“The Way of the Pilgrim”

Taize service

August 27, 2006

Scripture Reading: 1 Thessalonians 5:17

Rev. Dr. Carol L. Kerr 

Blue Point Congregational Church

Meditation One:

The Way of the Pilgrim is one of the great Christian classics on prayer.  It is an autobiographical account of a strannick – one of the wandering pilgrims who were a regular feature in the Russian countryside from medieval times until early in the 20^th century.  It is simple and yet profound.  Clues from the text indicate that his travels occurred around 1850.  Nothing is known of who this man actually was.  His name is not known.  

His first narrative begins:  By the grace of God I am a Christian man, by my own actions a sinner, and by calling a homeless wanderer of the humblest origins, roaming form place to place.  My worldly belongings consist of a knapsack on my back, containing dried bread, and a Holy Bible in my breast pocket.  That is all. 

This Sunday is the Twelfth Sunday after Pentecost.  On the Twenty-fourth Sunday after Pentecost this pilgrim went to church and there he heard this passage from the Bible, 1 Thessalonians 5:17 – it is one I often use for a Benediction.  Go live in peace.  Encourage the timid, support the weak, and show unending patience with everyone.  Do not repay evil for evil, but hold fast to what is good.  Aim always at doing the very best for each other and for all people.  Be joyfl always, pray continually, and at all timesa dn in all things never cease to give thanks….

He probably had heard it many times too.  But, you know when you suddenly hear something as if for the first time.  They say, “When the student is ready then the teacher will come.”  Sometimes something in us is ready and the words of the Bible will suddenly fit into our souls like a key in a lock.  This is what happened to him that 24^th Sunday after Pentecost.  The key was, “pray continually” or in his translation “pray without ceasing.”    The literal meaning of the words hit him like a ton of bricks.  How could he pray with out ceasing?  Something in him longed for the answer and longed to immerse himself so that there would be no beginning and no end of prayer in his soul.  What could he do to find the answer?  He had no idea.  So he began to ask around.  One priest, a spiritual director, suggest that he began to pray to God to teach him how to pray unceasingly.  (Something we might think of doing – pray to God to teach us how to pray.)  So he wanders throughout the countryside with this great longing building up in him.

Now we might wonder how did this man end up a wandering pilgrim?  The short answer is that in those days in Russia there was no insurance companies.  What happened was that his father and mother had died.  He and his brother were raised by his grandfather.  His brother was a wild kid.  He was a quieter kid.  One day his brother knocked him over and badly hurt his arm.  It became paralyzed and withered.  His grandfather knew that he could not work on a farm and he needed some talent.  So his grandfather taught him to read.  The only book they had was the Bible, so he learned to read on the Bible.

 

When they grew up and were in their teens, his brother became an alcoholic, left his grandfather and lived a self destructive life style.  He, stayed with his grandfather.  They went to church often and prayed often.  When he turned 17 his grandfather wanted him to marry.  He protested because of is arm.  But his grandfather insisted.  So he fixed him up with a plain girl who was an “old maid” at the age of 20.  A year later his grandfather died and left everything to him and nothing to the eldest son.  He left him the house and his money.  He lived happily with his wife, but his brother was angry.  So one night his brother broke into the house, stole all his money and burned the house down.  Like I said, they had no insurance.  So they were suddenly destitute.  Somehow they borrowed money to build a small house and lived as peasants on his wifes beautiful needlepoint, weaving, and spinning.  Then a few years later, she died.  He had no way of making a living.  He was so bereft that he would see his wife’s things and cry with anguish.  So he sold the house, gave what he had to the poor, took his Bible and began to wander. 

Now days in America, we have insurance companies.  At least some of us, are insured against such catastrophes.  Certainly in our culture we have no such spiritual person as a strannick, a wandering pilgrim.  Or, perhaps we all are wandering pilgrims in our hearts.  After all, haven’t the circumstances in your life at some time were so difficult that they brought you to the conclusion that the thing you really want to do with your life is to find God.  Find God wherever God may be.  We can look back on our lives and realize that we even secretly pray within ourselves without being consciously aware of the prayer or how it acts on its own in the soul and awakens the desire to pray more. 

Finally he runs into another priest or I should say, when the time was right and his heart was ready God provided him with someone who could answer his question.  This priest instructs him:  The unceasing interior Jesus prayer is the uninterrupted, continual calling on the divine Name of Jesus Christ, with the lips, the mind, and the hearts, while calling to mind His constant presence and beseeching His mercy, during any activity one may be doing anywhere and anytime – even while sleeping.  The words of the prayer are as follows:  ‘Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me!’  The instructions are simple and yet quite radical.  One is to say this prayer over and over unceasingly so that eventually one will not be able to live without it. 

