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Spiritual readings "Greetings from Whittier Presbyterian Church"
October 2006
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Robert A Johnson on Listening |
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Henri Nouwen on Silence |
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Jeremy Taylor: There is no place Where God is Not |
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Lectio Divina of Life |
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Ben Campbell Johnson on Evangelism |
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Merton on prayer and the world’s pain |
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Sadhu Sundar Singh |
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Buddha shakes the dust off his feet |
I’ve recently reviewed the book, “Owning Your Own Shadow – Understanding the Dark Side of the Psyche”, by Robert A Johnson, Harper San Francisco, 1991. I found this great little story he tells on himself. He had a friend with whom we would occasionally exchange cassette tapes and he began to benefit just from the process of making the tape. Then comes the story.
“When I was distressed, I would make a tape and find that I had often talked my way through a dilemma. …My friend lives far away and we meet infrequently. At one rare meeting my friend say, “Robert, why is it that you are so much more intelligent on tape than in conversation? Don’t answer; I know. On the tape I don’t interrupt!” Talking to him by tape had engaged my feeling function and given me the freedom to process my own thoughts. You can give another person a precious gift if you will allow him to talk without contaminating his speech with your own material.”
Have you ever tried to simply to listen to someone? Its hard work, hence indeed a gift to give to others. May you find the opportunity and ability to give that gift to someone today.
Grace & peace
Geoff
Henri J.M. Nouwen was one of the most popular spiritual writers until his death in 1996. (See http://www.henrinouwen.org/ or http://www.utoronto.ca/stmikes/library/nouwen/index.htm for more)
Here is something from one of his books, “Reaching Out,” Image Books, 1986.
“Silence and Solitude…ask for much discipline and risk taking because we always seem to have something more urgent to do and “just sitting there” and “doing nothing” often disturbs us more than it helps. But there is no way around this. Being useless and silent in the presence of our God belongs to the core of all prayer. In the beginning we often hear out own unruly inner noises more loudly than God’s voice. This is at times very hard to tolerate. But slowly, very slowly, we discover that the silent time makes us quiet and deepens our awareness of ourselves and God. Then, very soon, we start missing these moments when we are deprived of them, and before we are fully aware of it an inner momentum has developed that draws us more and more into silence and closer to that still point where God speaks to us.”
Over the last few years I’ve notice an increased longing for silence in my prayer life. Alas, I’ve not done much with that longing, but these words reminded me of it. How do YOU treat silence in your life, in your prayer life? I’m reminded of the expression of several years ago that was supposed to be something of a joke, but the kind of joke that touched on deep truth: “Don’t Just Do Something. Stand There!”
May you sense God’s presence today, in silence or just standing there.
Grace & peace
Geoff
Due to technical problems at the church, this email of last Tuesday didn’t get out until today. Hopefully we will be back on track now.
The other day I was reviewing “The Living Labyrinth” by Jeremy Taylor, Paulist Press, 1998 and ran across this. The story he is referring to is the story of the princess and the enchanted frog(!).
“Put in more overtly spiritual terms, the story in all its global variations points to the presence of the divine in everything, most particularly and importantly in the creatures, situations, and internal energies that are most ignored, despised, and repressed. There is no place where God is not. Even the most devout and pious believer is always in danger of failing to perceive and embrace the divine element in the lowly and despised figures in his or her dreams. Even in pious good works are dutifully offered to the lowly and despised in society on a regular basis, if these acts of charity are offered “without love” (that is, without a realization that there is a fundamental human similarity shared by the giver and the receiver(, the (to quote Saint Paul) these acts “are meaningless noise and amount to nothing.”
He is referring to St. Paul’s words in I Corinthians 13. I was struck by his sentence “There is no place where God is not.” The italics were his in the original. I hope they come through the various cyberspace mechanics. The omnipresence of God can be comforting, or perhaps intimidating, depending on what kind of life you lead. For those on the spiritual path, there is light, grace and hope. May you sense God’s presence today, somewhere you do not expect.
Grace & peace
Geoff
One of the spiritual practices involving the Bible that has become more regularly used lately is the technique called Lectio Divina. Here’s how we explain it at our church: “Lectio divina is a very ancient art whose origins are lost in the early years of the Christian Church. It has survived in the monasteries throughout the ages, particularly those in the Benedictine tradition. It is a way of reading and praying with the Bible that enables the one praying to sense God’s word to him/her with each session of Lectio.” You may have noticed the announcements for our Wednesday Movies programs if you scroll down these pages to see the church news. We use a technique based upon Lectio Divina for each session of the movies class. After viewing the portion of the movie, we ask these three questions.
1. What jumps out at you in today’s segment?
2. Why did this attract your attention?
3. What might God be saying to you through this process? How might this effect the way you pray?
We are finding this to be a most helpful process to reflect upon our movie. I use a similar process to reflect upon my dreams every day, it can be used to reflect upon poetry or any kind of reading. Indeed it is a most helpful process to reflect upon all of life. What are the things in your daily life that catch your attention? What is going on inside of you that these things caught your attention? Where might God be in all this?
