sacred~encounters

guidance

2012-02-03T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Whoever is his own spiritual director has a fool for a director.”

Early Church Father

Spiritual direction is a spiritual practice that helps you pay close attention to the movement of God in your life. You normally meet once a month with someone trained in the art of direction and through careful listening and gentle questions they help you discern what God may be doing. Many times, we can miss the subtle signs of the Spirit’s prompting. We can miss the ways the dots connect. We can forget how much God loves us. We can breeze past the corrections God is inviting us to make, justifying our behavior. We can come to the place where we think we have it all together.

We love to talk of the importance of Christian community but by that we usually mean a social community. Often that doesn’t translate to inviting people to peer into our dark places and ask questions that reveal truth and breathe life.

Who does that for you? Who forgoes advice-giving, counseling and opinion sharing with you for attentive listening, giving you the space to discern God’s still small voice?

Grace and peace,
Deb

P

life

2012-02-02T00:01:00.000-05:00

God of making
and unmaking,
of tearing down
and re-creating,
You are my home
and habitation,
my refuge
and place of dwelling.

In your hollows
I am re-formed,
given welcome
and benediction,
beckoned to rest
and rise again,
made ready
and sent forth.

Jan Richardson

My life in Jesus has been full of ups and downs. I have never had such incredible highs! Wonderful memories of life-changing mission trips, worshipping with new friends, in their own language while tears streamed down my face. Seeing my children baptized. Seeing them marry spouses who love them. Seeing my grandchildren grow. Having had a new, beautiful relationship with my mom. Experiencing changes in my own spiritual walk which have resulted in deeper intimacy. These are the mountains.

Then there are the valleys. A challenging childhood. The death of my sister-in-law. Losing one of my children to miscarriage. Going through a deeply hurtful church experience. Struggling in my marriage. Going through the divorce of my parents. Experiencing illness; mine, my husband’s, my children’s. Seeing my children go through painful things. Walking with friends through tough times. The death of my mom.

I trust God. I trust that He knows what is best for me and I know that he has been with me through all the mountains and valleys. He has a plan for me and it includes all of the above. My painful experiences have played a big part in making me who I am. He is present in all of it.

May you spend some time today reflecting on your experiences, both good and difficult, and notice where God was at work.

Grace and peace,
Deb

prayer

2012-02-01T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Usually prayer is a question of groaning rather than speaking, tears rather than words. For he sets our tears in his sight, and our groaning is not hidden from Him who made all things by His Word and does not ask for words of man.”
Augustine

Prayer should not be a list of “I want”s. Although there may be rare times that I tell God what is on my heart and mind, I feel more and more that I am being called into a time of intimacy with Jesus…not a time of talking but a time of being. A time where I surrender my agenda and my wants to Him. A time where I even surrender my need to be in control of my words. I rest in His presence and allow the Spirit to form prayer within me.

The question is not what it is that I want to pray about but what it is that God wants me to lift up to Him. I can only do that if I get myself out of the way. And be willing to not know what it is.

Sometimes that shows itself as silence. And sometimes, without knowing why, tears flow. I don’t question that any longer, trying to figure what it is about. I trust that it is my response to God and that if He wants to understand what it is, He will give that to me.

Consider spending some time today just being with God. Offer up your desire to let Him form the prayer within you. Even if you have no idea what you are praying, know that the Spirit does. Trust the prayer that has no words, that may even bring tears. Trust.

Grace and peace,
Deb

spa for the soul - meditating

2012-01-31T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Through meditating we explore in order to know more and more of Abba. Before we find this reality, we only BELIEVE; through experiencing a relationship, we come to KNOW.”

Morton Kelsey

To know someone, I need to spend time with them. I need to talk to them and I need to listen. The more I know them, the less I need to depend on words. I have a couple of people in my life who can just look at me and know what I am feeling. There is no need to explain myself in great detail. I am known by them.

It is that way with God. In the beginning of my relationship with him I talked…a lot. Now I talk less and listen more. There is more of a comfort level there…more of a ‘knowing’. I am learning to rest in the fact that He loves me.

Considering meditating, reflecting, pondering on who He is. Meditate on His love and His presence. Ask for nothing more than to know Him and be known by Him.

Grace and peace,
Deb
photo by Adam Ashton http://www.flickr.com/photos/adamashton/2943799875/

a 'no' is as good as a 'yes'

2012-01-30T00:01:00.001-05:00

"When one door closes, another opens; but we often look so long and so regretfully upon the closed door that we do not see the one which has opened for us."

Alexander Graham Bell

I have been on a journey of discernment for the past several years. I knew that something was coming but I didn’t have lots of clarity. I was excited when I began to see some signs that pointed me in the direction I was to go. But then, something painful happened that I could not make sense of. What seemed to me to be a part of the journey suddenly was no longer available. Not only was it removed, it seemed it was working against me. It took me a long time to figure out that this ‘obstacle’ was indeed a gift.

Recently, one of my friends went through a similar experience. He has been part of something meaningful to him for a long time and discovered that he was no longer a part of it. At first, the sting was hurtful. But on reflection he realized that perhaps this dismissal was also a gift.

We can become so focused on how we think God will work, only opening the doors we are to walk through, that we forget how He can also close doors to change our course. Sometimes that happens to make room for the new, sometimes to protect us and sometimes to remind us He works in ways we don’t expect nor always understand. Many times I think He does it because He knows we are creatures of habit and we would settle. We cannot even begin to fathom all He might have for us so status quo is just fine.

When life seems to hand you what on the surface appears to be a closed door, relax into God and trust that He holds it all. The loss of a job, loss of a opportunity, loss of a ministry, loss of a dream, loss of a relationship, even the loss of a community….is not only the end of something but it is possibly the beginning of something new – a change in direction – that will have so much more for you than you could have ever hoped or imagined. When we can view ‘the obstacles’ or the losses in this light, we can leave behind the frustration and the ‘what ifs’ and begin to look for the ‘what’s next’. God loves us and when we are fully trusting Him we will see the love, care and even direction He has offered to us in the pain and disappointment experienced when we encounter closed doors.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Xploiter http://www.flickr.com/photos/xploiter/3161899795/

transformation

2012-01-28T00:01:00.000-05:00

"Most transformation takes place in hidden ways, in slow, incremental ways, nurtured by a cultivated reverence."

