Prayer as secure attachment to Jesus.

Prayer series #1

Introduction

The heart of God is an open wound of love. He aches over our distance and preoccupation. He mourns that we do not draw near to him. He grieves that we have forgotten him. He weeps over our obsession with muchness and manyness. He longs for our presence. And He is inviting you-and me-to come home, to come home to where we belong, to come home to that for which we were created.

Prayer: Finding the heart’s true home. By Richard Foster

Without an understand of the purpose of prayer, we can often feel like it’s just one more thing to do in our so-called “Christian life.” But, what if we considered prayer to be less of something that we need to DO and more of something that allows us to BE?  

In prayer we can:

Be present with God.

Be healed.

Be heard

Be known.

Be comforted.

Ultimately, be free!

In the coming weeks, I want to share with you how prayer is simply attachment to Jesus.  

What is attachment?

If you aren’t familiar with attachment theory, I’ll offer a brief, limited explanation so we can dive deeper into how this impacts our interactions with God in prayer. I highly recommend Adam Young’s content on attachment that you can find here.

“Attachment” is easiest understood as the degree to which we feel relationally connected with someone. We learned how to relate to others based on interactions with our earliest caregivers and it formed pathways of connection in our brain. Those interactions formed our ability to regulate emotions, to recover from painful situations and how we relate to those around us in the present.   

The healthiest relationship style exists in secure attachment. Secure attachment is characterized by a high level of trust and comfort.  According to Dan Seigel, it’s when the 4 S’s are present: Safe, Seen, Soothed and Secure. When you experience an environment where the 4 S’s are active, you are assured that you matter, are cared for and will have your needs met.

Insecure attachment

There are also three types of insecure attachment: 

Anxious attachment is exhibited by clingy behavior, a fear of abandonment, or experiencing inconsistent emotional responses. Because of these responses, trusting becomes very difficult.  In prayer, this might look like God seems unpredictable or unreliable to me.

Avoidant attachment can be described by behaviors such as suppressing or being disconnected from your emotions, avoiding intimacy, or trying to meet your needs on your own. In prayer, this might look like I can’t bring my whole heart before God or that God won’t meet my needs.

Disorganized attachment is the least common and most severe form of insecure attachment. It is the result of severe disruptions in childhood such as trauma, abuse, and neglect.  This might be someone who has erratic behavior and may even struggle with intimacy all of their lives. In prayer, you might feel stuck, that you don’t know were to start to try and connect with God.

In our humanity, we can move between these relational styles depending on the person or situation.  We desire secure attachment with those close to us but because we have learned relational behavior, we move into insecure attachment when we feel unsafe.

Secure attachment restored.

Jesus came to model for us what a secure attachment to God, the Father looks like.  He gave His life so that we could be restored to a secure attachment with God.  Where we experience broken relationships here on the earth, Jesus provided a way for a relationship with God that could never be broken.  When we received Jesus, we were restored to our original father and brought into a new family: the family of believers. 

Honestly, it’s really hard for us to believe that our relationship with God is secure and can’t be broken.  As well as the insecure attachment styles we learned from our earthly relationships can often transfer over into our interactions with God. When this happens, we begin to question what His response to us will be and lose our desire to be with God in prayer.

We can ruminate on questions like:

• Will God show up for me?  
• Will He meet my needs? 
• Does He really love me and want to be with me?
• Does He hear me? Does He see me?
• Can I trust Him?
• How can I feel close to Jesus?

We can be assured that when we are in the presence of the Father, we are safe, seen, soothed and secure. Next week, we’ll be diving into the passage of scripture known as “The Lord’s Prayer” to help us understand how Jesus models for us secure attachment in prayer.