Mindfulness and Prayerfulness Distinguished

Mindfulness and Prayerfulness Distinguished

Of the many life strategies advocated in print and digitally, one that caught my attention was the recommendation of “mindfulness.” I would like rather to recommend “prayerfulness.”

First of all, they are not the same thing. Mindfulness can be practiced by anyone who sets their, well, “mind” to it. What exactly their “mind” is, or how it is equipped to engage in this activity, who knows? When it comes to minds, we are all dealing with a flawed tool.

But prayerfulness, and I am speaking of Christian prayer, is much different. First of all, it is a function of the soul, that non-material part of your being that doctors cannot examine but that God can. Similar to physical lungs, the soul’s “breath” is prayer. Sadly, most people’s souls don’t “breathe” much. Mindfulness need not engage the soul; true prayer does.

Prayer has an object. You are not talking to yourself in prayer, nor the ceiling. You are talking to the Creator and King of the universe, who is also, by virtue of faith in Christ, your heavenly Father. This alone sets it far apart from mindfulness. But also, Christian prayer is mediated by our ascended Lord, Jesus, who is at the right hand of the Father. He is called our High Priest, and every word or thought of our prayers reaches the ears of the Father through the Person of Jesus. And still more, this ascended Lord, Jesus, has given His Spirit into the hearts of those who believe in Him, that is, every true Christian, and this Spirit, among many functions, helps us in our prayers. He inspires us to pray; He guides us to pray aright; He edits our wrong-headed prayers. That is, we don’t pray in isolation, all by ourselves.

Now compare this to mindfulness. Since there is no divine element in mindfulness, you are indeed talking to yourself. Think about that. Whereas in prayer, you are talking to the one, true God, in mindfulness, you are talking to the biggest authority that you recognize, yourself. That is, you consider yourself to be your own god (if there are many gods, the “g” cannot be capitalized).

And in mindfulness, you are the facilitator of your own activity. Think back to the Old Testament where only Israel’s high priest could take the offering into the Holy of Holies once a year for the atonement of the people. That is now fulfilled in what Jesus did for us on the cross, a one-time event that completed fully the demands of God’s justice and also salvation for those who come to Christ. But with mindfulness, your messy mind is your own not-so-holy of holies. You are fabricating your own redemption through your half- baked thoughts collected indiscriminately from last night’s late show. And you are replacing the Spirit’s “energy” for prayer with an instinct to “reach out” or “reach up,” all the while asserting your own sovereignty and deity that starts and stops with you. You are, in essence, saying, “I can fix myself.” God’s Word says otherwise.

Now, have I overstated or been unfair? Perhaps. Christians who pray can also be mindful. But, this must be admitted. Christian’s pray. A Christian who does not pray is a contradiction of terms. And when we stand before God one day, Christian prayer is an assurance that we will not be talking to a Stranger. Mindfulness cannot make that claim.