Try this simple process today, and see/hear what you might find.
Grace & peace
Geoff
How do we go about telling others about Jesus and how do we make more deep disciples, either of ourselves or of others. I ran across this material from Ben Campbell Johnson pertaining to this subject. It comes from his book “95 These for the Church”, Columbia Theological Seminary Press, 1995.
Evangelism at its heart involves passing the faith on to a new generation or to a generation that has bailed out on the church. In either case these persons do not know or embrace the faith and need effective guidance in the art of Christian believing and living.
“Art” stands in contrast with “mechanics.” For too long belief has been more mechanical than artistic. We have given persons the creed, the confessions, or the proper texts and requested their assent to these faith formulations. But, if we understand Christian believing as an art, we make room for intuition and imagination, for individuality and spontaneity. Art involves the whole person and not merely the rationality of the person. “We are his workmanship, crated for good work in Christ. (Eph. 2:10)
I particularly like the appeal to intuition and imagination that Johnson makes. How do you tell others about Jesus? Here is at least another way to think about the task.
Grace & peace
Geoff
One of the books we are using in preparation for our January 2007 term at the DASD program is Don Postema’s “Space for God: Study and Practice of Spirituality and Prayer”, CRC Publications, 1997. It is a wonderful book if you are looking for help beginning to pray or to renew your prayer practices. Postema uses lots of quotes from other sources. Here is one from Thomas Merton’s “Contemplative Prayer”, Image Books, 1969.
“Is the Christian life of prayer simply an evasion of the problems and anxieties of contemporary existence?…If we pray “in the Spirit” we are certainly not running away from life, negating visible reality in order to “see God.” For “the Spirit of the Lord has filled the whole earth.” Prayer does not blind us to the world, but it transforms our vision of the world, and makes us see it, all people, and all the history of humankind, in the light of God.”
How tempting it is sometimes to avoid the messiness and pain of the world and to stay in our own comfortable surroundings, with the people who love us. Yet the Bible calls us out into the world and our life of prayer offers us the opportunity to keep the world in our sights as we look around for God’s presence and God’s call.
May you find both presence and call as you look at the world around you today.
Grace & peace
Geoff
For an introduction to spiritual writings of the Christian Faith, a good selection of brief readings is a book called “Devotional Classics; Selected Readings for Individuals and Groups”, edited by Richard J. Foster and James Bryan Smith, Harper San Francisco, 1990. There I was introduced to Sadhu Sundar Singh, who has been called the St. Paul of India. Here is the Wikipedia address for him. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sadhu_Sundar_Singh
His is quite a story. Here is a very brief excerpt by Singh from Foster’s book.
“In comparison with this big world, the human heart is only a small thing. Though the world is so large, it is utterly unable to satisfy this tiny heart. Our ever growing soul and its capacities can be satisfied only in the infinite God. As water is restless until it reaches its level, so the soul has no peace until it rests in God.”
I’m reminded of the expression of St. Augustine that addresses this human restlessness, “Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee.” As much as we look elsewhere, or as often as we are told that worldly things will ultimately satisfy us, these readings remind us that the only real source of fulfillment in this life is God.
May you taste and see that God is good, indeed the best.
Grace & peace
Geoff
Jesus says that sometimes we need to realize that we can’t “fix” things or convince people to love each other. When that happens he suggests we “shake the dust from our feet and move on.” (Matthew 10:14). I found another story like that, this one from a different faith tradition. Jane Vennard, in her book “Praying with Body and Soul”, Augsburg Press, 1998, tells a story that she got from “A Path With Heart: A Guide through the Perils and Promises of Spiritual Life” by Jack Kornfield, Bantam Books, 1993. Here’s the story the way Vennard tells it.
“(The)…Buddha…was called into service in a community of monks and nuns who were fighting among themselves. Some were accusing others of not following the rules of the monastery. Those accused were accusing their accusers of judgment and self-righteousness. Meditation practice was disturbed, peaceful living was absent, and compassion for one another was nonexistent.
When the Buddha arrived, he spoke with the monks and nuns, encouraging them to ask each other for forgiveness and to forgive readily from their hearts. The monastics took that advice into their disagreements and began to argue about what had been done that was wrong so that forgiveness could re quested and given. Conflict erupted in response to every suggestion the Buddha offered, so after a few days the Buddha left, leaving the monks and nuns to their own devices. The Buddha then took a short vacation in the forest, where all was peaceful and calm, knowing he had done what he could.
There is great wisdom to be found in boundaries, in knowing when to say enough is enough, when to shake the dust from our feet. Knowing our human limits paradoxically makes more room for God to be and work in us. May you know your limits and thereby better know where God can be in your life.
Grace & peace
Geoff
Here’s a prayer for the upcoming election. It comes from the Episcopal Book of Common Prayer, Church Hymnal Corporation, New York, 1979.
Almighty God, to whom we must account for all our powers and privileges: Guide the people of the United States (and/or your local state/community) in the election of officials and representatives that, by faithful administration and wise laws, the rights of all may be protected and our nation be enabled to fulfill your purposes; through Jesus Christ our Lord. Amen.
