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goodreadsTitle: Creative Prayer
Author: Chris Tiegreen
Genre: Christian non-fiction
Rating: 9/10
# pages: 163
Date read: May, 2007
Review: "A young man is in love with a young woman. He sings to her, dances for her, writes poems for her, picks flowers for her. How does she express her love back to him? She talks to him, usually briefly, and that is all."
Chris Tiegreen starts his book on creative prayer with this very descriptive, visual example of how God usually interacts with His people, and how we interact with Him. Praying through words has become traditional and the norm, so usually words are all we associate with praying. But it doesn't have to be that way. In fact, we're greatly restricting ourselves, if we don't believe that God can answer a drawn or danced prayer just as easily as a spoken one.
In his first chapter, Chris reminds us that God is not a formula, nor does He always respond to one. If one means of prayer has given results at one point in our lives, we tend to stick to that same formula over and over again. God doesn't work that way. He likes to keep us guessing, because that is how we keep being in a personal relationship with Him. Prayer is not about asking for what's logically the best for us. Prayer is about emotions, it's about getting creative, it's about passion, and it's about being personal.
At first Chris speaks very theoretically about creative prayer, leaving uncreative people like me a bit in the lurch, thinking "Yes, I want to pray creatively, but how?" Fortunately, he takes pity on me, and in the last chapters he offers a list of suggestions of how I may practically implement creative prayer in my life.
Creative Prayer came at a perfect time for me. My personal prayer life had been caught in a rut lately, with me feeling that there must be more to prayer than just what I was used to. This book helped me remember that I was limiting myself by relying solely on words, and that there's nothing unbiblical about praying using more than words--or sometimes not even using words at all. (Written for Armchair Interviews)
Book List
Author: Chris Tiegreen
Genre: Christian non-fiction
Rating: 9/10
# pages: 163
Date read: May, 2007
Review: "A young man is in love with a young woman. He sings to her, dances for her, writes poems for her, picks flowers for her. How does she express her love back to him? She talks to him, usually briefly, and that is all."
Chris Tiegreen starts his book on creative prayer with this very descriptive, visual example of how God usually interacts with His people, and how we interact with Him. Praying through words has become traditional and the norm, so usually words are all we associate with praying. But it doesn't have to be that way. In fact, we're greatly restricting ourselves, if we don't believe that God can answer a drawn or danced prayer just as easily as a spoken one.
In his first chapter, Chris reminds us that God is not a formula, nor does He always respond to one. If one means of prayer has given results at one point in our lives, we tend to stick to that same formula over and over again. God doesn't work that way. He likes to keep us guessing, because that is how we keep being in a personal relationship with Him. Prayer is not about asking for what's logically the best for us. Prayer is about emotions, it's about getting creative, it's about passion, and it's about being personal.
At first Chris speaks very theoretically about creative prayer, leaving uncreative people like me a bit in the lurch, thinking "Yes, I want to pray creatively, but how?" Fortunately, he takes pity on me, and in the last chapters he offers a list of suggestions of how I may practically implement creative prayer in my life.
Creative Prayer came at a perfect time for me. My personal prayer life had been caught in a rut lately, with me feeling that there must be more to prayer than just what I was used to. This book helped me remember that I was limiting myself by relying solely on words, and that there's nothing unbiblical about praying using more than words--or sometimes not even using words at all. (Written for Armchair Interviews)
Book List
