With: Reimagining the Way You Relate to God

by Skye Jethani

While Jesus certainly prayed vocally both in private and public, these utterances did not encompass the fullness of his relationship with his Father. A fuller reading of the Gospels shows that Jesus lived in constant communion with the Father even when no words were used. This fuller understanding of prayer is often perplexing to those who have only known prayer as communication. For example, in the 1980s Dan Rather interviewed Mother Teresa. The CBS anchor asked her, “When you pray, what do you say to God?” “I don’t say anything,” she replied. “I listen.” “Okay,” Rather said, taking another shot at it. “When God speaks to you, then, what does he say?” “He doesn’t say anything. He listens.” Rather didn’t know how to continue. He was baffled. “And if you don’t understand that,” Mother Teresa added, “I can’t explain it to you.”22 This communion view of prayer is what Paul meant when he commanded Christians to “pray without ceasing.”23 Paul was calling us to live as Jesus did—in constant connection