I hope you dance

I have found this analogy helpful today...

The contemplative journey is a bit like a dance. 

Being is our dance partner who is always there to lead when we consent. 

Lots of things pull us away from the dance - mostly thoughts, feelings, and distractions of all kinds.

You can enter the dance no matter where you are, or what you are doing.

Be open.

Consent. 

Allow yourself to be led into simple, spacious awareness.


Photo from video: I Hope You Dance by Lee Ann Womack

Manna From Heaven

There is something about manna that I have been thinking about for quite a while.

The Story

If you are unfamiliar with the story, it goes something like this... After the Israelites miraculously fled Egypt they began to grumble and expressed a desire to return to their old way of life. God responded with a daily miracle by giving them manna. Basically, bread fell from heaven! The Israelites would collect it, eat it, and hope that it would fall from heaven again the next day. (Exodus 16)

No Hording Allowed

One of the interesting parts of the story to me is that manna couldn’t be horded. It had to be consumed that day. They were also instructed to only collect what they needed. Spiritual sustenance cannot be horded either. If we wait and are open, God will give us what we need for today, usually no more and no less. 

Quiet Time

If you have some sort of quiet time in the morning, you have probably experienced this... you do your daily spiritual reading and later that day it is exactly what you need to get through some sort of situation, or possibly share with someone else who finds it helpful. To me, this is the spiritual miracle of manna in action for us today.

The Last Supper

Is it a coincidence that at the last supper Jesus took bread, broke it and said "do this in remembrance of me," or that He taught us to pray by asking for daily bread? 

Miracles

Manna came from God. Each day was a miracle, and it helps to be aware of the miraculous nature of our lives. Similarly, real spiritual food is a daily miracle that comes from God. Sometimes we just need a reminder.

Open Eyes, Open Heart

When the eyes of your heart are open

you can't help but see

that the world

is dripping with 
God's love.

~ Rod ~ 

To pray is to...

My devotional this morning from Thomas Keating* was partly about consent and prayer. I keep being reminded that prayer is essentially allowing God to pray through me. Saw this on Pinterest today...

*The Daily Reader for Contemplative Living

Dressed in Gentleness - Henri J. M. Nouwen

"Once in a while we meet a gentle person. Gentleness is a virtue hard to find in a society that admires toughness and roughness. We are encouraged to get things done and to get them done fast, even when people get hurt in the process. Success, accomplishment, and productivity count. But the cost is high. There is no place for gentleness in such a milieu.

"Gentle is the one who does "not break the crushed reed, or snuff the faltering wick" (Matthew 12:20). Gentle is the one who is attentive to the strengths and weaknesses of the other and enjoys being together more than accomplishing something. A gentle person treads lightly, listens carefully, looks tenderly, and touches with reverence. A gentle person knows that true growth requires nurture, not force. Let's dress ourselves with gentleness. In our tough and often unbending world our gentleness can be a vivid reminder of the presence of God among us."

- Henri J. M. Nouwen

Visit our website for inspiration, resources, news, events, community.

Source - Thanks to Steve Imbach for sharing this with me. Soulstream.org

Seek God

I seem to have an obsession with technique. Before prayer it was success. I read all kinds of books on success trying to find the magic formula. Now it seems as though I do the same thing with contemplative prayer. 

I know better, but as it is with so many things in my relationship with God, I tend to forget the really important things and get distracted by the not so important.

The good news, and I really mean this - this is the good news - God's got me covered. Through Christ we are one. I might be obsessed with whatever I am obsessed with, but He is 100% present nevertheless and loves nothing more than when I return to him.

Still, I was reminded today to seek God and not the perfect way to pray.

Accept Prayers Limitations

"A compassionate community will not be achieved only through prayer; I pray myself, but I accept its limitations. We need to take action to develop compassion, to create inner peace within ourselves and to share that inner peace with our family and friends. Peace and warm-heartedness can then spread through the community just as ripples radiate out across the water when you drop a pebble into a pond." ~ Dalai Lama

In learning to pray, I am learning to let go. Through Spiritual Direction I am learning to let God save me, instead of trying to save myself. What a huge paradigm shift this is. I never realized what a striver I am when it comes to my own salvation and ongoing relationship with God.

Letting go is also one of the ways I can "pray continually," and all of life becomes prayer. This is an element of being poor in spirit, and, of course, it's all a gift, not something to be striven for.

Like usual, Richard Rohr says it way better than I ever could, so enjoy!...