Eugene Peterson

Do you get discouraged with the lack of transformation in your life? Do you find yourself trying to memorize more scripture, pray harder and serve more?

What if transformation is really more God's work than yours? What if your part of the work is to be present, to pay attention, to notice what God may be doing? What if transformation is already taking place under the surface and what if what you need to do is prepare a space within yourself for God to work?

Remember...it takes place in hidden ways, in slow, incremental ways....nurture it.

grace and peace,
Deb

prayer

2012-01-27T00:01:00.000-05:00

As this night closes in
help me to realize that
you are as close as the silence and the dark
that surround me.

Let me wake
with Jacob
to a realization
that my world
is truly a holy place.

Venite Adoremus.
Come let us adore.
You are here.

John Kirvan

known

2012-01-26T00:01:00.000-05:00

"Friendship is born at that moment when one person says to another: "What! You too? I thought I was the only one."
C.S. Lewis

I am involved in a small group where we intentionally share what is happening in our lives. We share deeply with each other...our fears, our sins, our joys.

What we discover is that we are much more alike than we are different. We are not alone in our 'stuff'. Everyone has stuff - we just usually don't talk about it with each other.

But, once you do, you will notice how much less powerful that stuff seems to be. Take the risk....talk about what is going on. Be honest and notice how freeing it can be.

Grace and peace,
Deb

God's Aid

2012-01-25T00:01:00.000-05:00

God's Aid

God to enfold me,
God to surround me,
God in my speaking,
God in my thinking.

God in my sleeping,
God in my waking,
God in my watching,
God in my hoping.

God in my life,
God in my lips,
God in my hands,
God in my heart.

God in my sufficing,
God in my slumber
God in mine ever living soul,
God in mine eternity.

Celtic Prayer

room

2012-01-24T00:01:00.000-05:00

Room

“When we make a place for silence, we make room for ourselves. This is simple. This is radical. A room set apart for silence becomes a sanctuary – a place for breath, for refreshment, for challenge, and for healing. It is helpful to keep the space plain and simple; a few cushions, a rug….simplicity allows the sense to rest from stimulation.

Silent spaces invite us to go to the inner room – the room inside ourselves. By making room for silence, we resist the forces of the world which tell us to live an advertised life of surface appearances, instead of a discovered life – a life lived in contact with our senses, our feelings, our deepest thoughts and values.

When a space is reserved solely for mindful practice, the silence seems to deepen. A room devoted to silence honors and invites the unknown, the untamed, the wild, the shy, the unfathomable – that which rarely has a chance to surface within us. It is a visible, external symbol of an internal reality: an actual room signifying space within ourselves set aside for silence.

Gunilla Norris, Inviting Silence

Photo by a hundred visions and revisions
http://www.flickr.com/photos/phase3/2995950426/

waiting

2012-01-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

I am in a season of waiting. Some of that waiting requires me to let go, perhaps even be stripped bare of things that form my identity. Whatever God wants to strip away, whatever will move me closer to Him and closer to what He has for me, I am willing to surrender to that process.

Slowly,
she celebrated the sacrament of letting go
first she surrendered her green
then the orange, yellow and red
finally she let of her brown
shedding her last leaf
she stood empty and silent, stripped bare.
leaning against the winter sky
she began her vigil of trust.

Shedding her last leaf
she watched its journey to the ground.
she stood in silence
wearing the color of the emptiness,
her branches wondering:
how do you give shade with so much gone?
And then,
the sacrament of waiting began.
The sunrise and sunset watched with tenderness.
clothing her with silhouettes
they kept her hope alive.

They helped her understand that
her vulnerability
her dependence and need
her emptiness
her readiness to receive
were giving her a new kind of beauty.
Every morning and every evening
they stood in silence
and celebrated together
the sacrament of waiting!

Macrina Wiederkehr

Grace and peace,
Deb

prayer

2012-01-21T00:01:00.000-05:00

"Prayer is the inner bath of love into which the soul plunges itself."
Saint John Vianney

Do you see prayer like this? Or do you see it as a list of things and concerns you need to talk to God about? Intercession is a form of prayer, but there is so much more to this intimate act. Prayer is our love language with our God.

Allow yourself to soak in God’s love today during a time of prayer.

Grace and peace,
Deb

unlearning curve

2012-01-20T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Until we come face to face with the deepest, darkest fact of life without damaging our view of God’s character, we do not yet know Him”

Oswald Chambers

Commenting on the above quote –

“The point of this quote is that God does not allow trials to teach us something but to unlearn something. The next time I am faced with a trial, I want to ask – “What do you want me to unlearn?”

Peter Scazarro

I love this quote and Scazarro’s take on it. Isn’t it just like God to do the opposite of what we would think He would do? I know, during tough times, I have often asked myself, “What is God trying to teach me?” In reality, most of the time, I think God is revealing something deeper to me about who He is. He does not bend to my expectations. He does not answer my every prayer. He does not always clearly reveal the path I am to take. He does not do things the way I think they should be done.

God does not bend to my whims….He is God. I have so much to unlearn.

Grace and peace-
Deb

desire

2012-01-19T00:01:00.000-05:00

One Beautiful One
who calls to me
from deep within,
quiet the surface
of my soul
so that your
still, small voice
can be discerned.

May Your desires
rise within.
may they come
to the forefront
while all that
is not of You
scatter with the wind.

So that what is left
is as pure and deep and true
as this imperfect
heart can hold.

And may I live from
that place,
carrying your desires,
carefully,
into this needy and
hurting world.

identity

2012-01-18T00:01:00.001-05:00

“Ponder for the moment the numerous ways we spend time and energy in either trying to win the approval of others or protect ourselves from criticism. How often do we try to justify ourselves in the minds of others? How often do we rationalize our behavior, distort the truth, or embellish the facts in order to be seen in a positive light? How much of our behavior is posturing or putting on airs in order to impress? How often do we do things merely to enhance our image? How often do we lie or shade the truth to avoid rebuke or curry favor? How often do we vie to be the center of attention? The list goes on and on.”

