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When should I pray? The rhythm of time and praying.

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Really, now, you do the same things everyday and every week don’t you? If you are neat, you have developed a routine for keeping things tidy. And if you are a, uh, not so neat, you have a routine of where you put the pizza boxes in the room when you are done with them. And the reason we have these habits is because they create a rhythm of life that is a great comfort to us. We probably have never thought of our lives as being a rhythm. But they are. There is a rhythm to everything.

And we manage our relationships by the rhythm of time. I pick up my son every Tuesday for lunch from the bus stop. Every Tuesday night I meet with three other men to pray for our families and to encourage us to keep the spiritual life going. And every night my wife and I talk for about an hour about our children. This same rhythm of life for maintaining relationships is the same with our relationship with God.

The church took the hours at which the different events of Jesus’ life lead to his death and resurrection as hours at which they would pray. These hours are 6 a.m., 9 a.m., 12 p.m., 3 p.m. and 6 p.m.. These hours are called the "daily office." So, today, I want you to take a moment at each of these hours. Pray your regular prayer as close to 6 a.m. as possible and 12 noon. Then take little thirty second prayers at 9 a.m., 3 p.m. and 6 p.m. This keeping the rhythm of life is really ‘getting spiritual.’  (Click on Starting a Spiritual Life on the details of Spirituality and how to begin to pray and meditate.)

We will discuss the events that happened to Jesus and how they can form our prayer life in Dig Deeper. We will discuss the way in which keeping this rhythm makes us more spiritual in the Continuation of Article.

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Article Highlights

Continuation of Weekly Article

"Getting Spiritual" is more than just turning within ourselves and getting a good feeling for about ten minutes everyday.  Getting Spiritual means we are being changed from within so that our view on life is different.

This is the wonderful thing about the Spirit, he gets within you and starts to challenge you to do things that you never thought you were capable of doing.  And then he gives you the will to do them.  The more you encounter the Spirit, the more you are changed.  The more you are changed, the more you handle life in a more spiritual way.

This may not mean that you stop doing everything you don't like about yourself (as I can truly attest), but it does mean that your outlook on life will begin to change.  And when we start to see things differently, then our actions about what we see will change.

I hate to tell you this, but this process is called "moral formation."  It means that the way you act (your moral action) is being formed by your view on life (your formation).  

And it is like learning to ride a bicycle.  If you start to practice and you fall off, there are two choices: stop riding or keep trying until you get it right.  This is the same with spiritual practices.  We need to keep trying them to get them right.  It is the consistency of practicing them that forms us.

Where riding a bicycle everyday gives us skills at bike riding, praying everyday gives us spiritual formation skills.  And when we pray at various times throughout the day, then we are constantly being formed and our way will be changed.  The Lord, who is the Spirit, will encounter us and change us.

It is just that simple.

The more complicated stuff happens when we start to apply what we know to the tough areas of life.  We will talk about that later in the months to come.

The formation of praying the "daily office," which is praying at 6, 9, 12, 3, 6 and bedtime, is the formation of becoming more like Christ.  And for that, we should Dig Deeper.

Dig Deeper

The early church, and at least parts of the church over the millennia, was and is composed of people who are in love with the Spirit who is God.  And they do and did want to "pray without ceasing" as 1 Thessalonians 5.17 tells us to do.

To "pray without ceasing" is to maintain the relationship with God throughout the entire day.  And to do that, it is helpful to have checkpoints like a runner on a marathon has checkpoints to keep her on her path.  These "checkpoints" are the hours of the day.

6 a.m., This is usually the time of sunrise.  And we pray the prayer I have introduced you to praying in Starting a Spiritual Life (Go there if this is your first time on this site).  Don't change the time you set for your prayer time.  Yet, this is the beginning of the day.  It is when the Daystar rises.  It is also the time when our Daystar rose from the dead.  And this event filled us with so much joy that we celebrate the resurrection of Jesus first thing every morning.  

9 a.m. Most of us are at work at this time.  And this is the time when we can stop for a quick sixty second prayer and meditation at our desks or on the work floor.  And when we do, we remember that this is the time when Jesus Christ started his work on the Cross.  This is the hour they crucified Jesus Christ.  So, we stop and say a prayer that our work will glorify God like Jesus Christ's self giving work glorified God on the Cross.

12 n. We are all taking a break from the daily grind at this time of day for lunch.  This is the hour that Jesus Christ took a break from the world.  It is the hour at which he breathed his last.  At this moment, we contemplate with a psalm, prayer, the Lord's Prayer/Our Father, and meditate on how Jesus was faithful until the end.  Let us pray that we remain faithful in the working world until the end of the day.

3 p.m. Here is when we are ready to fall asleep on the job.  It is also the time that Joseph of Arimathea took careful time to place the body of Jesus in the tomb.  We can take sixty seconds to pray that we will take care to do our Lord justice with the rest of our workday.  We also pray for the Spirit to carry us the rest of the way.

6 p.m. This was the prayer at the setting of the Sun.  The lamps usually were lit in homes at this time.  It is the time we remember to light the lamp of our hearts for the Spirit.  We say we are sorry for the things we did that brought darkness into other people's lives to cleanse ourselves for the next day.  And we thank the Light of the World, Jesus Christ, for being in us and guiding us in the darkness.

All of these times keep us on course.  But remember to be patient with yourselves.  If we say these prayers it should have taken about 32 minutes out of our day total.

So, get into the rhythm of time.  Let it keep you dancing with the Spirit.  Get Spiritual by keeping the rhythm of time.  This rhythm keeps us in relationship by helping us focus on the Spirit who is constantly calling us.

For CDs that contain meditation to help you focus and prepare for these prayer times click on the Music and Supplies Page.  These meditation prayers, sung by the religious, give us peace and prepare us for the encounter with the Holy Spirit.

Coming Soon! Gregorian Chant from St. Meinrad.