Pastoral | October 29, 2026 | By: Aaron Hughes
The snow-covered forest flew by out the window of the train as I pulled out my journal to pray. I was traveling across Sweden, where my family had lived as missionaries for several years, on the way to a three-day silent retreat. As soon as I settled into my seat with my thermos of coffee, the retreat began. I had brought good books, my Bible, and a journal. After spending time reading and learning, I felt nourished by what I’d discovered and decided to turn toward prayer. "I don’t just want to think about God, to learn about Him; I want to spend these days with Him, communing with Him," I thought.
As I prayed, my mind wandered, and I found my thoughts bouncing between the details of life and cliché-sounding prayers that I sometimes just recited and sometimes genuinely prayed. Years ago, I found journaling could be a helpful method to focus and slow my thoughts in prayer. Even as I journaled prayers, I found it difficult to pray clearly, coherently, or intentionally. My prayers wandered in and out of unrelated ideas as the train wandered through the winter woods for the rest of the journey. I arrived at the retreat house excited for the retreat, but disappointed by the difficult start to a retreat with the Lord.
After a meal, I began three days of silence in a room with 12 men and a roaring fireplace. We sat quietly (and awkwardly) waiting for our elderly teacher with the long beard to begin. Finally, he spoke and introduced us to the lives of the prophets Isaiah and Jeremiah. After an hour of explaining the adventure God took them on, the challenges He guided them into, and the intimate view of His character He graciously allowed them, we moved into the chapel for our first time of prayer. This felt familiar. I loved learning about God but felt inadequate to sit before Him and offer prayers worthy of the Creator.
In a dark chapel, we were given hymnals to guide our prayers, which were the only moments of speaking for the entire retreat. The leader explained that we were not starting to pray, but joining a chorus of prayer and worship that is always happening. I didn’t know exactly what that meant. It sounded partially comforting and somewhat weirdly mystical. As I opened our hymnal, I was surprised. It wasn’t filled with songs but with Scripture.
We began with the Lord’s Prayer from Jesus’ Sermon on the Mount in Matthew, which the earliest Christians prayed three times a day. Then we wove together other Scriptures, sometimes reciting them in unison, other times in a call-and-response format. I should correct myself: we did not recite them; we prayed them. We prayed the Scriptures together, and the core of our prayer time was spent praying through various Psalms or portions of Psalms. As we closed our books and silently trickled out of the chapel toward our rooms, I reflected upon two things. First, my prayers were not marked by a need to produce. Second, God actively guided my prayers by His Word.
My prayers were not marked by a need to produce.
We are often taught that prayer is simply "talking to God." While that is true, we can unintentionally pick up the message that prayer is performative. As a follower of Christ bows her head to pray, she may be assailed by thoughts about the quality of her prayers. A man may worry whether he has prayed an appropriate number of words. We may evaluate our words for their theological accuracy and nuance. I have no desire to criticize the heart behind these thoughts, but sometimes the consequence is a pressure to produce. This tension arises when we focus on performing rather than simply being with God.
"Prayers are not tools for doing or getting, but for being and becoming."
– Eugene Peterson, Answering God: The Psalms as Tools for Prayer
When our prayers are clouded by production, we miss the heart of prayer: communion with God. We can become bogged down in the labor of producing rather than being.
Now this is eternal life—that they know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ, whom You sent. (John 17:3)
In addition to the noticeable change in the tone of my prayers, their content was also affected. As we read through the Psalms, I found words to present many of the details of daily life to God, but I also discovered myself praying through topics foreign to me. This was not a random journey into unfamiliar areas of prayer, but a needed complement to what was lacking in my prayer life.
“Psalm language is not careful about offending our sensibilities; its genius is its complete disclosure of the human spirit as it makes response to the revealing God.”
– Eugene Peterson, Answering God: The Psalms as Tools for Prayer
Whether because of church norms or my lack of awareness, my prayers are skewed if I guide them myself. The Psalms, however, steer the ship into the uncharted waters of the whole human experience. I was conversing with God about money, justice, and lament (sadness and grief) far more than before, for the Psalms are replete with these topics.
The Psalms explore the uncharted waters of the whole human experience.
Now I find myself driving up the 101, desert cacti flying by out the window, gazing at the McDowell Mountains, and reciting Psalm 8.
O LORD, our Lord, how magnificent is Your reputation throughout the earth!
You reveal Your majesty in the heavens above! (Psalm 8:1)
In the depths of loneliness or relational pain, I often return to Psalm 73.
Whom have I in heaven but You? And there is nothing on earth that I desire besides You. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. (Psalm 73:25-26)
The Psalms shape, sharpen, stretch, and strengthen our prayer life. They close the factory of performance and production, and invite the entirety of human life into intimacy with the Spirit of God in His Word.
Every Scripture is inspired by God and useful for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness, that the person dedicated to God may be capable and equipped for every good work. (2 Timothy 3:16-17)
Liturgy is a fancy theological word for the structure of worship, often within a specific culture or tradition. Eugene Peterson highlights that liturgy always provides three things: space, time, and order. Can I challenge you to begin praying the Psalms, as much of the church, and Israel before her, has been doing for thousands of years?
Make space for slowly praying a Psalm each day.
Give yourself time to read each Psalm more than once.
Allow the order of the Psalms to guide you a day at a time.
As you read God’s Word, release the need to perform or produce and simply allow the grace of the Father, the love of the Son, and the care of the Spirit to walk you through His Word and shape your responses to our King.
Aaron Hughes
Tempe Men’s & Marriage Pastor
Make space to be with God and let His Word guide your prayers. In Rooted, you'll explore prayer and other spiritual disciplines, grow in your faith, and connect with others. Join our next session!
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