From Richard Rohr http://www.cacradicalgrace.org:

LETTING GO

Question of the day:
What is God asking me to surrender?

Risk all for love, Jesus tells us, even your own life. Give that to me and let me save it. The healthy religious person is the one who allows God to save.

If this is the ideal Christian attitude toward God, then Mary is the ideal Christian of the Gospels. She sums up in herself the attitude of the poor one whom God is able to save. She is deeply aware of her own emptiness without God (Luke 1:52). She longs for the fulfillment of God’s promise (1:54); she has left her self open, available for God’s work (1:45, 49). And when the call comes, she makes a full personal surrender: “Let it be!” (1:38).

from Radical Grace: Daily Meditations, p. 322, day 333

Current mantra: Let go…let God

Two Questions

See if you recognize any difference in these two questions:

Question 1: What can I do to experience God?

Question 2: Where does God encounter me?

How do you feel about these questions?

Do you like one, or the other more?

What’s the difference?

Why does it matter? Does it matter?

Let me know what you think. Hit “Comments” below.

A Good Story

One thing about the evangelical community is we love a good story. Heck, I love a good Kingdom story and hope to share a lot more of them here in this blog. I wish I could tell a lot of sensational stories week after week about how the heavens open up day after day and angels come and meet me as I pray, but it just wouldn’t be true.

The truth is I sit in my chair a couple of times day, and I struggle to stay present and open to God, and maybe for a few brief seconds, if I’m lucky, I know in my heart that I am in the loving presence of God. Most of the time not much happens as I pray that I am all that conscious of. The only thing I have to go on is my wife and my friends noticing that I have changed a little; that I seem to be a little more at peace, and a little happier. I have also noticed that I handle situations differently. Situations that caused me a lot of stress, or anger in the past, don’t seem to get to me as much as they used to, and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Contemplative prayer has taught me to not buy the religious guilt trip any more. Whether it be over social justice, experiences of the Holy Spirit, reading my Bible more, evangelism, etc. Do miracles happen in my life, is it important to read my Bible, feed the poor, and tell others about the love of God? Yes, and in one way or the other I have been involved, or hope to be involved in all of these things in the future. Do I see evidence, and experience the Holy Spirit in my life? All the time, but I no longer cling to these experiences, and then tell other people they need to do this or that to be whole, or accepted by God. WE ARE ALL ACCEPTED AND LOVED BY GOD - PERIOD.

Prayer teaches me to let go of everything, including experience and religious guilt trips, and simply love God for who he is rather than what he can do for me. God loves me just as I am – weeds and wheat. Amazing kingdom stuff is going to happen, and is happening, but not because I force it to happen out of guilt and shame. It’s going to happen because God loves this broken world and he wants to share that love through me to whoever is open to it at any God ordained time.

I am “in the river” and good and bad stuff is happening all of the time, just like it did in the life of Jesus. Prayer teaches me how to handle it all more like him.

learning to pray: Let go of any religious guilt or shame.

How Great Thou Art

learning to pray: On your next walk, hike, or boating trip take the words for the hymn "How Great Thou Art" with you. Here's a sample that spoke to me recently as I was standing at the base of mountain in the midst of a beautiful garden at the Cedar Springs Retreat Center in Sumas, Washington:

When through the woods, and forest glades I wander,
And hear the birds sing sweetly in the trees.
When I look down, from lofty mountain grandeur
And see the brook, and feel the gentle breeze.


Then sings my soul, My Saviour God, to Thee,
How great Thou art, How great Thou art.

For the lyrics to the entire song go to: http://www.the-synergy.com/lyrics/howgrt.html Turn the volume up!!! (Just kidding).

Time Off

I'm taking the next week and half off to study for my real estate exam (please pray for me!), so I won't be submitting anything new for a while. If you have anything to contribute in the meantime that has to do with learning to pray, please make a comment below. Take Care!

Let your love, GOD, shape my life with salvation, exactly as you promised. Psalm 119:41

Your love, GOD, fills the earth!
Train me to live by your counsel. Psalm 119:64

Truth from your mouth means more to me
than striking it rich in a gold mine. Psalm 119:72

From 24-7: Report From Germany

Ralf Neumann and some of his friends are scheming to move back to the down-trodden area of eastern Germany that saw them grow up. They want to found a monastic community that will bring reconciliation, friendship, creativity and practical aid to those in need. They are daring to dream that they can be part of the solution in an area that is rife with depression, suicide and growing Neo-Nazism. Read More...

