In Us, For Us, and From Us

Image: Christianity.com

It is necessary that the Spirit of Christ be in us, that [he] may pray in us and for us and cause us to pray, and may unite our minds and hearts to God, and immerse [them] in his infinite ocean of divinity.

Anna Maria van Schurman

Though we are ever novices in prayer, it is also true that as we mature in prayer we discover that Christ is both the subject and object of prayer: He is both the inspiring source of prayer, and He is the one to whom our prayers find their home.

Van Schurman appears to be enamoured by this notion of being immersed in “the ocean of divinity” – in which we find ourselves to be merely a drop:

Altogether other is the mind of the Christian… who considers his very self and all his own as nothing, or as if, gazing upon a tiny drop of the ocean, only then judges himself blessed, when immersed in the measureless ocean of divinity, enveloped, penetrated, and filled, by that goodness and happiness.

Far from diminishing the worth of that one drop, we are rather found invaluable to the One who made us that one drop.  Is this what Bob Marley meant when he sang, “feel it in the one drop“?  Is this what Bruce Cockburn meant when he prayed, “I want to be a particle of your light“?

Here is an excerpt of Cockburn’s lyrics from “Hills of Morning”:

Let me be a little of your breath

Moving over the face of the deep — I want to be a particle of your light

Flowing over the hills of morning

The only sign you gave of who you were

When you first came walking down the road,

Was the way the dust motes danced around Your feet in a cloud of gold

But everything you see’s not the way it seems — Tears can sing and joy shed tears.

You can take the wisdom of this world And give it to the ones who think it all ends here

Let me be a little of your breath Moving over the face of the deep — I want to be a particle of your light

Flowing over the hills of morning

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Therefore… Come Holy Spirit and inspire prayer that finds itself at one in the ocean of Your divinity.

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