Photo: Unsplash – Harli Marten

When I was engaged to be married there was very little I could think about other than my fiancee. When I wasn’t with her I would think about the things I loved about her. I looked forward to seeing her again; I looked forward to our marriage, when in God’s eyes we would be united with each other.  It may be that you’ve been engaged, or that you haven’t; you may be sad and hurt that you’ve never been engaged or married. But (and I don’t write this lightly) in the context of eternity it doesn’t ultimately matter: As Christians we’re looking forward to a greater reality than being engaged or married in this life – a reality that those things point towards. And as we’ll see, the state of being engaged in this life is a small and imperfect picture of an experience we can all have now – the experience of communing with God.

This is the third post in the series ‘Means of Grace.’ As I write I’m assuming that you’ve read the first two posts, Means of Grace – Our destination and journey and Means of Grace – God’s word.

Communing with God

As human beings created in God’s image we long to know and be known; we long to be ‘fully known, fully loved, fully accepted forever’; we long to be part of a loving community. ‘Communing’ is my way of expressing what we do in that community. Here are a couple of examples of ‘communing’, to help us get a feel for it:

1, Think of a relationship you have (or had) with a loved one – how you relate to them: Listening to them; thinking about them and what they’ve said; talking to them. If you know them well sometimes you may sit with them in silence, simply enjoying being with them; or perhaps you share an activity together. This is communing.

2, Communing is what the persons of the Trinity do. We see many glimpses of that in John’s gospel, for example:

Don’t you believe that I am in the Father, and that the Father is in me?

John 14:10

The Father loves the Son and shows him all he does.

John 5:20

Perhaps supremely we see it in John 17. For example Jesus prays to the Father about “The glory I had with you before the world began” (verse 5). He prays for unity among his followers so that “the world will know that you sent me and have loved them even as you have loved me” (verse 23); and “I want them to see my glory, the glory you have given me before the creation of the world” (verse 24).

As he recounts Jesus’s words, John is painting a picture for us of a loving, joyful relationship between Father and Son in the power of the Spirit. They are so close to one another that the Father is in the Son and the Son is in the Father. The Father loves the Son; he wants the Son to be honoured and glorified; he shows him all that he does. In turn the Son obeys and loves the Father. And we know, of course, from that great Christmas passage John 1:1-4 that the Father and Son – the Word –  have existed in joyful love for all eternity. They don’t get bored of each other; in fact quite the opposite, they love being together. This is a wonderful picture of ‘Communing.’

Being caught up in the community of the Trinity

As Christians we get the privilege of being caught up in this community. Take, for example, John 14:13-20:

And I will do whatever you ask in my name, so that the Father may be glorified in the Son. 14 You may ask me for anything in my name, and I will do it. 15 If you love me, keep my commands. 16 And I will ask the Father, and he will give you another advocate to help you and be with you forever— 17 the Spirit of truth. The world cannot accept him, because it neither sees him nor knows him. But you know him, for he lives with you and will be in you. 18 I will not leave you as orphans; I will come to you. 19 Before long, the world will not see me anymore, but you will see me. Because I live, you also will live. 20 On that day you will realize that I am in my Father, and you are in me, and I am in you

John 14:13-20

Jesus says he will answer our prayers (verse 13); the Father will send the Holy Spirit to us – the same Holy Spirit who is the bond of love between Father and Son (verses 16-18). And the result is that we will know that we have been brought into the life of the Trinity (verse 20).

Of course we don’t fully experience the life of the Trinity yet – we’re still on earth, we still sin, we can’t see God. Our current state is a bit like being engaged. We’re longing for the day when we see God face to face – when we enter into the life of the Trinity. But even now we can commune with God.

Means of grace 2 – Prayer

What does communing look like? Let’s break it down into individual ‘activities’. The first activity we will consider (following God’s word in the previous post) is prayer. What does the word ‘prayer’ make you think of? Talking to God perhaps; asking for things; saying sorry; having a conversation with your Father. All of those are true; but we can go further.

Prayer is the main way as Christians on the journey that we engage in the life of the Trinity. In his famous book ‘Mere Christianity’, CS Lewis thought it was important to explain to those exploring Christianity that being a Christian is about being brought into the joyful happy life of the Trinity. And the first example he used to help his readers think about entering the life of the Trinity was prayer:

An ordinary simple Christian kneels down to say his prayers. He is trying to get in touch with God. But if he is a Christian he knows that what is prompting him to pray is also God: God, so to speak, inside him. But he also knows that all his real knowledge of God comes through Christ, the man who was God – that Christ is standing beside him, helping him to pray, praying for him. You see what is happening. God is the thing to which he is praying – the goal he is trying to reach. God is also the thing inside him which is pushing him on – the motive power. God is also the road or bridge along which he is being pushed to that goal. So that the whole threefold life of the three-personal being is actually going on in that ordinary little bedroom where an ordinary man is saying his prayers. The man is being caught up into the higher kind of life… he is being pulled into God, by God, while still remaining himself.