Marc Foley, O.C.D., The Love that Keeps Us Sane

When we are not able to see ourselves through God’s eyes, when we do not know that our worth and value come from him….when we have our identity in anything or anyone but him we will fall into these patterns.

I really saw myself in this quote. I know I have spent much of my life trying to justify myself in the minds of others. I know I have rationalized my behavior, I have distorted the truth, I have embellished facts – all to help others see me in a more positive light. I have postured and put on airs to impress. I have done thing to enhance my image. I have lied or shaded the truth to avoid rebuke or to curry favor. I have vied to be the center of attention. And my list goes on and on…..

How about yours?

Grace and peace –
Deb

music

2012-01-17T00:01:00.000-05:00

"Bach gave us God’s word, Mozart God's laughter and Beethoven gave us God's fire, and God gave us music so that we can pray without words." —

written in front of an old German opera house

Why is it that music can speak directly to our hearts? A song can easily take us back to a time in high school (good or bad!). It can evoke memories of a loved one who has passed away. It can bring up painful feelings of a broken relationship. It can remind us of childhood.

As a child, my mom loved country music. I can hear Loretta Lynn or Hank Williams Jr. sing, and once again, I am a 5 year old who is supposed to be taking an afternoon nap. I can picture my bed, the color of my bedroom walls and the sounds outside my window.

Somewhere Over the Rainbow reminds me of that one exciting night a year, as a child, when I would settle in for the annual viewing of The Wizard of Oz. The music that plays during the flying monkey scene still gives me chills!

The theme song, Tomorrow, from the Broadway play, Annie, was sung by my 16 year old sister-in-law a month before she was killed in a car accident. I cannot hear that song without feeling the loss of Lisa in my life.

Music can move me in ways that mere words cannot. I am thankful that God wired me in such a way that music is connected to my memory and my emotions. It can help me remember pivotal times in my life.

Give thought today to some of the songs that hold memories and emotion for you, whether those are feelings of pain or joy. Consider thanking God for the role music may play in your life….and go listen to a song that makes your heart sing.

Grace and peace,
Deb

soul work

2012-01-16T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Soul knowledge sends you in the opposite direction from consumerism. It’s not addition that makes one holy but subtraction: stripping the illusions, letting go of the pretense, exposing the false self, breaking open the heart and the understanding, not taking my private self too seriously.

In a certain sense we are on the utterly wrong track. We are climbing while Jesus is descending, and I think in that we reflect the pride and the arrogance of Western civilization, always trying to accomplish, perform and achieve. We transferred all that to Christianity and became spiritual consumers. The ego is still in charge. When the self takes itself that seriously, there’s no room left for God.

All we can really do is get ourselves out of the way, and we can’t even do that.”

Richard Rohr

What do you think about this quote? Does it resonate with you? Can you see, either in yourself or in others the need to accomplish and perform in the journey with Jesus?

I like Rohr’s assertion that it is not addition that makes one holy – but subtraction. Letting go of more and more; your masks, your title, your entitlement, your ego. Moving into deeper and deeper relationship with Jesus means surrendering more and more of yourself to Him and to His ways.

“When the self takes itself too seriously, there’s no room left for God. All we can really do is get ourselves out of the way, and we can’t even do that.”

In what ways might you try to get yourself out of the way even today?

Grace and peace,
Deb

presence

2012-01-14T00:01:00.000-05:00

I do not need
to seek God.
God is already here,
waiting to be found,
soaked in my reality.
My journey is to be one
of recognizing God,
always,
already present,
and surfacing
that presence in
my daily life.

Edwina Gately

fresh start

2012-01-13T00:01:00.000-05:00

"You may have a fresh start any moment you choose for this thing we call failure is not the falling down, but the staying down."
Mary Pickford

Do you ever feel like not trying anymore? You try and try and try and feel as if it will never work. Just put your 'issue' in the blank. "I am so sick of always _______________ and having it always______________________." Or - "I've done _______________so many times and nothing changes."

The easier thing would be to stop trying. But, that is 'staying down'and that is not what God has for us.

I love the reminder that we can have a fresh start at any moment....if we choose it.

Grace and peace,
Deb

glory

2012-01-12T00:01:00.000-05:00

"A man can no more diminish God's glory by refusing to worship Him than a lunatic can put out the sun by scribbling the word, 'darkness' on the walls of his cell."
C.S. Lewis

Why do you think we get so bent if someone we know refuses to acknowledge the reality of God? Or if they refuse to live the way we think they should? Does it change God? No.

Nothing diminishes God.

Grace and peace,
Deb

attention deficit

2012-01-11T00:01:00.000-05:00

“I begin to observe myself in the company of others, friends and strangers alike, and I’m surprised by the level of my availability. I watch my restless heart, the mercurial way my mind sweeps from one thing to another, the way my ego holds forth, keeping me abreast of my own expectations, wants, and preoccupations, criticizing, comparing, competing, imposing views. I realize that I can be with someone but on a deeper level I’m not available to them at all. I have attention deficit disorder of the soul.”

Sue Monk Kidd, Firstlight

Once I took the time to pay attention, I noticed that this was me. It was (and still can be) hard to be with others without not thinking about my own agenda…my restless heart, my swirling mind, my ego - wanting its own way – needing constant attention and feeding, whispering in my ear what I want, what I need, what I deserve. Indeed – I too have attention deficit of the soul.

But, I am grateful for the knowledge. I think it most dangerous when you don’t know you have this disorder. If you are unaware of it, you can’t change it. I have been aware of it for some years now. It’s weird because becoming aware is the only way to change it but it also can be overwhelming when you realize how much of your identify is built around it.

I encourage you to think about this. Do you have a need to make sure everyone knows about what you are doing? Or do you feel the need to convince people of your worthiness? Of your gifts and abilities? Do you find yourself always wanting…more? Is your ego driving your way of being in the world? Tough questions, but questions worth reflecting on. May today be the beginning of identifying and treating your attention deficit of the soul.

