Lectio Divina: diving deep to hear (III)

The next stage of the prayer happens quite organically (if I let it!) ... Oratio … I respond to God …I pray and I allow God to pray in me. I participate in the prayer of Christ to the Father through the Holy Spirit. As I read the words this time I notice what arises as the whole of who I am takes part ...

35 On that day, when evening had come, he said to them, “Let us go across to the other side.” 36 And leaving the crowd behind, they took him with them in the boat, just as he was. Other boats were with him. 37 A great windstorm arose, and the waves beat into the boat, so that the boat was already being swamped. 38 But he was in the stern, asleep on the cushion; and they woke him up and said to him, “Teacher, do you not care that we are perishing?” 39 He woke up and rebuked the wind, and said to the sea, “Peace! Be still!” Then the wind ceased, and there was a dead calm. 40 He said to them, “Why are you afraid? Have you still no faith?” 41 And they were filled with great awe and said to one another, “Who then is this, that even the wind and the sea obey him?” (NRSV Mark chapter 4: 35-41)

Oratio
Oratio or prayer is my response to God as I ponder and savour this Word. Meditatio grounded on lectio expands my capacity to truly listen, and transforms the way I respond to God. I praise, I give thanks, I petition, I repent, I adore. This ‘prayer of the heart’ is a spontaneous following of the Holy Spirit at work within me and is pure gift. St Augustine evokes the movement very well in his words: ‘If the text is prayer, pray; if it is groaning, groan; if it is thanks, be joyful; if it is a hopeful text, hope; if it expresses fear, then fear.’ Above all, I seek to be real.