82 – Spiritual Disciplines – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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The other day I was reading Invitation to the Jesus Life: Experiments in Christlikeness by Jan Johnson, and saw this –

“… disciplines are ways of entering the life of Jesus.  As you practice disciplines, keep in mind that they interrupt our patterns of living of a self-referenced life.  In these interrupted moments, you connect with God so that God can do a perfecting work in you.” (p 242)

What do you think?

    “entering the life of Jesus”

    “interrupt our patterns of living a self-referenced life”

    “God can do a perfecting work in you”

Do any of these statements ring true for you?  When has your life been interrupted for God’s perfecting work in you?  What does it take to “interrupt” your “self-referenced life”?

 

81 – Sabbath – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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As I try to listen to “soul cravings” this year, Sabbath draws me again and again.  Is it because I feel tired and want to “just” sit down and get away from the busyness?  Or is it something more I crave?

“God has created, called, and gifted each one of us as an expression of divine character and love. But our service to God grows out of relationship with God. Sabbath reminds us that all things are not held together by us or through our efforts. Sabbath reminds us that we are created for God and, as God’s children for relationship with one another. Sabbath is learning to say no. Sabbath is taking time away. Sabbath is seeing that all God’s work is very good.

“Our very busyness keeps us from the holy task of being still and remembering that God alone is God. Our Lord invested daily time in solitude and communion with God. We can do no better than to follow Jesus’ example.”

(From “Evening and Morning,” reading for Tuesday, June 14 by L. Joseph Rosas III in The Upper Room Disciplines 2011: A Book of Daily Devotions, and appeared on July 8, 2013 at http://daily.upperroom.org/ )

How will you take Sabbath time this week?

80 – Spiritual Formation – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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I decided to start this year by rereading 40 Days Living the Jesus Creed by Scot McKnight.  As I begin to read it again, I see more and more the passion McKnight has to share what he sees as foundational for us becoming the people God calls us to be.  In Mark 12 we read about a scribe asking Jesus what is the most important commandment and Jesus’ response that we are to love God, love others and love ourselves.  McKnight writes that we can “… turn to … Jesus and to his words about what it means to be spiritually formed … his answer to the great question about the center of spiritual growth.” (The Jesus Creed, p xv – xvi)

I suspect we could use the phrase we used last week and say McKnight’s soul craved to hear Jesus tell him not only what was the greatest commandment but having heard, then to have this take root so deeply in his life that it is the source of his every thought and action.  He then craved to make others aware of the power he found in the Jesus Creed and began writing about it.

What do you crave?  What is drawing you this year?  What has captured your heart and soul and mind so much that you want to give it your strength to be transformed into the child of God you are called to be?  Maybe you call this growing in Christlikeness, discipleship, sanctification, or living the Jesus Creed. Whatever language you use it is about becoming the person God created you to be.

Stop for a moment and listen.  Listen for what is drawing you.  And then take a step …..

 

79 – Soul Cravings – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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Last week I saw this from Sue Monk Kidd,

“The soul craves experiences that offer it the rich depths of God.  Silence, solitude, holy leisure, simplicity, prayer, journaling, the Eucharist, rituals that touch the space of Mystery, symbols and images, the Bible, laughter, delight in the divine Presence, deep encounters with creation, and the merciful coming together of human hearts.  All these feed the soul, producing energy for living the transformed life.”

It caught my attention for several reasons.  First, she identifies many of the practices mentioned here over the last months.  Second, she makes it explicit that it is not the practice the soul craves, or should crave, but the depth of God that we crave.  Third, she knows that the practice is not the end in itself but is done for the nourishment it gives us; the energy it gives us for “living the transformed life” God calls us to.

The start of a new year is a time we often look back on the past year and forward to the new year and consider what we have been doing and what we want to be do.  One thing to consider regarding our spiritual practices is why we engage in any practice.  Do we practice for practice’s sake?  Do we practice for only our own good, a personal “reward”? Or, are we drawn to a practice that feeds us and produces “energy for living the transformed life”?

While I see the value that comes from the practices I mention here, I hope we never let the practice become the end.

 

78 – Examen – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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This is the time of the year we see so many top 10 lists. You have already seen them: “The Year’s Most Memorable News Stories,”  “The Best Films of the Year,” and on and on.

I wonder what would happen if we took time to review our year.  To go back through the year and look for where God was in the past year.  More specifically, to look for what drew you to God, and even what drew you away from God.

I fear we might think we need to look for “large epiphanies” but then we might fail to see the little glimpses of God we are given much more frequently.

Some time ago I mentioned the Prayer of Examen (#35).  What I am thinking about now is an Examen of year.  Over the next several days, why don’t you try this?  Below I have summarized the steps in the Examen sightly adapted,

(1) Remind yourself that you’re in God’s presence, and ask God to help you with your prayer.

(2) Recall anything from the year for which you are especially grateful, and give thanks.

(3) Open your memory to recall events of the year, noticing where you felt God’s presence, and where you accepted or turned away from any invitations to grow in love.

(4) Recall any actions for which you are sorry.

(5) Ask for God’s forgiveness.  Decide whether you want to reconcile with anyone you have hurt.

(6) Ask God for the grace you need for now and the next year and an ability to see God’s presence more clearly.

I invite you to set aside several times over the next few days to sit in prayer with the intention of opening yourself to what God can bring to your memory about this past year.  Above all, let God be your guide through those memories.  God may have some surprises for you.

 

77 – Visio Divina – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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I have mentioned here a couple of times ( #36 and #66 ) lectio divina, a way of sacred or holy reading.  What I have not mentioned is visio divina, a way of holy seeing.