Grace and peace,
Deb

intimacy

2012-01-10T00:01:00.000-05:00

"The biggest challenge I face in my longing to become who I am is to know and enjoy each member of the Trinity to such an extent that I can remain centered in them when I'm with others. When I'm centered in God, alive to the spirit's rhythm, aware of the Son's grace, and basking in the Father's love, I no longer fear another’s judgment. It can hurt, but it cannot destroy. It is then that I more fully discover my true self, and I'm empowered to enter relationships with true love."
Larry Crabb

This quote speaks to the truth that we need to be completely surrendered to God and His desire for our lives to be fully who we are and to be in true relationship with others. When grounded in God’s love we are able to enter into relationships with more honesty, vulnerability and integrity.

Is God speaking to you about being centered in Him…in sensing the movement of the Spirit, in experiencing the grace Jesus offers, and feeling, on a personal and intimate level God’s love for you? Perhaps you could spend some time today pondering these three aspects of God’s work in your life. If God leads, consider writing down what He shows you. Where do you sense the Spirit’s movement? How are you experiencing the grace of Jesus? How do you feel God loving you today? These questions may help you move into a deeper intimacy with the Trinity. Enjoy that closeness.

Grace,
Deb

soul keeping

2012-01-09T00:01:00.000-05:00

“The whole area of spiritual formation essentially focuses on soul work as a spiritual endeavor. Fundamentally, it pertains to the mysterious inner formation of our spiritual soul. The lifelong process incorporates the elaborate notions of soul renovation soul shaping, soul becoming, and soul keeping. Concisely put, it is about the care and cure of souls, or soul care in short.”

Wil Hernandez, Henri Nouwen and Soul Care

What a beautiful description of spiritual formation. It is the care of our soul – or, my personal favorite of the descriptors, – soul keeping. Whether it my own soul I am attending to or the privilege of sitting with someone else and witnessing their ‘soul becoming’, ‘soul renovation’, or ‘soul shaping’, it is indeed a mysterious process that we can participate in but cannot make happen.

It is like planting a garden. We can prepare the soil, provide water and a sunny area and we can even plant the seed. But after that, what happens under the soil and what we see when that tender shoot breaks through the surface of the ground is not because of us. That is the miracle of life, of regeneration and transformation.
The same is true with our soul keeping. We can sit in silence and solitude. We can abandon ourselves to the Spirit and ask for transformation. We can read books, study the Word, and practice spiritual disciplines…but, the bottom line is that the transformation is not of us, it is of God.

What is it that you are currently doing to ‘keep your soul’? What are you involved in that helps make the conditions right for the shaping of your soul? Do what it is that you can and then rest in the knowledge that the Spirit is doing a beautiful and meaningful work in your spirit.

Grace and peace-
Deb

rhythm

2012-01-07T00:01:00.001-05:00

“There are greater rhythms that govern how life grows: circadian rhythms, seasons and hormonal cycles and sunsets and moonrises and great movements of seas and stars. We are part of the creation story, subject to all its laws and rhythms.

When we rest, we can relish the seasons of a moment, a day, a conversation. In relationships we sense the rhythms of contact and withdrawal, of giving and receiving, of coming close, pulling away, and returning. To surrender to the seasons and flowerings and dormancies is to savor the secret of life itself.”

Wayne Muller, Sabbath

(Post written last year - with moving in December this year I couldn't even FIND my Advent wreath!)

Christmas is past as are all the preparations that go along with it. Were there things you had planned on doing leading up to Christmas that you just didn’t get to? Like baking cookies, having intimate evenings with family and friends, contemplating the birth of Jesus? I always have the best of intentions but before I know it the season has blown by me and I’ve not gotten to some of things I had planned to do. For example, I bought an Advent wreath last year. I downloaded what it is that one does with an Advent wreath. I could envision myself lighting each candle, saying whatever I was supposed say and being very mindful about this sacred ‘waiting’ period before celebrating Christ’s birth.

So much for good intentions. First of all, I got the Christmas decorations out after the first weekend of Advent. So, I put the wreath in the middle of the table and very unceremoniously put the first candle in. The second week, I didn’t think about it until Sunday night and I again, without any thought, put the second candle in. This pattern continued until I had an Advent wreath complete with all four candles. None of them had been lit, no words spoken over them, no thought given to their meaning.

It is so easy to slip out of rhythm. So easy to not be mindful or attentive to what is happening around me. So easy to set a pace that doesn’t allow me to rest until my head hits the pillow at night. How much do I miss because of ignoring the natural rhythms of the seasons… or day and night – or the intentional rhythms I try to put into place to continue to keep myself aware of God’s presence? A lot.

How are your rhythms? How are you doing at slowing down long enough to pay attention to what is right in front of you? I invite you to consider how you are doing today moving in rhythms with the Spirit. Join me as I look ahead to a new year and a new opportunity to live into healthy rhythms.

Grace and peace,
Deb

grief

2012-01-06T00:01:00.000-05:00

“It's so curious: one can resist tears and 'behave' very well in the hardest hours of grief. But then someone makes you a friendly sign behind a window, or one notices that a flower that was in bud only yesterday has suddenly blossomed, or a letter slips from a drawer... and everything collapses. “

~Colette

Now I have no idea who Colette is…but I do understand what she is talking about. The other day I was unpacking boxes in my bedroom (we recently moved) and I came across a pillowcase. I felt as if someone had slipped their icy hand into my chest and grabbed my heart. It was the pillowcase that was on my mom’s pillow the night she passed. I remember stroking her hair while her head lay on that pillow. I remember resting my head on the edge of that pillow when the nurse helped me get into bed with my mom so I could hold her for awhile. I remember not wanting to wash that pillowcase….but I did and I put it in that darn box. It was in there waiting for me to unpack it. I held that stupid piece of fabric and cried like a baby.

Today, I sat with a dear friend who just lost her dad…last weekend. I listened while she shared her fresh pain and it opened mine. We cried in Panera Bread. We talked about watching our parents decline and what small things we had done to try and protect their dignity. We wondered what it would be like when our children would have to care for us when we were unable to care for ourselves. We both wanted to make sure we told our kids how much we loved them so they would never be left wondering.

