Please note:

I am no longer an affiliate of Amazon, Swagbucks, or any other company. Please disregard any affiliate/referral disclosures in posts on this blog. The Amazon links should still take you to the product pages, but I do not receive any commission on purchases you might make.

Although I try to keep this home page updated, the blog posts contain broken links. I apologize in advance for this.

Tuesday, August 17, 2010

Visual Prayer: My First Time

In my Friday's Fave Five post, I mentioned that I'd recently become aware of Visual Prayer.  Even though I have no drawing ability whatsoever, I decided to give it a try.  I made a conscious decision not to be intimidated by the examples that Michelle has posted on the Visual Prayer gallery, but to do it my own way.  Part of that, too, was the realization that putting my effort into trying to make a beautiful drawing would pull my attention away from the prayer.

I found that this technique was very helpful for me.  I tend to be distracted during my quiet time, and having a visual and kinesthetic focus helped me to keep my mind on prayer and meditation.  For these first few, I've mostly been using psalms--some as written and some paraphrased.

Whether to share these online has been a challenging decision.  Sharing my prayers--even though the words are not my own--feels like revealing something intensely personal, because you're going to see exactly what was on my heart at the time (last week). I'll post a few, but please be kind. :)
Ps 130

Ps 88

Mt 13
What do you think?  Is this something that you might be interested in trying?
iFellowship

Posted by Melissa at 6:00 AM
Labels:

11 comments :

  1. MelissaAugust 17, 2010 at 8:53 AM

    I like the mustard seed one because it is fitting and I can see how it would help one focus.

    I also like the stairs one. The visual structure actually helps one focus on the path/grwoth of the Psalm and aids on in understanding and not just letting it slip by.

    It reminds me of an exercise Beth Moore has participants do in her Psalms of Ascent Bible Study.

    ReplyDelete
  2. HeatherAugust 17, 2010 at 10:14 AM

    Very neat! I keep a list going and it works well for me!

    ReplyDelete
  3. Alexis AKA MOMAugust 17, 2010 at 10:21 AM

    Hun I'm so glad shared such a personal thing, just beautiful my deer. I agree the mustard seed is my favorite. Great job my dear.

    ReplyDelete
  4. JoyFilledAugust 17, 2010 at 9:01 PM

    That is really neat! I have never heard of doing this specifically, but I definitely think I could benefit from it. I'm a very visual person and a "doodler" and I think I could sit for hours and draw out my prayers. God might even find some humor in my artistic abilities! ;)

    ReplyDelete
  5. ~michelle pendergrassAugust 18, 2010 at 10:42 AM

    They are simply beautiful. You'll find the more you practice Visual Prayer, the more you'll let yourself go. You'll get over the fear and the newness of it and when that happens--watch out!!

    I understand the anxiety of putting it out there for all the world to see. It's like totally exposing our insecurities.

    I really hope you'll continue doing Visual Prayer!! I can't even begin to tell you how blessed I was to find this blog post. I had no idea!!

    ReplyDelete
  6. /\Heather/\August 18, 2010 at 11:44 AM

    Interesting. I had an idea pop into my head as I read this post: You've seen the poetry magnets? Why not prayer magnets? You could have your favorite verses magnetized, then you could play around with them on a magnetic clip board with a piece of appropriately-colored paper.
    In college, I learned that outlining / writing things down really made me focus on the material. This is great!

    ReplyDelete
  7. PennyAugust 18, 2010 at 7:12 PM

    What a neat idea! I'm your newest follower! If you have time come see me too over at Living Above Ministries.

    I picked up your button - you can find it on my Blogging Friends page!

    Have a great iFellowship Day!

    ReplyDelete
  8. DonnaAugust 19, 2010 at 10:12 AM

    I had never heard of that before. I like the mustard seed one.

    ReplyDelete
  9. ~ NoelleAugust 19, 2010 at 10:19 AM

    thank you so much for sharing this with us...
    I really like the mustard seed the best..
    you really did put your heart out there for us to see and that was a very brave thing...
    With HIM all things are possible!

    ReplyDelete
  10. Jennifer FarrisAugust 21, 2010 at 5:35 PM

    Wow. What a cool idea. Thank you for being willing to share something personal...(I don't think I would have been able to understand without your examples!)

    ReplyDelete
  11. JDaniel4's MomAugust 28, 2010 at 7:06 AM

    This post has been selected one of my great posts of the week. Here is the link: http://www.jdaniel4smom.com/2010/08/great-posts-i-came-across-this-week_28.html

    ReplyDelete

I love to hear what you're thinking, so thank you for leaving a comment!

Spammers are unwelcome here, and spam comments will be deleted.

Subscribe to: Post Comments ( Atom )

ShareThis