Ya' feel Me?
What do you feel when you pray? If I'm having what seems like a "good" time in prayer, I get this tingly, airy, spacious feeling in my chest. I won't pretend otherwise: I tend to think this feeling is God, like a mystical haze, ebbing into me.
Other times, "bad" times, I feel...nothing, nothing but a dull numbness.
I know there's probably neither scientific nor theological reason to think this tingly feeling is God's presence or that the lack of a feeling is God's absence. In fact, science and theology probably agree that, in fact, there's no reason to think my "feelings" are necessarily linked to the actual presence or experience of God. But I'd be interested in hearing about the subjective experience of others. Do you feel anything when you pray? Do you feel God?
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2 comments:
There's scientific evidence that the brain's patterns of activity change significantly during a spiritual experience. So yeah, whatever you're feeling is real, be it a connection to God, inner peace, what have you.
Prayer is talking to God. I don't feel anything in particular different than when I talk to a friend. I know He is listening, and I wait for His response. I do feel emotions sometimes, however, tho in just the same way as when I feel emotions while speaking to a human friend. I just quiet myself, and there He is, the ground of my being, more real to me than I am to myself, even more tangible, but so matter-of-fact is His presence that it doesn't displace me at all. I am just there with Him.
In worship, and in praying the Word of God, I do often get "feelings," and sometimes even more. None of this, tho, has to do with God's objective presence. It's just how my weak, mortal frame sways in the wind of His immortal, life-giving Spirit.
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