I came home tonight to a message from my dad. The daughter of a sweet friend of the family died last night. She fought a hard fight with ovarian cancer and several months ago the doctors said there was no more they could do – it was time for Hospice. Procuring Hospice care for an elderly parent is one thing but having it put into place for your child? That is the kind of grief that will steal your breath, drive you to your knees and make you wish you had never been born. Just being honest here, folks.

I feel surrounded by grief and grieving tonight. I feel weary and tired. I am sad. I am crying. Why? Because I miss my mom. And my friend misses her dad…and a wonderful mom misses her beautiful in-the-prime-of-life daughter.

On days like these I clutch onto Jesus and I wonder how those who are grieving and don’t know Him are even able to get out bed in the morning. ‘Cause this grieving stuff is real and could easily take you down.

I sense that tomorrow will be a better day for me. I am four months in and although it still sneaks up on me, it lasts a shorter time and there is more space in-between. Not so for my other friends. Their journey is just beginning.

Jesus – please hold onto them.

fill your space

2012-01-04T00:01:00.000-05:00

“The one worrying thing was that I might not be given time to carry out the whole scheme. I felt as though I was about to fill a space in the world that was meant for me and had long awaited me, a mold, as it were, made for me alone, but discerned by me only in this very moment. I was a molten substance, impatient, unendurably impatient, to pour into my mold, to fill it full, without any air bubbles or cracks, before I cooled and stiffened.

Later the true significance of what happened would inevitably become clear to me, and I would be numb with surprise.”

Alexander Solzhenitsyn

I am living this. The last four years have been amazing. I have felt invited to ‘fill a space’. At first, it took me time to really believe that the invitation was for me. You know – someone says “You – I pick you”, and you are looking behind you because you are sure they must be talking to someone else. But, there is no one behind you. So, you look at them and say “Are you talking to me?” minus the Robert De Niro accent. You stand back and wait for them to say “Oh yeah, sorry – I had you confused with someone else”, but they don’t. It is you.

When you realize the invitation is for you, you either say ‘Great!’ or you say, “I am not sure I can do it”. I think it is called the Moses Syndrome. I had Moses Syndrome. It seemed clear God was inviting me to fill a particular space but I wasn’t sure I was up to the task….like he didn’t already know whether or not I could do it.
Slowly, I came to trust God’s judgment over my own and walk into His invitation. Once I accepted it, I continued to listen and discern the next right step.

The line I most resonate with in this quote is, “…I would be numb with surprise.” It has been an incredible journey and I feel as if it is only beginning. He continues to invite through a variety of avenues and I continue to accept. Each time, I am numb with surprise.

What might God be inviting you today? What space in the world might He be asking you to fill? Will you say yes? He knows you and knows what you were made for. Trust Him and go fill your space in the world.

Grace and peace,
Deb

darkness

2012-01-03T00:01:00.000-05:00

d by darkness. It seems silent and dormant. But in that dark, solitary place, it germinates. Above the surface, you cannot tell that anything is happening. But below, new life begins.

It is the same with you and I. There are times when I feel as if I am separated from God’s presence. If I rely only on my feelings or my senses, I might believe that God is not there, not working. I must come to a place of trust. In that place I would know that He is there whether I can feel him or not. God may seem to be hidden but He is present and working.

Do you feel like He isn’t there? Do you feel separated from Him? Do you feel like you are in the dark? Know that He is there. Know that He is working even though you cannot sense it. All you need to do is surrender to the work He wishes to do. Consider what that might look like today.

Grace and peace,
Deb

rhythm

2012-01-02T00:01:00.000-05:00

“To surrender to the rhythms of the seasons and flowerings and dormancies is to savor the secret of life itself.
Many scientists believe we are “hard-wired” like this, to live in rhythmic awareness, to be in and then step out, to be engrossed and then detached, to work and then to rest.”
Wayne Muller

Recently we moved. We were hoping to move in October but ended up moving in on December 12th. I would not recommend moving that close to Christmas. Add to that finishing up a graduate degree and it is easy to see why I might be a bit tired.

Since we moved, I noticed something different. I am ready for bed by 9 pm. Now I am not a night owl by any stretch of the imagination but going to bed at 9 makes me feels like I am becoming my grandmother! (So far, I have not noticed a need to eat dinner at 4 pm or constantly look out the windows to see what my neighbors are doing so I think I am safe).

What I have been doing is paying attention to the new rhythm that is trying to take hold of me…and going with it. Occasionally I will fight it and try to stay up, especially to see a football game or unpack another box. But I am more and more yielding to it. I am giving in and not pushing myself to do ‘just one more thing’.
I wonder if this is a new thing God is doing in me or if my body is just seeking the rest I have denied it over the past several years….or perhaps both. Whatever it is, I am going with it, trusting it and enjoying it.

May you listen today to the rhythm God may be calling you to – is He asking you to rest? Listen. Try it and see what happens.
Grace and peace,
Deb

listening

2011-12-30T00:01:00.000-05:00

“……there are four kinds of listening:

Listening but not hearing.

Listening and connecting with one’s own agenda.

Listening and hearing without a personal agenda.

Intuitive listening, meaning not only hearing what was being spoken but what is not being said. Deep listening.”

Anne LeClaire
Listening Below the Noise

Who knew listening could be so complicated? Isn’t it just a matter of hearing what the other person says? Apparently not. Let’s see if I can connect this with my own personal examples.

Listening but not hearing. I think this is the kind of listening I do on a Sunday when I am watching football. Yes, ladies (and guys, if there are any of you reading) – in my house, my husband is the football widower. I have the remote and the big screen. Meals are planned around game time – bathroom breaks and drink breaks around halftime. I am serious. If I am not home for a game I want to see I record it. No joke. So, if Jeff asks me a question during a game, I listen but I don’t hear him. You know – polite enough not be rude (unless the Steelers are playing)but yet not tuned in enough to give a real answer. And ‘uh huh’ or a ‘nah’ – you know – monosyllabic. Keep it quick and simple.

