the child be motivated to do more of the same, the author...

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Drawing near to God by noticing patterns

Lynne Baab • Friday October 23 2015

The human brain loves to find patterns even when none exist. This explains the popularity of conspiracy theories, some of which must be false. (Only some of them? See, I can’t say, “all of which are false”! I love patterns and categories as much as the next person!)

We can use the human love of patterns to nurture our prayer life and to help us observe the pattern of our spiritual growth. Here are three ideas:

1. “Word for the year.” Some people advocate picking a word in January that you want to have as the theme for your year. My experience is...

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An amusing story of hearing God’s guidance

Lynne Baab • Thursday October 8 2015

Many months ago, a friend of mine was asked to lead music at an international conference. She was happy to say yes, and she immediately contacted people who had helped her lead music at conferences in the past to see if they would be willing to come along and help. None of them were available.

She prefers to lead singing with a team rather than alone, even though she is quite capable of doing it alone, so she wondered what to do next. Should she cast the net wide and contact everyone she knows who leads music? Or should she pray and...

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