My cowardly heart needs to learn to be silent

I'm often encouraged by the prayers of others. I'm inspired by that glimpse into the heart of another. Often I find bits of myself in others' prayers; and increased understanding. Here's part of just such a prayer by
Karl Rahner:

Though I find it so hard to serve you,
my weak and cowardly heart must learn to be silent and not to complain.
Rather should my mouth belie my heart - which wants to remonstrate with you - because in doing so it tells me of your truth, which is more important than mine:
Indeed, Lord, your service is good, your yoke is sweet and your burden light.

I thank you for all that you have asked of me in my life.
Be praised for the time in which I was born, glorified for my hours of happiness and my days of misery, blessed for everything that you have denied me.

Lord, though I am a lazy and head-strong servant, never dismiss me from your service.
You have power over my heart.
You have power over me even in the depths of my soul, where I alone am master of my eternal fate,
for your grace is the grace of eternal omnipotence.

Not about me

Here's a favorite prayer of mine from Thomas A Kempis' The Imitation of Christ. May this prayer encourage your heart as it does mine:

Lord, You know what is best; let this be done or that be done as You please. Give what You will, as much as You will, when You will. Do with me as You know best, as will most please You, and will be for Your greater honor. Place me where You will and deal with me freely in all things. I am in Your hand; turn me about whichever way You will. Behold, I am Your servant, ready to obey in all things. Not for myself do I desire to live, but for You - would that I could do this worthily and perfectly!

How do you address God?

Read these words by Thomas Merton today: :

"We make ourselves what we are
by the way we address God."

I've been thinking about this concept, off and on, all day. I've been thinking about the fact that how I address God demonstrates my thinking about Him. My thinking about God affects my actions, and my actions build the person I'm becoming.

So, how do you address God?

Chance traveling companion

May this prayer that I read this week by Karl Rahner, captivate your heart as it has mine:

May You alone enlighten me, You alone speak to me.
May all that I know apart from You be nothing more
than a chance traveling companion
on the journey toward You.

You mean it's not about meeting expectations?

Last Friday I went to lunch with a couple of ladies I’m getting to know. As we were about to leave and go our separate ways, one of them hands me a book and says:

“I don’t usually read fiction books, but I couldn’t put this one down. Go ahead and read it, and then give it to someone else or give it back to me.”

I’ll admit that her intro about not reading fiction put me off a bit. But recently my husband John & I went on a get away, while at the beach I started to read the book she gave me. It’s entitled The Shack and is written by Wm. Paul Young. By the time I finished reading the forward, I was totally hooked into the book. John came by me as I was reading and noticed the tears running down my face on several occasions, but wise man that he is, he didn’t say a word.

One of the many themes in the book is relationship. How God wants to be in relationship with us. There are two statements made by the personification of God in the book that really struck me:

“I’ve never placed an expectation on you or anyone else. The idea behind expectations requires that someone does not know the future or outcome and is trying to control behavior to get the desired result. Humans try to control behavior largely through expectations. I know you and everything about you. Why would I have an expectation other than what I already know? That would be foolish. And beyond that, because I have no expectations, you never disappoint me.”

“What I do have is a constant and living expectancy in our relationship, and I give you an ability to respond to any situation and circumstance in which you find yourself. To the degree that you resort to expectations and responsibilities, to that degree you neither know me nor trust me.”

I don’t know about you, but for me these are radical thoughts.

Although my head knows God loves me; my heart is only beginning to experience this. Most of my life I have felt like such a disappointment to God and everyone else.

I recognize that a lot of this stems from how I grew up. There was some good stuff in my childhood and I definitely appreciate that my folks did the best they could with what they had. But my entire childhood was one of feeling separate and alone.

I’m grateful that God has brought a lot of healing into my life. I’m grateful that today I do have a few close friends and am learning how to be in healthy relationships. But relationships still aren’t easy for me.