Listening and connecting with one’s own agenda. This might be the listening I am capable of 10 minutes before the game starts. The thought is that if I seem attentive now and we get this conversation out of the way, I will be able to watch the game without interruption. Or – if it can wait until halftime, I can actually face him and use my big people words rather than grunts. But make sure the conversation can be concluded in 10 minutes.

Listening and hearing without a personal agenda. This one is the hard one. It is so hard to get my agenda out of the way! I think this is easier with acquaintances in a passing conversation. Believe it or not, I am capable of doing it at home (when it is not football season) and usually find it very satisfying.

Intuitive listening, meaning not only hearing what was being spoken but what is not being said. Deep listening. This requires something else altogether. For me, it requires the help of the Holy Spirit. It is a time when I am very intentional about getting myself and my agenda out of the way and giving my full attention to the person who is speaking and to the leading of the Spirit. It’s a time when I tend to be silent more than speak. It is a time when I ask questions rather than give advice. It is a time when I am dependent on God and am trusting Him to provide the insight – both to me and to the person I am listening to.

I want to cultivate more intuitive listening in my life, not only when I am with directees but when I am with friends, family, co-workers, etc. I want to provide a space where people feel heard and seen. When I am able to do that it is even better than football. :)

Grace and peace –
Deb

Photo by Little Miss Soda Can http://www.flickr.com/photos/12gagirl/5344317623/

authenticity

2011-12-29T00:01:00.000-05:00

“When I could finally get past what everyone might be thinking about me, I realized that ultimately I could only live my own life, and I just wanted to live in humility, in honestly and be true to myself.”

Helen

I’m not sure if this is true for you but it is easy for me to get caught up in the expectations of others. I am, by nature, a people-pleaser and being first-born, I have a tendency towards perfectionism. Although both of these traits can make you look good – either with family and friends, in the workplace or in school – it is an illusion.

The ‘people-pleasing’ only works as long as you please ‘the people’ - whoever that may be. Once you fall short of that mark, no matter what the reason, you’ve failed. It doesn’t matter if you have really failed, or if they perceived that you have failed, because in your eyes, you’re a failure.

And perfectionism? What the heck is that? It is such a set-up because it is unattainable. There was only One who was perfect and that is certainly not me.
For me, both of these are substitutes for believing in and living out of God’s love for me – just as I am. Both put me in a position of ‘doing enough’ to prove I am worthy. But my worthiness should not be found in what I do or who I please. It should be found in God. If I never accomplish another thing in my life, if I never please another person, God’s love for me remains constant.
God is gently teaching me these lessons. He is lessening my grip on the need to even try to be perfect and He is giving me glimpses of how people-pleasing is an idol that needs to released to Him.

Am I living my own life? Yes. With humility? I try. Am I being true to myself? Not when I am people-pleasing and chasing after perfection, but I am moving closer every day, with Gods’ help.

How about you? Are you a people-pleaser? Do you feel the need to be perfect? If so, what do you think God wants to say to you about that? Spend some time today listening.

Grace and peace –
Deb

being present

2011-12-28T00:01:00.000-05:00

"This is the first, wildest and wisest thing I know, that the soul exists and that is is built entirely out of attentiveness."

Mary Oliver

When we are not attentive, we miss life. We live in the past or we live in the future but we miss the now. And now is what we have. Now is when God is active and working...now is when we get the chance to participate with Him. Obviously we can see where He was in hindsight but what a beautiful thing it is to see He in the now.

But to do that we need to pay attention to what He might be saying, how He might be working and then make the choice to live into that.

My prayer for you today is that you will be aware and watching so you don't miss the presence of God, in this moment.

Grace and peace,
Deb

integrity

2011-12-27T00:01:00.000-05:00

"If you are here unfaithfully with us,
You're causing great damage."

Rumi

When we are with others unauthentically, we hurt them and we hurt ourselves. To bring all of who we are to God and to our community is to be in integrity.

Consider those places where you come with less than who you truly are. Ask yourself why you would do that and reflect on what God might want to say to you.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Hawken King http://www.flickr.com/photos/hawken/239234587/

blind faith

2011-12-26T00:01:00.000-05:00

"MY LORD GOD, I have no idea where I am going.
I do not see the road ahead of me.
I cannot know for certain where it will end.
Nor do I really know myself, and the fact that I think that I am following your will does not mean that I am actually doing so.
But I believe that the desire to please you does in fact please you.
And I hope I have that desire in all that I am doing.
I hope that I will never do anything apart from that desire.
And I know that if I do this you will lead me by the right road though I may know nothing about it.
Therefore will I trust you always though I may seem to be lost and in the shadow of death.
I will not fear, for you are ever with me, and you will never leave me to face my perils alone."

Thomas Merton

I invite you to take some time today to reflect on this quote.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by Bruce Berrien
http://www.flickr.com/photos/bruceberrien/4445304728/

darkness to light

2011-12-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Mother Teresa once said “Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted are the greatest poverty”. To this I will add: Please believe that one single positive dream is more important than a thousand negative realties.”

Adeline Yen Mah

Recently, I have had interactions with four women, all of whom I know had difficult childhoods. As I sat with them, I was struck by the reality of their lives today. If anyone of them had lived into what their families had wanted them to believe about themselves, they would be living a very different life. But…something happened to them. God. He moved into their heart and began the slow process of changing how they saw themselves. He began by giving them glimpses of how He sees them. Now, they are all living beautiful, strong, affirming lives.

And, do you know the most incredible part of it? He uses other people to reflect His love…. to be Jesus with skin on. Through others…through their eyes, through their actions, through their acceptance, through their reaching out, healing begins.

It is in the context of relationship that people change. It is not always easy but it is worth the effort. Then, as we heal, we begin to give away what was given to us.

