The Jesus prayer, one of the more important meditative prayers of the Christian tradition, used especially by Eastern Christians, is at its heart, a simple prayer. While there are a few variations as to how the prayer can be said, the most common words used for it are: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy upon me a sinner.” The simplicity of the prayer helps us still our mind, and in doing so, helping us to attain some level of inner peace, a peace which then leaves us open to experience the presence of Jesus which can be found in the invocation of his name. We are humbling asking the one who is “the image of the invisible God, the first-born of all creation” (Col. 1:15b RSV) to come to us, to make his presence known, so that in and through it we can have his help, his mercy, in our lives. As we pray it, it is important that we do so in and through our heart, meaning, we do so, acting out of love for God, and not just out of some sense of ritual duty.
If we want mercy from Jesus, we must be merciful to others, and if we attain what we seek, we are meant to share the bounty of what Jesus gives us with others. We are not to confuse the prayer, or any prayer, as some sort of magical practice which forces Jesus to do our bidding, but rather, it should be seen as a way we clear our mind, put our focus on Jesus, emptying ourselves of everything which we otherwise put in the way between Jesus and us, so that we are then open and ready for Jesus when he comes to us in the invocation of his name. We should act towards him in our prayer the same way we would if he were physically in front of us. That is, we are to pray full of faith, hope, and love, similar to those who, upon meeting Jesus during his temporal ministry, asked for his help, as, for example, we see in the story concerning the blind man in Jericho (Bartimaeus):
As he drew near to Jericho, a blind man was sitting by the roadside begging; and hearing a multitude going by, he inquired what this meant. They told him, “Jesus of Nazareth is passing by.” And he cried, “Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!” And those who were in front rebuked him, telling him to be silent; but he cried out all the more, “Son of David, have mercy on me!” And Jesus stopped, and commanded him to be brought to him; and when he came near, he asked him, “What do you want me to do for you?” He said, “Lord, let me receive my sight.” And Jesus said to him, “Receive your sight; your faith has made you well.” And immediately he received his sight and followed him, glorifying God; and all the people, when they saw it, gave praise to God (Lk. 18:35-43 RSV).
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With thanks to Patheos and Henry Karlson, where this article originally appeared.
