Naked Prayers: Honest Confessions to a Loving Creator, by Mara Measor
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Naked Prayers: Honest Confessions to a Loving Creator, by Mara Measor
PDF Ebook Naked Prayers: Honest Confessions to a Loving Creator, by Mara Measor
"Mara Measor's Naked Prayers reads like a modern Psalter. Faith. Triumph. Doubt. Confession. More doubt. Celebration. Like King David of Israel, Mara sheds the thin veneer of a plastic faith and vulnerably reveals the honest rhythm walking with the Creator. If you want cliched and Christianeze answers to life, then this book isn't for you. But if you want an authentic and honest reflection on the valleys and mountaintops of the Christian journey, then you won't be able to put this book down."
Preston SprinkleVice President, Eternity Bible CollegeAuthor of People to Be Loved
In Naked Prayers, singer-songwriter Mara Measor shares a series of authentic prayers through words, doodles and songs. Imagine the book of Psalms penned in New York City, that the writers liked to doodle, and that they had access to a professional Manhattan recording studio to lay down these songs of intimate meditation.
When starting a prayer room on her college campus, Measor encountered many students who would confess with dismay, “I’m not good at praying.” In this book Measor fights the notion of “bad prayers” by suggesting that prayer is simply about getting naked before God: no frills, no pretend, just honest confessions to a loving creator. Her doodles tell the story of an earnest sojourner following God through a big city, and her evocative songs take you along for the ride.
There are a million and one books on prayer floating around Christian circles, but according to Measor, “This is not a how-to-pray book, this is a how-I-have-really-prayed book.” Her prayers are honest and open; she celebrates her triumphs, laments her inadequacies, and cries out for help when everything turns dark.
Naked Prayers contains 86 prayers taken from 13 months of Measor’s life, and is framed by four stages:
Following God through making a home in NYCFretting about the purpose and direction of her lifeFalling into a period of depressionFinding her way back to freedom
"Use these prayers in whatever way emboldens you to wipe the dust off your own mirror and get naked before your maker. May they welcome you into a quiet place where you have the freedom to be fully yourself before God."
Naked Prayers: Honest Confessions to a Loving Creator, by Mara Measor- Amazon Sales Rank: #773367 in Books
- Published on: 2015-11-03
- Released on: 2015-11-03
- Original language: English
- Number of items: 1
- Dimensions: .50" h x 5.50" w x 7.40" l, .0 pounds
- Binding: Paperback
- 160 pages
Review
"Mara Measor's Naked Prayers reads like a modern Psalter. Faith. Triumph. Doubt. Confession. More doubt. Celebration. Like King David of Israel, Mara sheds the thin veneer of a plastic faith and vulnerably reveals the honest rhythm walking with the Creator. If you want cliched and Christianeze answers to life, then this book isn't for you. But if you want an authentic and honest reflection on the valleys and mountaintops of the Christian journey, then you won't be able to put this book down."
Preston SprinkleVice President, Eternity Bible CollegeAuthor of People to Be Loved
Mara has written a delightful book on the honest nature of prayer, longing and connection with God. A fresh, honest, hopeful and whimsical vision of what it looks like to walk with God in these cynical times.
Jon Tyson Founding Pastor, Trinity Grace Church, New YorkAuthor of Rumors of God
Life is messy and complicated, and so is keeping your faith intact when things turn south. Mara's honest journey to encounter God, punctuated by her original music, is a must read for anyone who has wondered if God really cares.
Rebekah LyonsAuthor of Freefall to Fly
Though the title is bold, Naked Prayers, is written with delicacy and gentle understanding. Mara's story is truly a lesson by confession, one that everyone will appreciate. As the leader of a multi-faith community, I see a spirited universality in the book and album, doodles and all.
Susan DiamondFounder, Prayables.org
Chinese-American songstress, writer, and actor, Mara Measor, brings us a lively mix of personal songs with quaint instrumentation, sweet vocals, and spiritual undertones. Naked Prayers is a nine-track album under forty-minutes in length that contains several uplifting songs. In fact, all of the songs are really good with varying aural textures, melodies, and light rhythms bordering on new age-pop or alternative pop. Mara's sweet vocals resemble the Canadian group, Dala, as well as the U.K.'s Katie Melua, with similar instrumental set-ups akin to the former. The final number, Love Will Find You, seems like a throwback to the funky, jazz standards of the 1970's. The calming and essentially word-less song, Ooh, is a spiritual wonder with only Mara's voice leading the song and a distant thud of a drum. You Saw Me is a pensive, piano-driven song with guitars and percussion that are truly beautiful. All in all, Mara succeeds in creating a gorgeous album with memorable melodies, sweet vocals, and an underlying message of "good" without sacrificing anything.
Matthew ForssInside World Music
About the Author Mara Measor is a passionate singer, songwriter and actor guided by her Christian beliefs. With hundreds of music and acting appearances, she has made a name for herself in New York's prominent music and theater scene. But Mara isn't the product of a musical family. Instead, she is the youngest daughter of Hong Kong-based stock guru Tony Measor, a prominent figure in Hong Kong. Mara chose a career in the arts and is now a household name in Hong Kong, regularly speaking, singing or acting on the national stage. Now graduated from the prestigious Tisch School of the Arts at New York University, Mara has been devoting her talents and time to a new book and album project called Naked Prayers. This project stems from her many years of writing songs and keeping a prayer journal filled with simple yet expressive illustrations and heartfelt accounts of her personal highs and lows. Mara lives with her husband, Mark, in New York, New York, and frequently travels to Hong Kong to visit family.