If you are the wounded one, allow others to come near and care for you. If you have been restored to life through God’s healing touch and the love of others, give what you’ve received.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Malu Green http://www.flickr.com/photos/malugreen/3343242073/

margins

2011-12-22T00:01:00.000-05:00

I am tired. Just being honest, folks. Somehow I have allowed the margins around my life to become thinner and thinner. That means I wake up and realize I am not living what I preach. I didn’t sleep well last night and did not get up as early as I would have liked this morning. So…no intentional time with God. Doesn’t mean I didn’t sense His presence today…I did in so many ways. But I want time…no…I need time to sit down and reflect on the ways I saw Him work and move, how I heard His voice.

This isn’t being legalistic about how much time I must set aside to be with Him….or what I need to do during that time. It’s more about how I feel inside when I don’t have time with Him.I just want to be real about living what I talk about.

Hope you are carving out margins to protect your inner life. We all stray and get back on the ‘crazy hamster wheel’ of life….but, when you do, notice it and begin, as you can, to re-establish those margins. Tomorrow – yeah, I’m gonna have some margins tomorrow.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by Jody K http://www.flickr.com/photos/jodilynn/2876601526/

vulnerability

2011-12-21T00:01:00.001-05:00

“Daring to accept myself and receive love as I am in my nakedness and vulnerability is the indispensable precondition for genuine transformation. But make no mistake about just how difficult this is. Everything within me wants to show my best ‘pretend self’ to both other people and to God. This is my false self – the self of my own making. This self can never be transformed, because it is never willing to receive love in vulnerability. When this pretend self receives love, it simply becomes stronger and I am even more deeply in bondage to my false ways of living.”

David Benner

Transformation. This is what I desire. But in order to surrender to transformation, I need to be vulnerable…to God and to others. Vulnerability has a cost. Vulnerability means letting your walls down and every time you do that you risk getting hurt.

Whenever I pretend to be someone I am not, when I feel the need to defend, to prove, to over-explain, to compete, I am not resting in God. I am taking over the reins again and trying to steer things the way I want them to go.

So – will I rest in God, be vulnerable and let my true self show through – or will I resist, argue, pretend and put myself in deeper bondage to the false self?

Each day allows me to make that choice. Today I choose vulnerability. How about you?

Grace and peace –
Deb

Photo by Andreason http://www.flickr.com/photos/andreason/5816078146/

risk

2011-12-20T00:01:00.000-05:00

"Love anything and your heart will be wrung and possibly broken. If you want to make sure of keeping it intact you must give it to no one, not even an animal. Wrap it carefully round with hobbies and little luxuries; avoid all entanglements. Lock it up safe in the casket or coffin of your selfishness. But in that casket, safe, dark, motionless, airless, it will change. It will not be broken; it will become unbreakable, impenetrable, irredeemable. To love is to be vulnerable."
C. S. Lewis

I have friends who are afraid to love. They have been hurt and want to avoid being hurt again at all costs. They think that it is safest to not love at all. They keep others at arm’s length.

I understand the fear. But what they don’t see is that to choose to keep your heart closed off to hurt means you keep your heart closed off to joy. Our hearts are not capable of only letting in good things. When we decide to keep out hurt we keep out joy.

Loving others involves risk. It always has and it always will. Humans aren’t perfect. There are those that will hurt us every chance they get and we need to able to identify who they are and set up appropriate boundaries. But, there are others (and I think there are far more of these!) who will love us well, even if imperfectly. All of us love imperfectly. I do, you do…all of us do. If people never took a chance on me because of what others had done to them, I’d have no one in my life.

Be willing to risk. God created us to live in community and not as loners. Risk….risk being yourself with others, risk letting others in, risk being real….risk being hurt. Know that whatever comes your way, God is able to walk you through it.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by Marceluz (Lucía Rojas) http://www.flickr.com/photos/marceluz/4055361875/

wisdom

2011-12-19T00:01:00.000-05:00

As the years go by, I am noticing something. I do not look like I used to! Surprise, surprise. It can be difficult to see the changes that time brings. Anne Lamott, in one of her books, has a chapter called “The Aunties”. She is referring to her derriere. The Aunties are not what they used to be. She talks about not wanting to go out in a bathing suit because she is self conscious about The Aunties. She is constantly comparing herself to other women..younger women. Then she realizes that what she does possess is the wisdom that only age brings. It is a beauty that cannot be matched by a young, fit body. And she forms a new appreciation and respect for The Aunties.

I am beginning to appreciate that. I am starting to love my wisdom; a wisdom that comes from God. I like to call it 'saging'. I am learning to appreciate the beauty that comes with age…maybe not a physical beauty but the beauty of knowing God in an intimate way and living out of that place.

I am constantly trying to re-align my values with His…like knowing that how I look is not as important as who I am. Or that what the world values is not what God values. Some days I do better than others but I think the days of seeing it from God’s point of view are getting more numerous.

Today, may you value who God made you to be. May you value being known more for who you are than being beautiful. And may you thank Him for the wisdom that He has given you. Enjoy today and honor The Aunties...no matter what your age. :0)

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by arturoverfoto
http://www.flickr.com/photos/56082562@N00/330473859/

deep well

2011-12-17T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Everything about our modern lives fights against taking time to satisfy the needs and longings of the soul. Yet if there is one place I am allowed to be selfish, it’s in the care of my soul. Out of such selfishness, I become more selfless in caring for the needs of those in my sphere of influence.”

Stephen Macchia

Many would say that the practice of silence and solitude is selfish…even ‘navel gazing’. It’s true that I am protective of my time in the morning. I want to be alone…I want to be alone with God. I love that time. But…I know that when I spend that time, I am much more available for others throughout the day. Not only to the people I love but to those I come in contact with. I see those interactions as being orchestrated by God. I can give out of a deep, full well, rather than trying to give out of a well that is dry because I haven’t taken the time to pay attention to my own relationship with God.

To be sure…the introspective life is one of investing time in yourself. But if I do it to only enrich myself, I am missing the point. One reason God gives His love and presence to me so that I can give it to others.

