Rest

whose adorning let it be
the hidden person of the heart
(I Peter 3)

quoted from When the Lights Go Out by
Graham Cooke

quote:

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I am choosing to live my life in hiddenness, so that when God's manifestation comes, it's a bonus. I want to live in that place of constantly yielding inwardly to find the presence of God- the place that, even in the eye of the storm is one of tranquility, of peace and of rest. In such a place, "rest" becomes a weapon against the enemy. You can exasperate the devil, because when he comes against you, you don't fight against him, but submit to God (see James 4:7).

In fact, it is not our job to fight the devil. Our job is to "step back" into God and experience His majesty and power. Christ has overcome the devil, so we need to focus on being "in Christ"... Real warfare is about discovering the majesty, the supremacy and the sovereignty of the Lord Jesus Christ. Warfare is about seeking the face of God and enjoying Him as your fortress and your refuge.

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Lectio Divina

"the Bible tended to leave her cold,
as it had been used

more as a weapon

than an instrument of grace..." Benner

I consider myself a recovering Pharisee which- perhaps- leaves my children with a similar burden of painful misconceptions about God as Angie carried (see the above quote). I pray that this excerpt from David Benner's book "Sacred Companions" will help someone to take some steps closer to the real Jesus (who is too often poorly reflected by those of us who claim His name)


QUOTE: (clips from pages 110-117)
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Every idea and assumption we have about God must be measured against the person of Jesus. For most of us this will give us an opportunity to redraw our image of God. This is one of the most important ways in which Christian spirituality matures- by allowing immature and incorrect ideas of God to be reformed. The filter for that reformation ... is Jesus of Nazareth.

Meditation on the Gospel accounts of Jesus’ life has been the core of many Roman Catholic approaches to spiritual formation. We Protestants do well to learn from them in this regard. Bible reading can take many forms. Nonmeditative reading may involve some reflection, but it is usually more oriented toward analysis and comprehension of content. For years I read the Bible this way, attempting to discover or be reminded of things that would help me live the Christian life.

Meditative reading is less focused on the words and more focused on the Word behind the words. In the case of meditation on Gospel accounts of Jesus, the intent is to come to know Jesus better. This involves lingering over the story long enough to allow yourself to meet Jesus in that account. ...

No one has anything to fear about imagination that is guided by meditation on Scripture and the Spirit of God.... Any moment in the life of Christ or any of his teachings or parables offers rich opportunities for meeting Jesus. Consider this fragment of a conversation with a woman named Angie with whom I worked in spiritual direction.

Angie struggled in her Christ following. Her personal history made her deeply uncomfortable in the church- any church- and her relationship to Christians was filled with ambivalence. However her spiritual yearning was fervent, and she entered spiritual direction out of a longing to encounter God more deeply.

After we explored the contours of her spiritual journey, I asked her about her experience of God. She told me how much trouble she had relating to Christ. Her perceptions of him were all tainted by dysfunctional childhood family and church experiences. I then asked her about her ability to meet Christ in church or in Scripture. She said that she was sometimes deeply aware of meeting him in the liturgy but that the Bible tended to leave her cold, as it had been used more as a weapon than an instrument of grace in her childhood.

...
Angie had been on the journey of Christian spirituality for a long time. However her progress was seriously limited by her unfamiliarity with the Jesus of the Gospels. Her ideas of God needed reformation in the light of the decisive revelation of God in Christ. She needed to get to know Jesus better...

The only way to come to know Jesus is through the Gospels. There is no substitute for meditation on Scripture as a route to a deep, personal engagement with God. Attunement to the Christian God must always involve attending to Jesus...

For some time after the session I recounted earlier, Angie continued to focus on Jesus, seeking to encounter him through the Gospels. Increasingly , however, she came to speak of the great difference between Jesus and the God of the Old Testament. It seemed important therefore for her to meet God the Father of Jesus as he revealed himself in the rest of Scripture. Again the goal was not simply to teach some point of theology. It was to facilitate her attunement to God.

I did this by encouraging her to meditate on the Genesis account of the creation and fall of humans. My instruction was for her to watch for the hidden presence of Jesus- the God of grace she had come to meet in the Gospels. Praying for eyes to discern grace, she went off to read and meditate on the first three chapters of Genesis.

She returned to our next meeting with considerable excitement. Something totally new had struck her. She was deeply impressed by the care God took to prepare garments of skin for Adam and Eve after they discovered their nakedness and were overwhelmed with their shame. She added, “Had God been like I have often pictured him, he would have wanted to rub their noses in their shame to make sure they learned their lesson. I was so impressed that what he seemed to want was to eliminate their shame, not exploit it.” This was a profound insight for her. It led to a cascading series of subsequent insights about the nature of God as she subsequently meditated on other Old Testament passages.