It’s still easier for me to think about something concrete such as expectations, and then set about seeing how I can perfectly meet every single one, than to be in relationship. Maybe that’s why I’m so attracted to the writing of Christian mystics like Teresa of Avila and St Augustine; these folks spoke from, what seems to me, the depths of relationship with God.

What about you? Do you relate more to God in terms of expectations or expectancy?

Poverty that is the Adoration of God

Back from a few days with John at San Juan Capistrano. Time for long walks on the beach and time to read. Our idea of a perfect get away.

The following words, taken from Brennan Manning's book, The Ragamuffin Gospel, delighted me as I read them this week. May they bless you as well:

We see our darkness as a prized possession because it drives us into the heart of God. Without mercy our darkness would plunge us into despair - and for some, self-destruction. Time alone with God reveals the unfathomable depths of the poverty of our spirit. We are so poor that even our poverty is not our own: It belongs to the mysterium tremendum of a loving God. In prayer we drink the dregs of this poverty. In a sudden and luminous moment we realize that we are being accosted by Mercy and embraced even before we lay hold of ourselves. Not clinging to anything, not even our sinfulness, we come before Jesus with open hands. We drain the bitter cup of self-rejection when we disappear into the tremendous poverty that is the adoration of God.

Wings to leap free

This is a prayer from John Kirvan's book God Hunger: Discovering the Mystic in All of Us that resonates with the desire within me to break free of what holds me back from God:

"Break open my heart
to make a home
large enough
to hold
the friendship
that you offer.
Give me wings
to leap free
of all that holds me
back from you."

Live Gladly

"The greatest honor we can give Amighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of His love."
- Julian of Norwich

His Love and Grace are Enough


Here's a prayer that creates the same desire in me as that of the writer; taken from The Spiritual Exercises Of St. Ignatius:


"Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty, my memory, my understanding, and my entire will--all that I have and call my own. You have given it all to me. To you, Lord, I return it. Everything is yours; do with it what you will. Give me only your love and your grace. That is enough for me."

Do you have a prayer that you've read that helps encourage your faith?

Captive Lover

Teresa of Avila is one of those Christian Mystics who I periodically read. She helps my mind think along different lines than those to which I would normally be drawn,. Today I read the following quote from her in regard to one's will when in prayer:

"It merely consents to God allowing Him to imprison it as one who well knows how to be the captive of its lover."

Oh to be like that!

This thought of the passionate lover that is captive was especially real to me today because I've been listening to the audio books of the Stephanie Meyers books. As I was cooking and cleaning today I was listening to Eclipse. These books show so well the captive heart of one in love.

My Savior is oh so desirable and lovable. He is faithful and true and powerful and interest ed in me and has my good at heart.

Oh Father, bring me to the point where my will is totally in Your control

Do you have someone who you periodically read that inspires your passion for God?

The naked soul

This book, "Anthology of Devotional Literature", that my husband found at a second hand store was an awesome find indeed!

Yesterday we read from another author that is well known to many but new to me - Jakob Bohme. We just read an excerpt entitled "The way to God's love" from his book "The Supersensual Life". Therein a wise Master is speaking to his Disciple. It's as if the Disciple's heart is mine when he laments:

"The entrance of the soul naked into the will of God, shutting out all imaginations and desires, and breaking down the strong partition which you mention, is indeed somewhat very terrible and shocking to human nature, as in the present state. Oh what shall I do, that I may reach this which I so much long for?"

I'm reminded of Jesus' words recorded in Luke 9:23-24 (MSG):

"Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat—I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to finding yourself, your true self. What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you?

Captivated

I've long been captivated by journals of Christians who lived before me.

Today I read a devotion entitled "The Embrace". It was more like a personal journal excerpt, by someone who's apparently well known in some circles but new to me; Hugh of St. Victor.

He totally caught me with that first line:

"What is that sweet thing that comes sometimes to touch me at the thought of God?"

