ARRR(rrrrrrrrrrrrrr): How to Pray Like a Pirate

04-16-2017Weekly ReflectionSeminarian Sam McCarty

What if Jesus didn’t know anything about you except what you told him? Would you be able to have arelationship? The main idea behind this simple paradigm for prayer is that we can use our everyday, ordinaryexperiences as the springboard to relationship with God. Because we live in the world and live very active lifestyles, wecan use that nearly limitless trove of experiences as material for prayer. Here’s the paradigm:

A – Acknowledge – Recognize the movements inside of you and honestly name them. Pay attention to thoughts and emotions. Try to be more aware of what's going on in your heart: self-knowledge is essential for growth in the spiritual life.

R – Relate – Tell God what's going on. Be completely real with Him and don't hold anything back. (If you're angry at Him, let Him know.) It isn't necessary, but it might help to imagine Jesus sitting in front of you as you're talking to him.

R – Receive – Hear what God has to say about what you've told him. (This step is the most difficult.) Be confident that he will communicate with you! Try to be attentive in particular to echoes of Scripture.

R – Respond – Act on what God said. This could be continuing the conversation, taking some action, allowing yourself to be changed, or almost anything.

What does this look like? Take Susan for example: she's a working mom of three and is planning a three-day weekend away for herself and her husband. Although she has taken time off, two days before she is supposed to be gone she's told she can't miss work that week, and suddenly can't go on the trip as intended. She is angry at this injustice and acknowledges this anger to herself. When she has a moment of silence at home that evening she relates everything to Jesus – she tells him even more than she told her husband that afternoon. In prayer she remembers when Jesus said in the Scripture, "Come to me all who labor and are heavy burdened," and is able to receive these words asJesus speaking to her. She responds by offering Jesus her anger and is at peace after her time in prayer.

Note that we can use anything as material for the ARRR prayer. Stubbed your toe? Tell Jesus you're annoyed and see what he says. Perhaps he'll tell you he did that one time. Maybe you had a delicious hamburger, fought with your sister, were laid off, held a baby, watched a good movie. Bring it to the Lord and tell him what's going on in your heart! He desperately wants to be part of your life. As you become more familiar with the paradigm it will becomesecond nature, and suddenly you'll find yourself receiving Jesus' grace and mercy no matter what you're going through.