Scripture is given for our instruction and edification. In its totality Scripture presents the God revealed in Jesus and whom we seek to follow. The story of his pursuit of humankind despite our unfaithfulness is a story of grace. Biblical revelation aids our attunement to God by helping us encounter the Lord God of heaven and earth, not simply the god of our imagination, childhood experience or previous religious instruction.

~~~~~~~~~Lectio Divina (pg. 170)~~~~~~~~

... a modification of the classic lectio. It emphasizes four ways of reading (or listening to) Scripture, each named for the corresponding monastic form of meditation. It also involves reading the passage four times.

1. Lectio. Listen with your senses, without thinking too much about the meaning. Attend to your imagination, noting the smells, sounds and images that arise as you hear the passage. Allow yourself to enter into the setting using your imagiantion.

2. Meditatio. This time I want you to follow along in your Bible as I read the passage out loud. Use your thinking to reflect on the meaning and significance of the passage. Consider why the passage is included in Scripture. What does it mean? How does it affect your understanding of God?

3. Oratio. This time as you listen, I want you to attend to your feelings. Note your feelings and silently offer them back to God as a prayer of the heart. Comment in your prayer on anything in the passage to which you particularly respond.

4. Contemplatio. Before I read the passage a final time, quieten yourself, close your eyes, breathe deeply and regularly, and prepare to receive God’s Word. This time I want you to listen with your intuition- your heart. If something impresses you, simply notice it and then refocus your attention on what you are hearing. Don’t worry if you do not seem to have any thoughts or impressions. Simply remain open to the passage and to the Spirit. After expressing gratitude to God for your experience, open your eyes.
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The only way to heaven.... by Jeanne Guyon

Jeanne Guyon 1648-1717
Quoted from “Jeanne Guyon An Autobiography”

The only way to heaven is prayer, a prayer of the heart, of which everyone is capable, and not by reasoning, which is the fruit of study, or by exercise of the imagination, which, in filling the mind with wandering objects, rarely settles it; instead of warming the heart with love to God, they leave it cold and languishing. Let the poor come; let the ignorant and carnal come; let the children without reason or knowledge come; let the dull or hard hearts that can retain nothing come to the practice of prayer, and they shall become wise.

Oh you who are great, wise, and rich. Do you not have a heart capable of loving what is proper for you and of hating what is destructive? Love the sovereign good, hate all evil, and you will be truly wise. When you love anyone, is it because you know the reasons of love and its definitions? No, certainly....
None can exempt himself from loving, for none can live without a heart, nor the heart without love.

Why should any amuse themselves in seeking reasons for loving love itself? Let us love without reasoning about it, and we will find ourselves filled with love before the others have learned the reasons that let to it. Make a trial of this love and you will be wiser in it than the most skilled philosophers. In love, as in everything else, experience instructs better than reasoning. Come, then, drink at this Fountain of living waters instead of the broken cisterns of created beings, which, far from allaying your thirst, only tend to continually augment it. IF you could drink once at this Fountain, you would not seek elsewhere for anything to quench your thirst. While you still continue to draw from this Source, you will thrist no longer after the world. But if you quit it, alas! The Enemy has the dominance. He will give you a portion of his poisoned drink, which may have an apparent sweetness, but will assuredly rob you of life.

I forsook the Fountain of living water when I left off prayer. I became like a vineyard exposed to pillage, hedges torn down with liberty for all the passengers to ravage it. I began to seek the creature what I had found in God. He left me to myself, because I first left Him. It was His will, by permitting me to sink into the horrible pit, to make me feel the necessity of approaching Him in prayer.

Nouwen "Out of Solitude"

Quoted from Out of Solitude by Nouwen:

quote:

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As a community of faith, we remind one another that we form a fellowship of the weak, transparent to Him who speaks to us in the lonely places of our existence and says: Do not be afraid, you are accepted..

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quote:

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It is in solitude that we discover that being is more important than having, and that we are worth more than the result of our efforts. In solitude we discover that our life is not a possession to be defended, but a gift to be shared...

In solitude we discover that our worth is not the same as our usefulness...

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The love of Solitude

The Following of Christ
The love of Solitude
an early-15th-century devotional tract by Thomas à Kempis (c. 1380–1471)

A soul, which is separated from all the amusements of the senses,
seeks and finds in God
that pure satisfaction
which it can never meet with in creatures.
A respectful and frequent remembrance of the presence of God
occupies the mind,
and,
an ardent desire of pleasing Him
and of becoming worthy of His love
engages the heart.
It is absorbed in Him alone:
all things else dwindle into nothing.
It buries itself and all things in God:
it breathes only His love,
it forgets all to remember only Him

Communication Skills: Worst to Best

From Retrouvaille post session workbook:


quote:
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Use this scale as a guide to see whether or not you are giving your spouse healthy responses that promote good communication. Like anything, “Practice Makes Perfect.”

Worst:
When my spouse says something and I...
...reject or ridicule his/her feelings
...criticize him/her
...question his/her perceptions
...defend myself
...ignore him/her
...share just to meet my own needs
It is hurtful and indicates rejection
My spouse’s feelings might be... I feel hurt

Poor:
When my spouse says something and I...
...ask questions about the facts
...give advice
...ignore his/her feelings
...reassure without identifying his/her feelings
It misses feelings and indicates toleration.
My spouse’s feelings might be... I feel frustrated

Good:
When my spouse says something and I...
...accurately identify his/her main feeling
It acknowledges main obvious feelings and indicates acceptance.
My spouse’s feelings might be... I feel accepted.

Best:
When my spouse says something and I...
...ask questions about the feelings
...mirror back with empathy
...communicate understanding of his/her feelings
...try to understand non-verbals
It goes beyond the obvious to underlying feelings and indicates acceptance.
My spouse’s feelings might be... I feel cared for and want to tell you more.