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Teach Us To Pray Conference With Contemplative Teacher, Jerry Webber
How did you get started on this contemplative spiritual path? In the early 1990’s I was a Senior Pastor in a medium-sized church. I found myself doing things that were important for the congregation, but which drained life out of me. I began to explore, reading about spiritual practice by writers like Eugene Peterson and Richard Foster. I started hanging out with people from other Christian traditions, trying to learn about prayer from Episcopalians who prayed daily at set times and quiet Quakers... from gospel-oriented Mennonites and monastic Catholics... from Orthodox and Celtic Christians. I explored and experimented, and found life in giving attention to my inner life. I also found that tending the inner life meant that I engaged in service and ministry very differently than before. Over time, several years in fact, I discovered that I was also searching to find my own faith in God, rather than accepting without question the faith handed to me by family, church, and culture. So the quest for me was for an authentic expression of my own personhood in connection with God. I have to say that the journey has been incremental, at best. There has been no clear, straightline forward. I stumble ahead a step or two, then stall out, or step backwards. The journey for me has been full of fits and starts. And I’m nowhere near the destination. I’m constantly reminded that I’m only a beginner on this spiritual path, and will never be anything more than a beginner.
What seems important to you in an ongoing life of prayer and practicing God’s presence? A couple of things seem important, at least from my experience. First, we have to practice prayer and the spiritual life as an embodied experience, rather than merely study it or gain knowledge about it as a conceptual exercise. In other words, we learn and grow as we do, as we actually pray and make our spiritual experience real in daily life. I find too many people who study or read about contemplative spirituality as an object of interest or curiosity, but who do not actually embody it. The life of prayer and spirituality really is a life! Second, it’s helpful to cultivate an exploring spirit. This means being grounded in God’s love... there is nothing you can do or not do that will cause you to lose God’s love. God’s love for you is the one constant in life. God’s love is an always-everywhere reality. So you can afford to explore prayer and the spiritual life without fear that you will lose God’s love. This is a huge safety net. You’re not going to fall over the edge of the map in your explorations. So you can try new ways of prayer, things that are out of your comfort zone, things that seem to be the domain of another denomination. You’ll never lose God. So explore! My mentors always communicated to me that when you are tethered to God at the center, you can fly a long way out. That has been a guiding image for me through the years.
