Pisteuomen - πιστευομεν - T. Michael W. Halcomb

                                  M   T   W   Th   F   S   Su When Painting Advent Refound Your Pneumatic Essence Bosom Friend Heart To Heart I Will Pray For Presence An Acrostic Prayer (Click the title of the prayer to visit the site)

Hey friends, when you get a minute, head over to my totally revamped, flip-book, journal-style website called Virtual Prayers . You can check it out by click HERE or the image-link to the left.

This year, my New Years Resolution was going to be to journal / blog a prayer every day for 365 days. Well, I don't want to wait another month! So, I figured, what better time to start than with the season of Advent? Today, then, I am reviving my online prayer place " Virtual Prayers ". I am going to do my best to write a prayer about seeking God's presence for an entire year. I would challenge others of you out there to join me in this spiritual journey whether through reading my offerings or, journaling online yourselves. In fact, I'll just go ahead and call this "The Advent Challenge". I think it would be an extraordinary thing to have a few folks to do this with. So, if you're interested, email me or leave a comment here. For now, head over to Virtual Prayers and see today's entry: When Painting Advent .

Dear Scripture, I want you to know that I appreciate you. Some scoff at you and judge you by your cover and some remain perplexed. I know you've been beat down and used up but I also know how beautifully you read. I know you intimately. I know your history, you've told me a thousands times. You have your highs and lows and still, I have your name written on me. We go well together most of the time. You are well-traveled, well-spoken and your whispher has rippled and echoed through the earth. Your storied soul is a picturesque geography of integrity and your narrative world ebbs and flows, rises and falls and has its own accent and inflection. If I didn't know any better, I'd think you were from the hills of Kentucky. Do you realize how much people talk about you? At schools, churches, on bridges, in prisons, on cardboard...And do you realize the power you wield? It's not just God's hands that you rest. And its not just your friends that stake a claim...

O Lord, in this moment of slowing down, I seek Your presence. What is it O God, that is welling up in Your heart? I must know! What is it O God, that You desire? I will wait Lord, I'll do whatever it takes, to know these things. And I will move Lord, when You vulnerably open up to me. You have shared before and I have failed. You have opened up before and I have closed You off. Forgive me O God and open Your wounded Spirit to me again. Lord, would You take a risk on me? Would You? Holy Spirit, could You hover over me? I seek Your presence because to me, it is the only necesarry thing. With the hope of pleasing and glorifying You God, I seek Your presence. As You seek me, may we know one another's deepest desires. Creator of breath & thought, Does it fascinate You like it fascinates me that, When I speak to You or think to You, Breathing and thinking have come full circle? Thank You for Your moments of presence God. I love You God. I wait.

One of the most troubling things about the Christianity that resides in America today is the distorted view of God’s favor that is constantly being shoved down people’s throats! The Word Of Faith Movement with Joel Osteen, Joyce Meyer, Benny Hinn, Creflo Dollar, etc., etc., are always trying to fly a banner that says “I have God’s favor”. When they do this, not surprisingly, they do it out of ill-informed Scripture readings and interpretations. For people like Joel Osteen, who boils God’s favor down to awarding him open parking spots closest to the mall doors (because that’s where all preacher’s go, right?), is just absurd. It is not uncommon to hear him rip Scriptures out of their socio-literary contexts and abuse them, twist them and fashion them out to make himself a “successful businessman approved by God”. Sadly, this mindset has made it’s way into the mainstream church and has raped it of any theological dignity it may have once had. To be sure, the ancient Hebrews or Greeks did ...

Speaking in tongues is an interesting thing. I have never spoke in tongues myself but have been around people that seemed to be doing it. I know hardcore charismatics who believe it is THE sign of the Holy Spirit in one's life and I know cessationists, those who contend that such gifts ended with the death of the Apostles. While debates have raged on about this topic, all of the arguments seem to say the same thing over and over, mainly because they all use the same approach: Prooftexting. Prooftexting is what occurs when people open the Scriptures, find a verse and attempt to use it (out of its socio-literary context) to prove a point. You find advocates both for and against tongue-speaking doing this very thing all of the time. In fact, the book that Wayne Grudem recently edited ( Are Miraculous Gifts For Today? Four Views ) consists of 4 authors who do this very thing for over 350 pages. Not only is this unhelpful in the conversation, it is actually a terrible example of scholar...

