O God, you are my God; early will I seek you: my soul thirsts for you, my flesh longs for you.....(Psalm 63:1, KJV)
Velocity can be both good and bad....especially in one's prayer life. Speed and direction in a moment of crisis is just the motion needed. Quickly praying upward. Immediately turning (directionally) to the One who hears.
Yet, apart from times of urgency, one's prayer times can be so much richer than that, as reading through the Psalms clearly shows. The poetry of the Psalms seems to take on a slower rhythm......a rhythm of the life of the poet or author, from David and Solomon to unknown others. Laments. Praises. Testimony. Confessions.
Morning prayer times often have me praying slowly.....prayers for others expressed thorough passages from the Psalms. The rhythm of my own life expressed in language from the Psalter. Inhaling the scripture, exhaling the prayers. A breath of God breathed out---His Words, my breath.
Panic prayers, arrow prayers and night-night prayers, are more rapid than those morning ones. Reading through a psalm or other scripture slows me down. No speed reading. In cadence with God's word. Reading and praying. The silences and the sounds.
Holy Spirit, living Breath of God, Breathe new life into my willing soul. Bring the presence of the risen Lord To renew my heart and make me whole. Cause Your Word to come alive in me; ("Holy Spirit, Living Breath of God," lyrics)
A "hurried" velocity in praying doesn't leave room for empty space.
"A note in music gets its significance from the silences on either side." (Anne Morrow Lindbergh, Gift From the Sea, p. 115) As in music, empty space is essential in correlating the scripture to the prayer.
A slowing of my morning cuppa mirrors the velocity of my reading and praying, as it takes time to sip and savor both----my English Breakfast Tea and prayers re-directed to Him as I am stimulated from His word.