Communion at 6000 Feet

We had been climbing for hours with little breaks here and there to enjoy the amazing scenery. Little did we know that our guides had a surprise for us. We were up so high we were at the tree line, and there was only one small bunch of trees left before the mountain continued to rise up into the sky. Our guides had us sit and wait while they went and set something up behind this last group of small trees. What was going on?

Unbeknownst to us one of the guides had carried up a large silver cross in his backpack, some bread, and some wine. Inside of the last cleft of trees at this height he was setting up a communion table on a flat log. One at a time the five of us went into this natural sanctuary made of ancient trees, ate the bread, sipped from the cup and remembered the One who loved us enough to die for us. One at a time we came out...rocked by the Holy Spirit!

Forgiveness and the incredible mercy of God was the essence of that weekend hiking trip for me. I went on the trip full of guilt and shame, and thanks to our guides, and the mercy of God I returned home feeling refreshed, cleansed, and accepted by God. I love the outdoors. That weekend I was blown away by the views of the beautiful valleys, mountains, lakes and streams, but I actually came home even more blown away by how great God is, and that he loved the world so much that he came to earth, died and rose again, to forgive sinners like me.

learning to pray: take communion, be grateful and rest in the knowledge that you are forgiven.

Walking With God in the Midst of Hell

There’s an interesting book out by a lady named Etty Hillesum. Etty was a Jewish person living in Holland during World War II. She would eventually die in Auschwitz on November 30, 1943. The book contains her diaries and letters that she wrote in the years and months just prior to her death. If you are thinking of reading this book, be aware that Etty describes her love life in quite a bit of detail. She even has an abortion at one point. Nevertheless, she had a beautiful relationship with God and depth of inner piece that few of us ever experience.

One quote that I like in particular is the following one, written a year or so before she received her orders to go to a concentration camp. Some of her friends have left already for camps, and food and travel are heavily restricted at this point:

But sometimes I feel as though a layer of ashes was being sprinkled over my heart, as if my face were withering and decaying before my eyes, and as if everything were falling apart in front of me and my heart were letting everything go. But these are brief moments; then everything falls back into place, my head clears again, and I can once more bear and stand up to this piece of history that is ours. For once you begin to walk with God, you need only keep on walking with Him and all of life becomes one long stroll – such a marvelous feeling.

learning to pray: No matter what your circumstances, no matter what you have done, the peace of God is available to you right now. Simply "begin to walk with God" and "keep on walking with Him."

"Etty Hellisum: An Interrupted Life and Letters From Westerbrook"

An Act of Kindess

Several years ago my brother in law (that's him in the picture - isn't he cute?) wrote his doctoral thesis on treating kids as if the were at promise instead of at risk. The core of his thesis is that if we want to raise healthy and whole kids we need to mentor them and call out the treasure in them instead of all of the potential bad stuff by labeling them at risk. It’s a great theory, one that Tim lives out in his job as a High School Principal and Dad (see www.atpromise.com) and one that I thoroughly believe in.

Around the time that Tim, or Dr. Tim as we like to call him, wrote his thesis, I was a volunteer basketball coach at an elementary school at one of the poorer areas in our Province. I came to the conviction that unless we help these kids from these rough and difficult backgrounds many of them were in big trouble.

Since that time I repeatedly see, and hear, great stories about people who received an encouraging word, or an act of kindness just at the right time and it helped to change their lives for the better. My daughter’s friend, for example, has a love of photography (see http://jamiedelaine.wordpress.com), so she wrote to some of the best photographers she could find and one of them responded and has asked her to work with them on a few photo shoots this summer. Isn’t that great? Isn’t that kind of this busy, successful photographer? My daughter’s friend is so excited.

I think the thing about kindness is that we just never know. We never know when an encouraging word, or a kind act is going to make all the difference in the world to someone, and because we just never know, we need to be kind as we go out into the world.

Kindness begins with our view of God. You can’t go to a Graham Cooke conference without hearing him say, “God is the kindness person I know.” As we begin to grow in our relationship with God by learning to pray and serve others, I think we become more and more aware of the kindness of God, and this naturally spills over into our interactions with other people. I don’t know Graham all that well, but what I do know of him is that he is a man that prays, and he is one of the most generous people around. Could this be because at his core he believes in, and has experienced the kindness of God?

learning to pray: Just pray and be open to the love and grace of God. Let his kindness find you!

