Contemplative Prayer

Preface to My New Book: “Healthy Prayer”

Books, Prayer, Solitude, Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Growth

Writing a book was never really a goal of mine. Vocationally, I have always self-identified as preacher first, content to read what other people have written.

But three years into pastoring my church in South Louisiana, I experienced a dynamic shift in my prayer life. I discovered an approach to prayer that was a bit foreign to me, but once I experienced it I couldn’t get enough. This shift in prayer set me on a course that began to slowly transform my marriage, my parenting, and my approach to life and ministry.

Not long after, I decided to begin teaching the people in my church what I was discovering about prayer. Every couple months or so, I began hosting “prayer workshops” in my living room. I would take 8-12 people at a time and teach about prayer for three hours on a Saturday morning.

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Book Recommendation: “Prayer – 40 Days of Practice”

Books, Kingdom of God, Poem, Prayer, Solitude, Spiritual Disciplines, Spiritual Growth

Back in April, I was browsing through a bookstore and found a book with an interesting-looking cover. The title was Prayer – 40 Days of Practice.

Because prayer has been a subject of great interest to me, I picked it up and began thumbing through it. I discovered that this was quite a unique book, indeed.

Each page includes a thoughtful one-sentence prayer with an accompanying illustration on the opposite page. The prayers are written by Justin McRoberts and the illustrations are created by Scott Erickson.

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What I’ve Been Reading in 2018 (first batch)

Books

My goal going into this year was to read 52 books. So far, I’m halfway to that goal – a bit ahead of pace. But I already know I won’t be doing this again next year. Every so often I find myself pushing forward too quickly rather than slowly absorbing what I’m learning.

Anyhow, I thought I’d go ahead and share a brief snippet about the 26 books I have read so far in 2018. For space reasons, I will only include the first thirteen of them in this post, and then wrap it up in a couple weeks. As you’ll see, I tend to read a lot of theological books, however, there is a little variety sprinkled in.

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