While we can open ourselves to seeing the holy in any place or any time (have you every been looking at a mountain or the ocean or a lake or even a tree and “saw” something more, been touched by something more, found yourself on holy ground?) this time of year is full of things to see.  We might say it is “too crowded” with sights for the eyes.

More than once as I set looking at our lighted Christmas tree, I have found a sense of peace and presence coming over me.  In this otherwise busy season of the year does anything standout to you that draws you to peace, even to holy ground?

Recently I discovered Linda Roberts is sharing online “Advent Doodles” which are, to me, more than doodles and full images that can speak to me.

http://www.patheos.com/blogs/markdroberts/advent/

Let me give you two suggestions for practicing visio divina on your own.

First, you could go to one of Linda Roberts doodles and spend time looking at it.  You could look at it on your computer or you could print the image and sit with it.  Look at all of it; look at the different images within the doodle.  Have a sense of what draws your attention and let that leading take you into the image and maybe lead you to a holy place.

Second, spend time looking at some Christmas decorations.  I don’t mean driving by a number of homes with decorations and thinking, “How pretty.”  Maybe some place has already drawn you in a way.  It might be the Christmas tree at your home or the lights and decorations at someone else’s home, or what a church has done.  Find a place and stay there a while.  Look and see the lights, the decorations, and see what happens.

My prayer is that you will be blessed by the sights, and sounds, and smells of this season, this Holy Season.  Merry Christmas to you and yours.

 

76 – Morning Prayer/Quiet – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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Is it important to set aside time for prayer or quiet or silence in the morning?

Last week I came across a quote from C. S. Lewis that a blogger entitled “The real problem each morning.”  C. S. Lewis wrote,

” … the real problem of the Christian life comes where people do not usually look for it. It comes the very moment you wake up each morning. All your wishes and hopes for the day rush at you like wild animals. And the first job each morning consists simply in shoving them all back; in listening to that other voice, taking that other point of view, letting that other larger, stronger, quieter life come flowing in. And so on, all day.”

Lewis goes on to suggest that initially we can do this but for a moment but as we practice this listening “the new sort of life will be spreading through our system: because now we are letting Him work at the right part of us.”

Lewis’ observations ring true to me and encourage me to keep at the practice of giving some early part of the day (the first part?) to God.

(The blog post can be found at – http://merecslewis.blogspot.com/2011/12/real-problem-each-morning.html )

 

75 – Waiting – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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Are your hearing and reading a lot about Advent?  I suspect some of us are.  My inbox has been full of offers and suggestions for Advent devotions, things to do, and suggestions on how to make this Advent season meaningful.  I suspect more than once you have read that “waiting” is one of the major themes (if not THE major theme) of Advent.  I have read and heard that time and time again but it stuck me differently when I read this from Dr Molly Marshall,

“Waiting in hope is an active spiritual practice.  It requires a fundamental trust in God’s faithfulness and the humility to allow the mystery of God’s work to unfold over time.  Trying to force the Holy One to function now as in prior days displays a desire to control God; it also displays an unwillingness to perceive God in the surprising ways God may choose to reveal divine intention.”

(You can find the full post at http://mtmarshall.blogspot.com/2011/11/waiting-in-hope.html )

“Waiting … active spiritual practice … trust … humility … to allow …unfold … force … control …unwillingness …surprising … reveal … ”

I have to admit that I had never made a connection between “waiting” and “active spiritual practice” before.  But as I read and reread her sentences, it makes more and more sense that as we learn to wait we learn to move beyond ourselves and learn to trust.  And maybe learn to see. For some of us, it takes practice to do that.

Are you practicing waiting?

 

74 – Morning Prayer/Evening Prayer – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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For several weeks we have been considering the form or pattern our daily prayer can take.  We have thought together about “formal” prayers as found in the Daily Office and liturgy and we have considered a pattern prayer might follow as outlined by W. E. Sangster.  Last week as I thought about these forms or patterns I realized another way to think of this is as a model for prayer and then it hit me.  We need to look at what some call “The Model Prayer” and is most often called “The Lord’s Prayer.”

I am not interested in our dissecting The Lord’s Prayer to analyze it “parts” but I am interested in our spending time with it and noticing not just the words but the form it encourages our prayers to take.  If we let this be the pattern of our praying, what would we “pray about” that perhaps we now are not praying, and what might we now be praying that we might pray less if this model prayer was taken seriously as a model, a guide, a pattern, an encouragement for our prayers.

Our Father, who art in heaven,
hallowed be thy Name,
thy Kingdom come,
thy will be done
on earth,  as it is in heaven.
Give us this day our daily bread.
And forgive us our trespasses,
as we forgive those who trespass against us.
And lead us not into temptation,
but deliver us from evil.
For thine is the kingdom,
and he power, and the glory,
for ever and ever.

Amen.

73 – Gratitude – Intention on the Spiritual Journey

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Gratitude as a spiritual practice.

Since tomorrow is “celebrated” as Thanksgiving Day by so many, are you surprised to see me remind us that gratitude and thankfulness is often included in a list of spiritual practices?  How many emails have arrived in your inbox this week mentioning thankfulness?  If yours is anything like mine, a lot! Is that enough to remind you to practice gratitude?  Is that enough to make you grateful?

How do you practice gratitude?  Meister Eckhart is reported to have written, “If the only prayer you said in your whole life was, ‘Thank You,’ that would suffice.”

How to you pray “Thank you” tomorrow? Today?  Everyday?

Why don’t you take one minute right now and pray, “Thank you.”