He goes on to speak from two vantages, that of the soul and that of the man. He's having that inward conversation with himself in which we all engage. In the soul he's reflecting on the experience of encountering God. He speaks with such winsome passion:

"I lose memory of my former trials, my soul rejoices, my mind becomes clearer, my heart is enflamed, my desires are satisfied. I feel myself transported into a new place, I know not where, I grasp something interiorly as with the embraces of love."

He goes on to speak of how he engages to:

"struggle deliciously to prevent myself leaving this thing which I desire to embrace forever"

He arrives at that point where I so long to live my life from, where he can sincerely say:

"I had at last found the goal of all my desires. I seek for nothing more. I wish for nothing more."

He describes this experience of complete satisfaction within his soul, encountering his God. But from the man vantage he explains how God allows us just bits of His presence, so wonderful that we are overwhelmed. Those experiences which allow us, as followers of God, to:

"in the times of His absence thou shalt console thyself; and during His visits thou shalt renew thy courage which is ever in need of heartening."

I so often hear Christians today speak about needing those times of prayer and meditation, those quiet times, to enable us to live our lives as God wants. I hear this so often that sometimes it becomes meaningless to me.

But I love the peek into Hugh of St. Victor's quiet time; a look into how rapturous it can be, and what that rapture can reap in my life.

What are some of the things that you have read, or are currently reading, that help you rekindle your excitement about taking away time to be alone with God?

Eat this book

I'm reading "Eat This Book: A Conversation in the Art of Spiritual Reading" by Eugene Peterson.

I can't say enough how much I adore Peterson's paraphrase of the bible entitled "The Message". For me it's like a breath of fresh air and helps me see scripture in a whole new light.

As for this book, I really enjoyed the introduction & first chapter. Peterson has a quote in the first chapter by Kafka that I love:

"If the book we are reading does not wake us, as with a fist hammering on our skull, why then do we read it?...A book must be like an ice axe to break the frozen sea within us"

The bible is like that! I never cease to be pierced as I open my heart and read God's word; sometimes it's joy that radiates my soul, sometimes it's despair as I recognize anew the depths my own depravity...but it's definitely not just an instruction manual that I'm reading. I appreciate Peterson's call to relish, luxuriate and experience the Word of God.

However, to me it seems that once I read the introduction and first chapter the rest of the book is just a restating of that premise.

Looking to God for Great Things

You pay God a great compliment by asking great things
of Him. - Teresa of Avila

The soul and Family

I'm captivated by the book I'm currently reading, Care of the Soul by Thomas Moore.

In his chapter "The Myths of Family and Childhood", Moore makes some points I've never really thought about. One of which he states this way:

" What if we thought of the family less as the determining influence by which we are formed and more the raw material from which we can make a life?"

What a liberating way to look at life!

Instead of seeing the misfortunes that may have come our way in our families as the reason we have specific problems, we can see all events as leading to the the person we can become. As I read this I'm reminded of a beloved bible passage in Romans 8:32; The Message paraphrase puts it this way:

That's why we can be so sure that every detail in our lives of love for God is worked into something good.

Moore also had an interesting reflection on the place of family in reference to the individual's soul:

"The soul prospers in an environment that is concrete, particular, and vernacular. It feeds on the details of life, on it's variety, its quirks, and its idiosyncrasies. Therefore, nothing is more suitable for the care of the soul than family, because the experience of family includes so much of the particulars of life. In a family you live close to people that otherwise you might not even want to talk to. Over time you get to know them intimately. You learn their most minuscule, most private habits and characteristics. Family life is full of major and minor crises - the ups and downs of health, success and failure in career, marriage, and divorce - all kinds of characters. It is tied to places and events and histories. With all of these felt details, life etches itself into memory and personality. It's difficult to imagine anything more nourishing to the soul."

"If we don't grasp this mystery, the soulfulness that family has to offer each of us will be spirited away in hygienic notions of what a family should be. The sentimental image of family that we present publicly is a defense against the pain of proclaiming the family for what it is - a sometimes comforting, sometimes devastating house of life and memory."

