“To pray is to ponder.”
I came across that little phrase recently, and it made me stop. Not because it’s particularly profound, but because it’s almost annoyingly simple.
To pray is to ponder.
We often think of prayer as a conversation (and it is). We bring God our concerns, requests, gratitude, and confessions. We ask God to help this person, fix that situation, open this door, close that door, and so on. Sometimes we remember to thank God for the many ways in which we’ve been blessed.
And there’s nothing wrong with any of that. It’s how Jesus taught us to pray.
But as this little quote reminds us, prayer isn’t limited to words. It can be something quieter. Prayer can be pondering.
Psalm 1 begins with a picture of one “whose delight is in the law of the Lord, and who meditates on his law day and night.” (Psalm 1:2).
Meditates. Ponders. Lingers over it. Turns it around in the mind. Sits with it for a while.
Maybe you’ve had a conversation that stayed with you long after it ended, read something, or heard the words of a song. You replayed the words. You thought about what was said—and what wasn’t said.
That’s pondering. And perhaps that’s what prayer can be.
We don’t always have to rush through our prayers to get to the next thing. Sometimes we can take a verse of Scripture and stay there. “The Lord is my shepherd.” What does that mean for me today? “My grace is sufficient for you.” Where do I need to trust that today?
Mary gives us another beautiful picture of this. After the shepherds told her what they had seen and heard, Luke says: “But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.” (Luke 2:19).
She pondered. She didn’t have all the answers. She couldn’t possibly understand everything that was happening. But she held it.
She turned it over in her thoughts.
Perhaps that’s sometimes the most faithful prayer we can offer. Just, “God, I’m going to sit with this for a while.”
We live in a world that doesn’t encourage pondering. We scroll. We swipe. We click. We move on. Even our prayers are hurried. “God, here’s the list. Amen.”
Psalm 1 suggests something important happens when we linger with thoughts about God and faith. The person who meditates on God’s Word is described, in v. 3, as “a tree planted by streams of water.”
A tree doesn’t grow by frantically trying to grow. It grows by staying planted. It takes time. Faith grows the same way. Maybe prayer doesn’t always have to begin with, “Lord, I need…” Maybe sometimes it can begin with: “Lord, I wonder…”
So today, maybe take a few quiet minutes and linger with a verse from Scripture or something from this meditation. Don’t worry about saying much. Let it linger. Ponder. You might be surprised what you notice when you stop long enough to see.
Prayer: Lord, teach me to slow down. When my mind is racing, quiet me. And when I don’t know what to say, remind me that prayer doesn’t always require words. Sometimes it’s enough to linger and let your truth take root in me. Amen.