In my experiences of prayer, some of the most awkward situations that I've had have come when someone else is praying. At times, I have disagreed with what the person praying was saying and at other times I have found myself strugging to find focus. So, to explore the idea of what to do when someone else is praying, well, it has been something valuable to me. Hopefully, next time you find yourself in church listening to a preacher or someone else pray or you find yourself in a situation where someone wants to pray with / for you, recalling some of the thoughts from this article might help you. To begin, I want to start by once again, sharing my definition of prayer: Attending to the presence of God both around us and in us. With this in mind, we should first realize that with corporate or public / group prayer, the goal is still the same; it doesn't change. Now, I want to conjecture here that in the group prayer event, if we are genuinely attempting to encounter the presence of...

One of the longstanding and thus, traditional views of God is that God is "impassible". To put it more succinctly: God cannot be affected by humans, their situations or their prayers. Proponents of this view usually hold to a hard view of predestination which asserts that before God ever formed the earth of the first humans, He planned out every last detail of its future. Not only do I heartily reject this view, I find it theologically troubling for myriad reasons. In fact, such a view (which I used to hold) troubles me in many different ways and on many different levels, especially when it comes to the topic of prayer. I have already given a number of reasons for why I hold a different view and I have shared a few thoughts as to why I believe words like "impassible" are not words that should be used to describe God. Indeed, God is "all-passionate" and "all-genuine" which means that more than anyone or anything else in this world, God can relate ...

Oddly enough, one of the most salient features of the prayer event for many people is "distraction". To be sure, there are many things that can act as distractors when it comes to praying. In this post, I want talk about two sorts of distractions: Inner & Outer Distractions. I want to start by talking about outer distractions. These are things like someone or something interrupting during the prayer event (e.g. a person or a phone) or stuff preventing you from getting into the prayer event in the first place (e.g. not enough time, work, etc.). It may well be the case that the best way to curtail such distractions depends on both your personality and life context. After evaluating and taking these factors into consideration, you may need to force yourself to make time for the prayer event (e.g. schedule it into your planner). While the types of outer distractions just mentioned can be tough hurdles to cross, in my opinion, it is the inner distractions that are harder to ha...

I once read a quote from a friend of mine, which said: "I never knew I was lonely until I saw un-loneliness." In my view, that is a simple yet incredibly profound statement. Really, if we were to let it, I think it could touch a nerve deep within all of us because in this day and age, loneliness is something that many people can relate to. In this post, I want to explore for a few moments, the relationships between prayer, loneliness and manipulation. At first, these items may seem to have no connection but upon further reflection, it appears that, in fact, they can be intimately linked. I want to re-assert here, my definition of prayer: Attending to the presence of God both around us and in us. We need to start here because really, such a definition has a bit to say about loneliness and manipulation. For starters, if prayer is first and foremost about attending to God's presence and to seek out His wants and desires, then this offers a sort of critique of loneliness: To ...

As I've said before, I'm not a peson who uses prayer to request "things". In fact, I don't pray for things (read more about that HERE ). To many, this might seem irreverent or even outright ridiculous. This is probably the case because in our Western culture, which has been dominated by patriarchalism, capitalism and democracy, many people have the following view of God: The Father (patriarchy), who is rich beyond measure (capitalism) has tons of mansions and great gifts to give out to those whom He pleases as He pleases (democracy). With these images in mind, people head into the prayer event with the idea that if they just have enough faith, whatever they ask for, they can get. This is not a view that I hold. As I said HERE , I do not believe that "asking, seeking and knocking" is about us getting things. Instead, it is about us "asking, seeking and knocking" to find out God's wants and desires; it is about Him! So, I treat prayer as the ...

Without a doubt, the topic(s) mentioned in the title of this post are "hot topics" for many Christians. It may well be the case that when it comes to such matters, a great deal of so-called Christians let zeal override any shred of reason or critical thinking skills they may have. Even on Facebook, many Christians are starting groups to promote prayer in schools and at public events; of course, they are referring to "Christian Prayer" here, not prayer in relation to any other religions. And really, that last statement leads into the first point I want to make about "Christian Prayer" in public schools and at public events. For those who claim to adhere to the Gospel of Jesus Christ, it must be noted that Jesus never forced His views down people's throats. In fact, during His lifetime, even His own family members struggled with His movement and teachings, yet, He didn't force them to take His side. The truth is, in Jesus' mind, adherence to the ...

