Soaking Prayer: A Quiet Way to Pray With a Journal

Soaking prayer is a way of resting quietly with God for a few minutes, without a list of requests and without trying to get anything right. You sit, you breathe and you let yourself be still, sometimes in silence and sometimes with soft music playing.

This page explains the practice in plain words. It also shows how to try it with a journal in four simple steps and what to expect when you do. You can start today with as little as 10 minutes.

What soaking prayer is

The name comes from an everyday picture. Think of a sponge in water or a tired person in a warm bath. You are not scrubbing or working at anything. You are just staying in one place long enough for something to sink in.

Soaking prayer is a practice some Christians use to rest in God’s presence. Many people do it in silence, and others play quiet instrumental music in the background. There is no agenda. You are not reciting, studying or asking. You are simply there.

Psalm 46 gives a simple invitation for this kind of prayer: “Be still, and know that I am God.” (Psalm 46:10). The next verse adds a comfort many people like to rest on: “Yahweh of Armies is with us.” (Psalm 46:11). Soaking prayer takes those words slowly, as a place to sit rather than a lesson to master.

If you would like a related practice with a little more structure, our guide to meditative prayer with a journal walks through slowing down with God in a similar way.

How to try it with a journal

Your journal is not the main event here. It works more like a doorway before the quiet and a place to land afterward.

1. Settle and write a line. Find a spot where you will not be interrupted for 10 to 20 minutes. Open your journal and write one sentence about how you are arriving, such as “I am tired and a little scattered today.”
2. Read the passage slowly. Read Psalm 46:10-11 once or twice, out loud if you like. Pick one phrase to carry with you, and write it at the top of the page.
3. Rest without writing. Close the journal, start your music if you use it, and sit. When your mind wanders, return gently to your phrase or to your breathing, and keep the pen down until the time is up.
4. Write what you noticed. Open the journal again and write a few honest lines about the time: what you felt, what came up, or simply “I sat.” Close with one sentence of prayer in your own words, if you want to.

What to expect

Your thoughts will wander. You might start planning dinner or replaying a conversation within a minute. That is normal. Notice it without scolding yourself and come back to your phrase. Coming back again and again is part of the practice.

You might feel sleepy. Resting is close to the whole point, so this is not a failure. If it happens often, try sitting up a little straighter, choosing a different time of day, or keeping your eyes softly open.

Some days, nothing seems to happen. You sit, the time ends, and the quiet felt flat or empty. Many people who pray this way know those days well. You can still write a line about it, and you can still count it as time given to God.

Sometimes feelings rise to the surface: sadness, relief, an old worry, tears you did not expect. Let them be there. You do not have to fix or explain them. If something stays with you, your journal is a good place to put it into words, and the prayer prompts can help when you want to write more.

If you are not sure what you believe, you are welcome here too. You can sit with the words “be still” as an honest question rather than a settled answer. That is still a real way to begin.

This is prayer, not a technique

Soaking prayer is not a method for producing a certain experience. There is no guaranteed feeling, insight or answer waiting at the end of 15 minutes. Some days will feel full and some will feel ordinary, and both are fine.

There is no wrong way to sit with God. You can try it once a week or every morning, in silence or with music, for five minutes or 20. If you would like to keep going with a passage after your quiet time, the scripture prompts offer gentle places to start writing.