Prayer: Kyrie Eleison

Prayer: Kyrie Eleison
Scott Lyons
6/25/2013
In my last article, I wrote about the parable of the Pharisee and the tax collector. I want to continue to focus on this parable and our great need for mercy. In this parable we read the words that gave birth to an Orthodox Christian prayer, the Jesus Prayer. In the liturgy of the Church, the Jesus Prayer began with the Kyrie eleison (Lord, have mercy). And the prayer grew. Part of the prayer comes from the parable itself when the tax collector prays, "O God, be merciful to me, for I am a sinner" (Luke 18:13, NLT). He prays from the heart and goes home justified. Part of the prayer comes from the blind beggar at the end of the same chapter as the blind beggar cries out, "Jesus, Son of David, have mercy on me!" (Luke 18:38, NLT). The beggar finds healing. There is a similar cry from the ten lepers in the previous chapter. The Jesus Prayer grows out of these verses into the traditional form, which is, "Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner." Tax collectors, blind beggars, and lepers—this is what we are. This is our prayer.

This prayer flows from an awareness of my littleness, my nothingness, in the presence of God. It is not a plea for mercy from an angry god. It is not a belief that, if we say something over and over, a distant god might possibly hear and answer. Rather, it is trusting in God, being aware of his presence, and being aware of one's own constant, desperate need for his presence, just as one needs breath and life.

Because of our constant, desperate need for God, the Scriptures exhort us to pray always (Luke 18:1; 21:36; 1 Thessalonians 5:17; Ephesians 6:18). This is understanding and practicing the presence of God, as Brother Lawrence wrote of it. God is with us, but we are not always conscious of his presence. When we pray continually, we draw our thoughts back to the reality of his presence throughout the day.

Having a prayer such as the Jesus Prayer is also useful in the fight against temptation. Barsanuphius, in Guidance toward Spiritual Life, says, "The incessant invocation of God's name, is a medicine which mortifies not just the passions, but even their influence. Just as the physician puts medications or dressings on a wound that it might be healed, without the patient even knowing the manner of their operation, so also the name of God, when we invoke it, mortifies all passions, though we do not know how that happens."

You can send up many different kinds of short, “arrow” prayers throughout the day. For instance, the people of God have always cried out the ancient prayer for help: "O God, come to my assistance; O Lord, make haste to help me!" These kinds of prayer draw our minds and hearts to God, like little children running to the skirts of their mothers or reaching up and taking their fathers' hands.

If you are tempted to disregard the Jesus Prayer simply because of its constant cry for mercy, please do not yield. Instead, let's learn something of the word "mercy." Our modern sense of this word is more along the lines of, "Jesus, forgive me!" But this is not the primary intention of the prayer (though often it can and should be so in our lives). The word mercy comes from the same root: the Greek word for olive and olive oil. In the ancient Near East, Olive oil was used for a variety of purposes. Kings were anointed with it, signifying the presence, choice, and favor of God. More widely, it was used medicinally. It is perhaps best to view this constant cry for mercy as a cry for God to heal us, to make us whole, to be near—something which Christians from any faith tradition can understand and pray for wholeheartedly. When we ask for the mercy of God, we are asking for his nearness and for our healing, the necessary healing of our human brokenness. We continually need that healing until that time when we are like Christ himself.

So begin praying as the tax collector, as the blind beggar, and as the ten lepers: Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner. Pray always, and be healed.