There is an empty office next to mine. It’s where my friend used to work. Friday was his last day and I missed it. I was out of town and, though I knew it was coming, today’s quiet brings a reminder that he has moved on.
His generosity of spirit was the first thing I noticed when he picked me up at the train station when I first came to meet with the Bishop about this new adventure. He took me to lunch at a great little bistro – long since closed – and showed me around the small town, making sure I saw only the good. Trying to “sell” me on the move were his instructions and, apparently, it worked.
Over the next three and three-quarter years, we forged a friendship built on mutual respect and trust. Though age separates us by ten years and experiences separate us even farther, we shared our office suite like a couple of brothers, listening to one another when it was necessary and picking on each other when the tension needed breaking.
He’s off on another adventure, shifting gears, recalibrating. So he is in my prayers today. As I pray, I am reminded of the wise advice I received just about four years ago: “If you don’t want to change, don’t pray.”
Prayer teaches us to dream, to imagine the impossible. Prayer works against time, noise, language, pragmatism, and inability. It begins with an appraisal of what we are and where we find ourselves, and then moves on to changing the situation and ourselves.
We pray and change is inevitable. It is the start of a motion, a continuing transformation, and upheaval. Things are never quite the same as before and there is no going back.
Change means letting go, dying and rising. It is the continual paradox of death and resurrection, which is experienced in prayer. It is a longing for change. It is asking that we become what God dreams us to be.
If you don’t want to change then don’t pray. To live is to change. To be holy is to have changed often.
My friend prayed for guidance and knew a change was necessary, that life outside these walls was not only possible but essential.
Still, I will miss my friend in the office next door to mine.
~pjd