Mere Christianity, pages 142-143

Lewis is demonstrating that when a Christian prays, she relates to each member of the Trinity.  She prays to the Father – adoring him, thanking him, bringing her needs and concerns before him. She prays through the Son, who is the bridge: He is the reason the Father hears our prayers; it’s because we’re united to him through faith that the Father is our Father. (And notice, wonderfully, that even when we struggle to pray Jesus is always praying for us – Hebrews 7:25.) And she prays in the power of the Holy Spirit. The Spirit gives us the desire to pray; he enables us to pray. (And even when we don’t know what to say, he prays with us in groans – Romans 8:26 – so we can no longer say “I don’t know what to pray” as a reason for not praying!) In short, when we pray we are engaging in the life of the Trinity: the Trinity is at work. What a privilege! Doesn’t that make you want to pray?

The posture of prayer

Notice in this context a couple of things about prayer. First, the posture or attitude of prayer is dependence. We come to our Father needy, dependent. (That’s one of the reasons why traditionally Christians have prayed on their knees.) Everything comes from our Father as a gift – and even the ability to pray at all is a gift of God’s grace. So there’s no place for pride; or for thinking that because I’ve prayed I’ve earned something, or I deserve something. Remember from the previous post, that an attitude of dependence is central to receiving all the means of grace: We bring water, and ask Jesus to turn it into wine by his Holy Spirit.

The purpose of prayer

Second the purpose of prayer isn’t ultimately to get things; it’s not even to bring our needs before our Father. The purpose of prayer is to commune with God: To have fellowship with our Father, to talk to him. After all, we’re going to spend eternity having fellowship with our Father and his Son Jesus Christ in the power of the Spirit. And prayer is a way of getting into practice now.

So prayer is one part of our whole life with God – engaging in the life of the Trinity. It’s all by grace – prayer is a means of grace. And hopefully that takes the pressure off our prayer life. It’s not something we have to force – it flows naturally out of our relationship with our Father and his Son Jesus Christ. And even if we don’t know what to pray – the Spirit and the Son help us.

Means of grace 3 – Meditation

What does the Bible mean by meditation? And how does it fit in a life of communing with God? Perhaps the most well-known passage related to meditation can be found in Psalm 1:

Blessed is the one
    who does not walk in step with the wicked
or stand in the way that sinners take
    or sit in the company of mockers,
2 but whose delight is in the law of the Lord,
    and who meditates on his law day and night

Psalm 1:1-2

The word translated ‘meditate’ has the sense of chew, or dwell upon. Consider a cow chewing on the cud; in the same way, the blessed (or happy) person chews or dwells upon the law (instruction) of the LORD. Returning to my engagement for a moment: I said earlier that I couldn’t stop myself thinking about my fiancee. You could say that I meditated on my future bride. This gives a little picture of how meditation fits into the Christian journey: We have a bridegroom, Jesus Christ, who is supremely glorious, supremely magnificent and supremely beautiful. And so we meditate on Scripture – we chew and dwell upon God’s word in order to gaze on the beauty of God, to enjoy God, to fuel our love for God, and to prepare ourselves to enjoy him and love him forever. Or to return to John Owen (see the first post in the series), meditation is how we ‘behold the glory of Christ.’

Is this something else to feel guilty about?

As busy Christians reading this post, we might be thinking this is just one more thing to feel guilty about.  But that isn’t the case, for two reasons:

First, we need to differentiate between union and communion. Every Christian has union with Christ all the time: that is, we’re united to Christ through faith. We are justified – declared righteous in God’s sight – not through what we do (including how much we pray and how much we meditate) but through what Christ has done. Christ lived a perfect life – he prayed perfectly, he meditated perfectly – and when the Father looks at us, because of our faith in Christ he sees Jesus. If we are repenting and believing we have union with Christ – no matter how we’re feeling. (So in fact, as Christians we shouldn’t be feeling guilty about anything!)

But union is different from communion. Communion is when we enjoy that relationship – when we go deeper into that relationship. Think again about marriage. Marriage is a union – the couple remain united even when their marriage goes through a difficult patch. But every wise couple seeks to build communion with each other; and every wise Christian seeks to build communion with God. When we mess up – which we often do – we come back to our union with Christ; we remember that our union is the foundation for our communion. But we keep trying to build communion.

Second, prayer and meditation are means of grace: ways in which God gives himself to us, or how God turns water into wine in our lives. So the question isn’t so much “should I feel guilty if I’m not doing them?” The question is rather “why aren’t I doing them?” or “why wouldn’t I do them?”

Other connected means of grace

Here are some other means of grace connected to what we’ve thought about. I’ve given a brief explanation, but there’s more explanation in chapters 6 and 7 of ‘Formed for the glory of God.’   

  • Contemplation: Like meditation but with a particular focus on gazing on Christ in the Word.
  • Silence and solitude: “Times of silence and solitude (being alone) are important to foster the rest necessary to wait on the Lord.” (Strobel)
  • Soliloquy: Speaking directly to your soul as you stand before God. See Psalm 42 for example.
  • Fasting: An opportunity to prepare the hearts of God’s people – taking on the posture of dependence by embracing our weakness.
  • Prayer of Lament: Something I’ve found helpful recently,  a permitted prayer of ‘complaint’ to God when you’re struggling with circumstances.
  • Christian books
  • Christian music

Taking it further

Formed for the glory of God – Kyle Strobel (chapters 6-7)

The Deep things of God – Fred Sanders (chapters 12-13)