I feel compelled to write a message to my "science-based" friends who may still be thinking of themselves as incompatible with being "Jesus-based". You actually have a path to Jesus thats easier to navigate than you think if your soul is still curious enough to try walking it. It even involves using the particular set of aptitudes that your ego has always suspected you have "more of" than your non-"science-based" friends. You indeed may have greater power on tap in the reading and writing of language spoken or unspoken, but don't indulge your ego just yet. I beseech you to think on what you may be blind to that comes to you in an incoherent jumble outside your senses from your subconscious hearts, instincts, and intuitions.
First off, I do think you can congratulate yourself for keeping a tidy mind. I'm sure you have a great organizing strategy you've adjusted over your lifetimes and you are quite the proud librarian in its upkeep. This will actually be a great advantage to you in the puzzle you are about to play with.
The mindgame begins like this. Firstly, presume you've arrived at this moment in time already a Christian, Jesus has always been walking with you, etc. etc. and you're just behind a bit on your praying. Its been so long, your language has drifted. The word "pray" has a different meaning to you now and is a concept you don't grok the way people seem to use it. You witness people you despise claiming to do it so start associating prejudices to its meaning. Those writing the world's history books may have slipped in buried notions to reinforce your prejudices so what you come to understand as its meaning isn't anything that you actually do.
To those people who've lost the "pray" word, I think you can find it back if you temporarily substitute the word for "imagine" and get to work on exercising the imagination muscle again. Exercising it does not mean abandoning the organized mental library your busy-body ego keeps, just giving him a break and trusting everything he's hoarding in his shelves will still be there after the workout at the imagination gym is done. He may not like that you're going to do something without him, so you'll have to trick him. He'll be pissed, but he'll be back– you dont need him, but you need his library to survive in the world with comfort.
You may not yet have realized who it is in control of your imagination and instincts, but its not Mr. ego but you'll meet him later. Mr. ego gets pretty self-important the bigger his library gets and might even suggest there is no time in this world for exercising imagination if it doesn't add into his library. Too dangerous to waste any time not feeding the library, the workings of the world depend on it for survival he will say. If you don't grow your imagination muscles at the gym to similar levels to be able to fight Mr. ego, he'll get pretty cocky and annoying. He needs to be put in his place and you'll need the confidence you'll get by side-effect from the workout instructor at the imagination gym to contend with him when he reveals himself to be a real ass.
Anyway, the "imagination" exercise you might try first is take all the religious ideas that seemed ridiculous to your ego that he sent first to the "cant understand" pile (dangerously close to the "nonsense" pile and trash bin) and see if you can't imagine a way to assume them true while still fitting in with the rest of your mental library. A key is to realize that language is loose in meaning and your imagination has capabilities beyond whats reachable using words and facts. Don't let Mr. ego see you take ideas he's already filed as nonsense to the imagination gym, he's easily offended and insecure because he knows you see him sneaking things from his "can't understand" pile to the trashbin. What you come up with might look like science fiction and I and church people would love to hear you share the endeavor, though they may not understand you just yet as you may not understand them, but I urge you not to feel judged by them. In attempting to "synchronize" themselves to you there will be mismatches. The mismatches are inevitable, but the "synchronizing" between us makes everything stronger and why we need fellowship, but be careful in who you choose to share them with, and see this verse from our Bible:
"Do not give what is holy to the dogs; nor cast your pearls before swine, lest they trample them under their feet, and turn and tear you to pieces". – Matthew 7:6
This is warning to any who share what they think might be holy thoughts to heathens. Lots of people live in fear of ridicule or mob cancellation of their ideas. If your imagination is trying to make sense of Jesus' words, any thought is a holy thought, and they are all pearls to Jesus that he urges you to share carefully. Its goes in reverse to, which I think Christians protect themselves by always falling back to quoting the Bible, which is always invulnerable to being "trampled". Jesus also says:
"Assuredly, I say to you unless you are converted and become as little children, you will by no means enter the kingdom of Heaven" – Matthew 18:3
He knew many of us will need back the imagination our ego caused us to abandon as kids later in life. Jesus equates the spiritual novices as "children" all over the Bible, and this is his curse to any of those who might discourage you:
"Whoever causes one of these little ones who believe in Me to sin, it would be better for him if a millstone were hung around his neck, and he were drowned in the depth of the sea. Woe to the world because of offenses! For offenses must come, but woe to that man by whom the offense comes!" – Matthew 18:6
Its one of the most aggressive quotes by Jesus in the Bible, and if you consider yourself kin to the spiritual novice "child" to which he refers to you and feel discouraged in any way to what might be a growing empathy towards Christians, the well-versed God fearing ones will always pause to reflect how their actions might be affecting you. Take this as a clue to who is going to be good on the journey you didn't realize you just started down.
The fact that you know your imagination exercises feel a little absurd and scifi is just because you're out of practice and have a lot of catchup work to do. They'll continue to refine themselves into ideas that might even get the attention of Mr. ego, but don't trust him. He's held captive by the world, which obeys a different master and an abusive one. Eventually, you'll probably have to fire him and reclaim his library as your own, as you already know his filing system. Don't be tempted to throw away shelves of books he's filed for you neatly in his library when he leaves, libraries are timeless and beautiful things.
And finally, as you continue to exercise your imagination muscle, realize the meaning of this verse, as Jesus answers someone frustrated about Him speaking so much in parables or analogies compared to the other thought leaders of the world at the time.
"Because it has been given to you to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been given. For whoever has, to him more will be given and he will have abundance" – Matthew 13:11
What it means to me, is whether you like it or not, your weird imagination will keep working on ideas/analogies/parables that will end up transforming you and the change the kingdom you have found yourself residing in. If you find yourself residing in a kingdom with no miracles, teleport yourself into the one where there was an impossible seeming human resurrection around 2026 years ago and reach me at jboff@jboff.com.