The Jesus Prayer | The Prayer of the Heart: 

“Lord, Jesus Christ, Son of God, Have Mercy on Me,
the Sinner.”

Reflection: 

This short prayer consists of praise, thanksgiving, theology, petition, and confession. It is our Faith’s ‘Prayer of the Heart’, which Sts Basil the Great and John Chrysostom have mentioned in their writings (4th/5th centuries).(1) Through worship, God stretches out to us, and we through prayer stretch out toward Him, our entire lives striving for our total union.(2)

“The Christian knows that Christ by His Passion, Cross, Death and Resurrection, willingly and sinlessly entered into the totality of human pain, transforming it into an expression of His perfect Love.(3)

When we feel human pain in our heart, in the core of our being, for ourselves and our neighbor, then we truly are praying from the heart. The mind (our thoughts and feelings) descends into the heart when the heart feels pain. 

When our heart pains for the other person, we put ourselves in their position, in true empathy, it is then that our prayer becomes of the heart.(4) It is from this place of empathy for others and the world, while recognizing God’s good works and our own shortcomings, that we pray the Jesus Prayer. Our prayer becomes a state of being.(5)

By its initial cry ‘Lord’: we glorify God...for He is the King of Israel, creator of all things visible and invisible.  ‘Jesus’: we bear witness to the fact that Christ, our savior, is present, and in gratitude we thank Him for granting us eternal life. The Lord tells us to pray in His name(6).  With the third word, ‘Christ’: we speak theologically, confessing Christ as the Son of God.(7)

Through the inward petition, “have mercy on me”: we fall down and implore God to be merciful, to answer our pleas for salvation, and fulfill the desires and needs of our hearts. 

And note that little word, ‘me’! What a breadth of meaning it contains! It designates not only myself, but all those who have been naturalized into the state of Christ, into His Holy Church; who are members of His Body(8) 

Finally, ‘the sinner’: by confessing that we are a sinner, like the saints who through such a confession became children of the light of Christ, we too begin to repair our relationship with God and neighbor through our repentance with this prayer.”(9)

References: 

1)  St Aimilianos of Simonopetra, The Church at Prayer, pgs 51.

2)  St Aimilianos of Simonopetra, The Church at Prayer, pgs 13.

3) Archimandrite Zacharias, The Hidden Man of the Heart, pg 98. 

4) St Paisios the Athonite, Spiritual Counsels V6 Περι Προσευχης, pg 130 and 187.  

5) 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18  Rejoice always, pray without ceasing, in everything give thanks; for this is the will of God in Christ Jesus for you.

6) John 15:16

7)  Hebrews 1-2

8)  Ephesians 5:25

9)  St Aimilianos of Simonopetra, The Church at Prayer, pgs 46-47.