 

 Mediation Two:

The idea of calling on the name of Jesus as a prayer might seem silly to us now days.  That is because now days names mean something different than they use to.  A name can simply a label by which you refer to someone.  ‘That guy over there in the blue shirt is “Paul.”’  Or, it can indicate an certain heritage.  Our last name, “Kerr” is Scottish and my son’s middle name is “William” which is the name of one of my ancestors who was a Puritan and an early Governor of Connecticut.  Parents can flip through a book of names, which they now have in paper back, to pick out a name that suits their fancy for their newborn child.  However, in religious circles and in the olden days, names mean more.  The name is more than the word made up of letters and capitalized, Ed, Carol, Susan, Fred… A name points to the essence and identity of the person.   So when you call upon the name of a person in prayer, you are calling upon their unique personhood. 

How do you do the prayer?  First, I like the way it is explained by a modern Russian monk Lev Gillet, “As you repeat the Holy Name, gather quietly, little by little, your thoughts and feelings and will around it;  gather around it your whole being.  Let the Name penetrate your soul as a drop of oil spreads out and impregnates a cloth.  Let nothing of yourself escape.  Surrender your whole self and enclose it within the Name.

He also says, The Name pronounced may be extended and prolonged in seconds or minutes of silent rest and attention.  The repetition of the Name may be likened to the beating of wings by which a bird rises into the air.  It must never be labored and forced, or hurried, or in the nature of a flapping.  It must be gentle, easy, and let us give to this word its deepest meaning – graceful.  When the bird has reached the desired height it glides in its flight, and only beats its wing from time to time in order to stay in the air.  So the soul, having attained to the thought of Jesus and filled herself with the memory him may discontinue the repetition of the Name and rest in Our Lord.   

The Pilgrim in 1850 was not as gentle and much more literal.  He was told to start by praying, “Lord Jesus Christ have mercy on me.”  3000 times a day.  When he was done with that he had to increase it to 6000 times a day.  Finally it was 12000 times a day.  He said his tongue got swollen.  But, he said that this exercise filled him with such lightness and joy that it felt as if his mouth spoke the words on their own accord.  The day became wrapped in joy.  Eventually he started reciting the prayer not with his mouth but with the beat of his heart.  1) Lord 2) Jesus 3) Christ…. 

To us, modern protestants praying the prayer 12,000 times a day seems excessive.  But let me review a little math of our own.

The average person lives 77 years.

The average person lives 28,000 days.

The average person lives 670,000 hours.

The average person lives 40,000,000 minutes.

 

The average person spend 40 minutes each day on the telephone.

That’s 20 hours per month.

That’s 10 days a year.

That’s 2 years a live time.

 

The average person spends 1 hour in the bathroom every day.

That’s 30 hours per month.

That’s 15 days per year.

That’s 3 years a life time.

 

The average person spends 25 minutes getting dressed.

That’s 13 hours per month.

That’s 7 days per year.

That’s 1 year a life time.

 

The average person spends 3 hours per day watching TV.

That’s 45 day’s a year.

That’s 9 years a live time.

The average Christian spends less than 10 minutes each day praying with the God of the universe, the truest friend, savior of the world, creator of time.

That’s less than 6 hours per month.

That’s 3 days per year.

That’s 7 months in a life time.

Who is crazy the Russian pilgrim who calls on the name of Jesus 12000 times a day, or the average American Christian who spends less than 10 minutes a day in prayer, 7 months in a life time.   

  

Meditation Three:

Durign this time I also read my Bible and felt that I was beginning to understand it better than I had before, when so much was still unclear and puzzling to me.  …I began to understand parts of the hidden meaning of the Word of God.  The meanings of such statements as

 “the iner hidden man of the heart,”

 “true prayer,”

 “worshiping in the spirit,”

 “the Kingdom of Heaven is within us,”

 “the intercession of the Holy Spirit with unutterable groanings,”

  “abide in me,”

  “give me your heart,”

 “to put on Christ,”

 …calling from one’s heart:  “Abba, Father!”…

 

As I began to pray with my heart, everything around me was so delightfully transformed: the trees, the grass, the birds, the ground, the air, the light – all seemed to proclaim that they exist for the sake of man and to bear witness ot the love of God for man.  All creation prays to God and sings His praises.

 

…The holy Fathers say that the efforts of those who strive for salvation only from a fear of hell’s torments, or even solely from a desire to enter the Kingdom of God, are mercenary.  They say that to fear suffering is the way of the servant, while to desire a reward in the Kingdom is the way of the mercenary.  Yet God desires that we come to Him as sons, and that we be honest and delight in the redemptive union with Him in our hearts and souls – but only out of love and devotion to Him. 

  

The Lord’s Prayer inner Meaning

 

OUR FATHER WHO ART IN HEAVEN:

These words raise the mind to heaven, to the heavenly Father, and to remember our obligation ot place ourselves and to live our lives in the presence of God at each and every moment.

HALLOWED BE THY NAME:

This IS a direct request for the gift of interior prayer of the heart – a request that the most holy Name of God be engraved upon the heart and hallowed by the self-acting prayer, so that it might sanctify all our feelings and spiritual powers.

THY KINGDOM COME: 

May inner peace, tranquility, and spiritual joy come into our hearts. 

GIVE US THIS DAY OUR DAILY BREAD: 

Means the feeding of the soul with heavenly bread – the Word of God – and the union of the soul with God through constant remembering of him.