A Place to Pray

Prayer is one of the primary spiritual practices throughout our lives, but it is a special focus of the season of Lent, the forty-day period of preparation for Easter. Prayer, along with fasting and giving to the poor, is one of the three practices that Jesus highlights in Matthew 6:1-18. These practices are not meant for show; they’re not meant for public display. Rather, “whenever you pray, go into your room and shut the door and pray to your Father who is in secret; and your Father who sees in secret will reward you” (Matthew 6:6).

What a blessing it is that we have a special room at the church set aside for the practice of prayer! Our prayer chapel is beside the carpeted narthex in the back of the sanctuary. It’s been here about seven or eight years. Kathy Robertson initially designed it and she keeps it updated throughout the church seasons.

The prayer chapel has several stations or areas. It has a kneeling rail that was handmade by Farrell Eaves, with a kneeling pad that Kathy sewed. It has a cross where you can write down a prayer request on a post-it note, roll it up, and place it in the arms of the cross. There’s a treasure box full of other people’s prayers that you can join in lifting in prayer.

For the season of Lent, Kathy has placed on a table a bowl of ashes with 10 questions to ponder for prayer and self-reflection. There is also a silver bowl with 30 pieces of silver, the price Judas was paid to betray Jesus, along with the words to an old hymn that invites reflection on the ways we are tempted to sell out our faith and compromise our discipleship. There is also a wooden cross with a heavy hammer and long nails and an invitation to name our own specific sins that Jesus carried with him to the cross.

There is also a mirror that you probably don’t see until you turn to leave. I won’t give away what’s written on the mirror; it’s better that you see it for yourself. Suffice it to say it sends you forth with an invitation to see yourself as God sees you, as a beloved child of God.

The prayer chapel is a calm, quiet, peaceful place. It’s a perfect place to “be still, and know that I am God” (Psalm 46:10).

Sometime during this season of Lent, I invite you to stop by the prayer chapel and just spend some time there in the spirit of prayer. Just be there in the presence of God. I think you’ll be glad you did.