Recently, during a conversation with a friend, we got to talking about this "Towards A Theology Of Prayer" series and he made a comment that had yet to dawn on me, he said: "Your definition of prayer is very mystic(al)." After thinking about it a bit, I came to the realization that, indeed, he was, in a few ways, quite correct. I guess it had not dawned on me because I do not really consider myself a "mystic" nor do I have a background steeped in "Christian Mysticism". In fact, if I were to be honest, the term "mystic" conjures up sort of esoteric and exotic images for me; I don't consider my prayer life esoteric or exotic. When I think of mysticism, I think of desert monks, hermits, etc. Of course, this sort of caricaturing is only half true! There is a sense in which a mystical prayer life isn't all that exotic or doesn't seem all that exciting. In fact, Friedrich Heiler has said that mystical prayer is the "sublimest...

Of all the philosophical and theologial questions that often arise for Christians when it comes to prayer, there is a good chance that pride of place goes to the inquiry issued in the title of this post. Indeed, the question "Why pray if God already knows (y)our thoughts" is both a good and popular one! Needless to say, there are a number of different ways that people answer this question. Without writing a book here or launching into a lecture on the history of this matter, I simply want to offer some of my thoughts. First of all, I want to make two points: 1) There is actually an idea embedded in or underlying this question that the people asking it often don't realize is there, and 2) Once we are able to differentiate between the question asked and the underlying question, we can really start to arrive at some good answers. So, let me deal with point #1 here. The underlying question that exists beneath the surface of "Why pray if God already knows (y)our thoughts?...

In the last two posts of this series (see below for links), I explored the notion of "genuine prayer". In short, I urged that since God is the most genuine and relational being in existence (my term: Omnirelational), then He desires genuine relationships with us. The logic follows, then, that He desires genuine prayers from us. In other words, our prayers should avoid manipulation and they should also avoid self-focus, however, they should also be genuine enough that when there is tension between God's wants & desires and ours, we can express those. At the risk of being repetitive, I shall say here once more: God is not threatened by our thoughts, emotions or words. It is my belief that much of the reason that Christians get frustrated with prayer is first and foremost that they have an incredibly ill-informed definition of what prayer is and what it is about. What flows from this, then, is bad theology of prayer altogether; if the starting point and foundation is err...

In my previous post of this series (other article links below), I argued that because God is the MOST genuine being in existence and because He is, at the core "Relational" (my term: "Omnirelational"), then, it follows that He desires a genuine relationship with humans. One of the elements that helps humans connect with this genuine God in a genuine way, is prayer. My starting point or definition of prayer is: Attending to the presence of God around us and in us. In this post, I want to explore the concept of "genuine prayer". In the main, I want to ask and attempt to answer three questions (not necesarrily in the following order): What is genuine prayer and what does it look / sound like? How do we pray genuinely? Why is genuine prayer necesarry? First of all, I want to address the question of why genuine prayer is necesarry. First and foremost, it is necesarry because any other type of prayer turns into manipulation and thus becomes something other than ...

It really goes without saying but the question in the title of this post is a sort of "hot topic" in theological circles these days. Typically, you have two camps that answer this question different ways: The "Yes Camp" and the "No Camp". What I want to do in this post is attempt to navigate through some of the ramifications of this inquiry. It is not my goal here to exegete lots of Scriptural narratives or do any sort of word studies. Instead, I want to offer a few thoughts, ask a couple more questions and then, give some feedback that I think is helpful. First of all, I want to share my definition of prayer once again: "Prayer is attending to the presence of God both around us and in us." As I have said over and over, this view of prayer places the focus squarely on God and not humans! And I believe that this is a good thing. One of the results of having this view of prayer is that since God is the centerpiece, we humans are attempting to gain ...

Without stopping to think much about the question asked in the title of this post, most "believers" would probably answer "Yes" right away. Indeed, I would venture to say that the large majority of so-called "Christians", wouldn't even pause to consider what is really being asked. So, in this post, I actually want to do that; I want to stop and reflect on this question and draw out some of its underlying insinuations and presumed answers. First of all, I would argue that this question is actually the wrong type to be asking when it comes to the topic of prayer. One reason for this is that it comes across as (and is ) a strictly "utilitarian" type of inquiry (e.g. it treats prayer as a "function" or a "means to an end"). Another reason that this question is problematic is that it assumes a faulty definition of prayer. In general, this question seems to presume that prayer is some sort of object that can be manipulated to ou...