For me these words of Moore brought recognition that I have definitely had a "hygienic notion" of what family should be. Neither my family of origin nor my current family lived up to the sentimental image. But Moore's concept here if full of acceptance. It offers a paradigm that allows me to look at the reality of life, memories, & family in a similar fashion to how I look at myths; archetypes to illustrate lessons I can grow from and be nourished by.

Very interesting food for thought.

How do you think family nourishes the soul?

Dark night of the Soul

My mind needs opening. I have a void of thinking that causes me to benefit from the thoughts of others. Recently I’ve began to read some of the great Christian mystic writers.

One such author is St John of the Cross. This is a man who spent 9 months in a prison in 1577. When I read his writings I have to think really hard about what he’s saying because I don’t have a background that makes understanding of him easy. However, I found another author, Thomas Merton (A Trappist monk of the Abbey of Our Lady of Gethsemani in Kentucky who died in 1968), whose writings have helped me in my understanding of St John of the cross.

St John of the Cross, in his book The Dark Night of the Soul helps me understand transcendence. That experience that is beyond satisfaction brought by the physical things around me or from the praise of people. The experience of the presence of God and the all consuming desire to serve Him that brings a pleasure that can not be described.

I want to quote here from St John of the Cross as well as from Thomas Merton’s commentary on what St John said:

St John of the Cross - "These times of aridity cause the soul to journey in all purity in the love of God, since it is no longer influenced in its actions by the pleasure and sweetness of the actions themselves, . . . but only by a desire to please God. It becomes neither presumptuous nor self-satisfied, as perchance it was wont to become in the time of its prosperity, but fearful and timid with regard to itself, finding in itself no satisfaction whatsoever; and herein consists that holy fear which preserves and increases the virtues. . . . Save for the pleasure indeed which at certain times God infuses into it, it is a wonder if it find pleasure and consolation of sense, through its own diligence, in any spiritual exercise or action. . . . There grows within souls that experience this arid night (of the senses) care for God and yearnings to serve him, for in proportion as the breasts of sensuality, wherewith it sustained and nourished the desires that it pursued, are drying up, there remains nothing in that aridity and detachment save the yearning to serve God, which is a thing very pleasing to God. "(The Dark Night of the Soul, i, 13. Peers, op. cit., vol. I, p. 393.)

Thomas Merton – “The joy of this emptiness, this weird neutrality of spirit which leaves the soul detached from the things of the earth and not yet in possession of those of heaven, suddenly blossoms out into a pure paradise of liberty, of which the saint sings in his Spiritual Canticle: it is a solitude full of wild birds and strange trees, rocks, rivers, and desert islands, lions, and leaping does. These creatures are images of the joys of the spirit, aspects of interior solitude, fires that flash in the abyss of the pure heart whose loneliness becomes alive with the deep lightnings of God”.

“And thus St. John of the Cross not only makes himself accessible to us, but does much more: he makes us accessible to ourselves by opening our hearts to God within their own depths.”

Have we ignored our souls?

Currently I'm reading a book Care of the Soul by Thomas Moore. It's fascinating reading. I want to post an excerpt from the introduction here:

"The emotional complaints of our time, complaints we therapists hear every day in our practice, include:

emptiness
meaninglessness
vague depression
disillusionment about marriage, family, and relationship
a loss of values
yearning for personal fulfillment
a hunger for spirituality

All of these symptoms reflect a loss of soul and let us know what the soul craves"

As I read this I thought about how, as a society, the mainstream culture in America, we really have ignored our souls.

We read self help books. We seek to improve; almost as if perfection is an attainable trait. We seek to be control of our lives and frequently the lives of those around us. We live in pursuit of entertainment, power, intimacy, material things, sexual fulfillment and status. We somehow think that if we can find the right job, or relationship, church or therapy it will bring us these things we pursue. But if we lose our soul, none of these things will be satisfying.

Jesus once said:

"Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You're not in the driver's seat; I am. Don't run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I'll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to saving yourself, your true self. What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you? What could you ever trade your soul for?"
(Mark 8:34 The Message)