“Sing to the Lord a new song.” Psalm 96:1
Sacred routines can become empty rituals if we don’t “freshen them up”
with some “right-brained” creativity from time to time. Pastor Batterson writes
that spiritual growth is a conundrum in that it does involve developing a
spiritual discipline; a routine. But once a routine becomes routine, there is
the danger of it becoming a mindless effort. It becomes a “left-brained”
practice that we’ve learned how to execute, but forget why.
While it is extremely important to have a spiritual routine, we must
steer clear of the pitfall of “left-brained” memory, where all of our motions
are like a mechanical programming that is void of meaning. Jesus warns against
meaningless verbiage disguising as prayer in Matthew 6:7 (for broader context,
read verses 5-8).
The Lord doesn’t expect all of us to pray the same way. Each one of us
is unique – and I find it very gratifying to just talk to Him the way I speak
to my dear friends. He is the dearest to me, after all. We can speak to the
Lord from our hearts, in our own personalities – not feigning some Old English
form of speaking. Our God can hear the words we can’t even utter by the power
of His Holy Spirit. A soulful moan can be interpreted with clarity; crying out
to the Lord gets His full attention.
These kinds of prayers happen when we move away from rote scripts and begin
to seek His face in sincerity.
Let us allow the Lord to come closer, and He will create within us a
greater desire to be one with Him. With love that awesome flowing between us
and Him; between earth and heaven – there will always be ‘next level’ worship,
praise, devotion, service, love!
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