Deep Sea Divers

I’ve been re-reading portions of Philip Yancey’s book on prayer this week as I prepare for a (unexpected) sermon on Psalm 13. Yancey has a gift for listening to the wisdom and insights of other people. Two of those insights he includes in his book include similiar metaphors–and they seem fitting for this week.

On grief: “Evengelicals tend to want to get to the happy ending. Sometimes, there is no happy ending, and we’re simply suspended in grief. When I’m with suffering people, I feel like a deep-sea diver accompnaying them into the depths. Come up too fast, and you’ll dangerously decompress. We need to stay with the grief for a while, feel it, let it out. maybe we can see things through tears that we can’t see dry-eyed.” (269).

On prayer: “…God has equipped us to go deep-sea diving and instead we wade in bathtubs. What makes the difference…is how seriously we take prayer. I see prayer as the process of becoming available for what God wants to do on earth through us.” (276)