Nothing

Can you imagine a street hustler on a street corner saying, “Hey pal come here – do I have a deal for you!
“What is it?” you ask.
He says, “Make yourself nothing.”
You ask, “What does it cost?”
He says, “Well I’m not sure, but it cost Jesus everything.”
Our friendly street hustler probably wouldn’t have a lot of takers, would he?

The words in reference to Jesus emptying himself and or “made himself nothing” (Phil 2) have been ringing through my head this morning. As far as Jesus was concerned it had to do with being humble, and becoming a servant, even to the point of death. I think emptying ourselves and becoming nothing relate to prayer too.

In prayer we get the opportunity to empty ourselves and become nothing, to lay down our agendas and pray for, and hopefully do the will of God. In the process, if we stay at it long enough, God becomes everything. It’s not easy, it’s far from automatic, it’s contrary to what society says we should do, and it’s even the opposite of our very nature. It’s one of those things that only comes through prayer and suffering. Frankly, it’s why not a lot of books on contemplation become No. 1 bestsellers, and why contemplation is resisted, even in Christian circles.

On top of that, emptying ourselves and becoming nothing is one of those things we only come to through grace. There is no formula. It’s a gift of God and we have very little control over it. We can forgive ourselves, and let go of the things that imprison us. Then we can walk out of our cells – whatever they may be, including judgmental forms of religion, and be able to stand in the dark, and be able to just be with God. I honestly don’t entirely know what happens next, accept that I need to do what I can to keep leaving the my cell, go stand on a ledge, and stare out at the darkness, of Nothing, and simply rest in the presence of God. I think our faith, love and confidence in God grows to an incredible depth as we empty ourselves and become nothing.

Here I stand in the dark, at the edge of Nothing, with a bit of a sense of the presence and love of God. And that’s it.

learning to pray: What does becoming nothing mean to you when it comes to prayer?

What Time Is it?

A friend of mine asked me last night what I’ve been learning about time. He asked because he said he has had a less stressed out week this last week because he made a decision to be less concerned with time, and more focused on the task at hand, and the people he was with. Basically, he has been practicing presence, and looking at his watch less often!

Many of us tend to get caught up in, or weighed down by time. We have incredible anxiety about the future that keeps us from giving our full attention to what we are DOING RIGHT NOW. This is a stressful, even unhealthy, way to live, but most of us live this way anyway.

My wife and my two teenage daughters take a lot longer to get ready to go out than I do. Somewhere along the way I had to decide that I wasn’t going to let the time that I spent waiting for them stress me out. I can’t even tell you how I did it. Maybe it was simply a gift of patience from God, but whatever it was, it was a great stress reliever for everyone concerned.

Jesus encouraged us not to worry. He said look at the birds, and look at the lilies of the field; they don’t strive, or get stressed out, and yet God takes care of them. He goes on to say that if we seek him first all then other stuff will be taken care of. For Jesus, faith and anxiety don’t mix.* I encourage you to go outside and actually watch the birds, or stare at a flower or a tree for a while. See what insights you come up with.

Around 300 years ago, Francis Fenelon said,

“Make a habit of bringing your attention back to God on a regular basis…and you will undoubtedly find him with peace and joy.”**

For me, this is the key to overcoming my anxiety about time. When I find myself getting stressed out, it’s a sign, or an invitation even, to bring my attention back to God. If I do this often enough, the peace of Christ will rule my heart (Col. 3).

None of this means that we don’t put in a good hard day’s work. It speaks to the “how” of everyday life. My friend that I mentioned above had a very productive week, he just did it differently. By being less concerned with time he did what he had to do with a lot more inner peace.

Learning to pray: TRUSTING GOD is a huge issue for many of us, and can go very deep, even to the core of who we are, and what we believe about God. What is keeping you from trusting God with your time and your future?

*”Everything Belongs” by Richard Rohr
** “100 Days in the Secret Place,” compiled by Gene Edwards

From 24-7 Prayer: Incarnation vs. Attraction

"The guys who attacked Timothy smashed a beer bottle in his face, beat him with their fists and kicked him until he was able to break through the circle they made around him and get away." Read More...

Rest In God

"I believe that we have no real access to who we really are except in God. Only when we rest in God can we find the safety, the spaciousness, and the scary freedom to be who we are, all that we are, more than we are, and less than we are."

Richard Rohr - Everything Belongs: The Gift of Contemplative Prayer