Excerpt. © Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved.
If I had to come up with an image that best captures my understanding of prayer, I would draw a person standing in front of the mirror, naked.
Most of us start our days by putting on clothes. Underwear, shirt, pants, a jacket. And then there’s makeup for the ladies, hair gel (wax? pomade?) for the men. And then the smiles, the mannerisms that mark our carefully constructed individuality, the veneer required for our varied occupations, the endless other layers we protect, perfect, and puff ourselves up with.
I used to keep the layers on as I spoke to my maker. Fully clothed and carefully made up, I would ask him for a new sweater, a new pair of pants, or to fix a torn stitch in an old shirt. Sometimes I even pretended to be someone else beneath it all. Someone I imagined God would like to hear from, who knew all the right ways to pray and glittered with holiness. But I’m me. My sentences are not elegant; I like doodling more than doctrine; I am small and quite weak.
I knew God for many years before I began suspecting he might prefer that I speak to him as I was, oafishness galore. But during a year I spent in Ethiopia when no one else around me seemed to understand a word I said―I turned to God more and more. In a little town with only enough water supply for me to shower twice a week, my inner life thrived as my outer appearance floundered. I started to strip away the layers and really talk to my God. With honesty and simplicity, I told him about my hurts, my anger, and my desires, even the buried ones that took some deep diving. I looked into my mirror, naked, and talked to him about what I saw.
It was a grand experiment, and I wanted to see where it would go. So I started to write my prayers down. Maybe, over time, I would get a little older and a little wiser in the way I related to him. Maybe I could give him a little more room to relate back to me.
The year was 2012. I didn’t know it then, but the journey that became Naked Prayers was about to begin. I was fresh out of college, full of ideas about who I was and what God wanted. Pain was not part of the picture.
I always thought having depression meant feeling a bit sad a bit too often. I learned better. Like those who have struggled before me and those who are struggling now, I watched my sunny world turn dark. Over the 14 months recorded in these prayers, as I fought to make a home in New York City and support my family in crisis in Hong Kong, I lost all direction and purpose. I pushed blindly through each day. I bought groceries, performed songs, talked on the phone. But I was in hiding. I hid from everyone, except God.
While following him became difficult as I began to fret and seemed impossible as I entered an emotional free fall, I see now that I was never lost. I guess while I was busy opening my heart to God, he made sure my ears were open too. I don’t know how else to explain the presence of scripture in my prayers and in this book. Sometimes, halfway through a prayer, a verse would come to mind. Other times, my whole prayer was a response to a verse that spoke to me on a certain day. But, much more often than I realized, my own words evoked passages I wasn’t even conscious of. God’s voice formed the basis of almost every praise and plea. In the delight of discovery, I have exposed these hidden verses in the book’s final pages. It makes me smile to know that truly, the same spirit has been leading men to pray since the time of Genesis.
We all need someone to speak for us sometimes. The Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words. This is especially true when we’re going through pain that leaves us dumbfounded, but it’s also true when we feel tired, lonely, or just uninspired. This is not a how-to-pray book, but a how-I-have-really-prayed book. While my prayers can’t instruct you, hopefully they remind you that you’re not alone, forgotten, or unheard, even (especially) when you don’t know what to say.
There’s no right way to read this book. Read through the pages in one sitting. Set the book on your bedside table (or, if you are like me, on the pile of clothes beside your bed) and read whichever page you happen to flip to on a given night. Go straight to the third section, Falling, to get a quick shot of comfort. Use these prayers in whatever way emboldens you to wipe the dust off your own mirror and get naked before your maker. May they welcome you into a quiet place where you have the freedom to be fully yourself before God.
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Most helpful customer reviews
2 of 2 people found the following review helpful. Moving, inspiration and real By IE Naked Prayers is clearly an outpouring of an incredible desire to know God. The author perfectly captures what prayer can be- total disclosure to a God who cares and lovingly speaks back. This book inspires me to believe that restoration is real, that hope through pain and grief is possible and that the human experience is rarely tidy and neat but it does contain beauty and life.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. A humble memoir with deep implications By BV I've never seen anything like Naked Prayers. It is essentially a memoir of a prayer life -- a refreshingly ordinary prayer life, or one that should be ordinary.In an age that strives for the cure and answer to literally everything, this book reminds me that there is value in the weakness and in the mystery of being human. In sharing the record of her relationship with God as she went through a period of painful and unfortunately common darkness, Mara demonstrates the quiet grace and power of God-with-us. I know from personal experience that in moments of overwhelming confusion or pain, it's difficult to know anything but your own need and the fact that God hears it. It's comforting to remember that sometimes that's all you need to know.I recommend keeping this book close by, like a friend who's always there in times of trouble. When the pressures of the world start to close in, it will remind you of the simple and incredibly powerful joy of being known and accepted by God.
1 of 1 people found the following review helpful. I loved the writing style and as an avid reader By Elias Reading this book, I am struck by its honesty and truth. I loved the writing style and as an avid reader, I voraciously read through the book twice already. It was just as good the second time. What struck me the most is how she was able to articulate what I felt in moments of hope, despair, brokenness and anxiety. She brought them out to light in a way that made me feel not so alone...and I believe others feel too.I would highly recommend this book as it not only helps give us a place to voice our deep honest nakedness, but challenges to be just as transparent in our relationships. Please read it.
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