May you take the time to invest in your relationship with God. May you spend time just sitting in His presence. May you take the riches He shares with you during that time and carry them into your day, sharing them with those He brings into your path…and go to bed tonight knowing that you gave deeply from the well of God’s love.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Happyhiker4 http://www.flickr.com/photos/marklindsay/6313309409/

waiting

2011-12-16T00:01:00.000-05:00

The sea does not reward those who are too anxious, too greedy, or too impatient. One should lie empty, open, choiceless as a beach - waiting for a gift from the sea.

Anne Morrow Lindbergh

Waiting is hard…so hard. If I know what is next, what it looks like, how to prepare, I feel as if I have some control. But to just wait?

Waiting can be a sign of trust. Like the beach, being empty, open and choiceless can allow whatever God wants to come to me, to come. It isn’t that I don’t care about what is next – it's that I am allowing God to choose the direction and the timing.

Are you waiting for something? What might it look like to wait – being empty, open and choiceless? Yielding all? I invite you to try.

Grace and peace,
Deb

sabbath

2011-12-15T00:30:00.001-05:00

“At least one day in every seven, pull off the road and park the car in the garage. Close the door to the tool shed and turn off the computer. Stay home not because you are sick but because you are well. Talk someone you love into being well with you. Take a nap, a walk, an hour for lunch. Test the premise that you are worth more than what you produce – that even if you spent one whole day being good for nothing you would still be precious in God’s sight- and when you get anxious because you are convinced this is not so, remember that your own conviction is not required. This is a commandment. Your worth has already been established, even when you are not working. The purpose of the commandment is to woo you to the same truth.”

Barbara Brown Taylor
An Altar in the World

Why is it that I find it so easy to disregard this commandment? I would not consider stealing, murdering or adultery. I try really hard not to covet. But, I don’t even attempt practicing the Sabbath, at least not in the way that I think God intended it. If one of the purposes of Sabbath is to convince me that the world will keep turning if I stop, I haven’t stopped long enough to find out. If the purpose is to have a day filled with rest and play – that is what I call ‘vacation’. If the purpose is to focus more on being than doing, a full day seems indulgent. If the purpose is to refrain from consumerism one day a week, I’ve missed the mark.

Sabbath isn’t to be a dull, dreary day. It is meant to be a gift - a day to rest, to renew, to refresh, to play, to relax, to notice, to stop. Why would I say no to that?

Barbara Brown Taylor remarks that if we paid attention to the verses – no – the commandment that speaks to Sabbath (Lev 25) the same way we pay attention to the verses that speak to sexual practices (Lev 18) we might discover that God is just as interested in economics as He is in sex.

I find myself asking some hard questions….why is it so easy for me to disregard Sabbath? It certainly is counter-cultural, but so are many of the other things I believe and practice.

In reality, it is a beautiful gift God has offered to me…. and to you. What would it look like to begin opening that gift? I will be reflecting on this more intentionally as I continue in this Christmas season. I invite you to do the same.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Viperium http://www.flickr.com/photos/viperium/247333791/

prayer

2011-12-14T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Trust and faith should frame our whole prayer experience. This is what allows us to let go of control and allow God to shape prayer and our encounter. Prayer involves surrender to a mysterious inner process, submitting to something God does in us. If we trust enough to let go, God will give us a gift of prayer communion that we could never create or even imagine.”

David Benner

Even in prayer, it is to my benefit to ‘let go’. As long as I insist on using prayer as a vehicle to get my way, I am misusing one of God’s most beautiful gifts. Being able to pour my heart out to Him while holding on lightly to any outcomes – or even more- having my prayer be a place of expressing to God that I want what He wants more than what I want allows me to trust that He knows best.
What might you be holding onto tightly today? What would it look like to release it into God’s hands? Could you express that to Him in a prayer of surrender? Give it a try….

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Kevin Henderson - http://kevlhenrit.zenfolio.com/p197120307

silence

2011-12-13T00:01:00.000-05:00

“When we make a place for silence, we make room for ourselves….By making room for silence, we resist the forces of the world which tell us to live an advertised life of surface appearances, instead of a discovered life – a life lived in contact with our senses, our feelings, our deepest thoughts and values.”

Gunilla Norris

Photo by Kevin Henderson -
“When we make a place for silence, we make room for ourselves….By making room for silence, we resist the forces of the world which tell us to live an advertised life of surface appearances, instead of a discovered life – a life lived in contact with our senses, our feelings, our deepest thoughts and values.”

Gunilla Norris

Photo by Kevin Henderson - http://kevlhenrit.zenfolio.com/p197120307

meditation

2011-12-12T00:01:00.001-05:00

“Through meditating we explore in order to know more and more of Abba. Before we find this reality, we only BELIEVE; through experiencing a relationship, we come to KNOW.”

Morton Kelsey

To know someone, I need to spend time with them. I need to talk to them and I need to listen. The more I know them, the less I need to depend on words. I have a couple of people in my life who can just look at me and know what I am feeling. There is no need to explain myself in great detail. I am known by them.

It is that way with God. In the beginning of my relationship with him I talked…a lot. Now I talk less and listen more. There is more of a comfort level there…more of a ‘knowing’. I am learning to rest in the fact that He loves me.

Consider meditating, that is reflecting on, or pondering who He is. Meditate on His love and His presence.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Austinevan Found at http://www.flickr.com/photos/austinevan/3304246079/

prayer

2011-12-10T00:01:00.000-05:00

There are times when we feel, quite simply, far too small
to contain everything we are feeling.

Maybe a moment of awesome beauty overwhelms us,
or a piece of music brings tears to our eyes.

We hold a newborn child in our arms
and are lost for words.
We gaze, helplessly, as a loved one takes a final breath.

Or maybe we are speechless with rage,
impotent in the face of some gross injustice,
or some intolerable pain.

Prayer can catch us in its arms at times like these,
often in shared rituals or rites of passage,
but also in the unspoken, and unspeakable,
aching and yearning of our hearts.

We pray when our hearts are overflowing.

Margaret Silf
The Gift of Prayer

Photo by Ashley Gillett Photography

wisps

2011-12-09T00:01:00.001-05:00

“For sometimes the voice of God thunders into our lives, but more often than not, it wisps by us like a gentle breeze with a fragrant reminder of faraway fields”.

Brennan Manning

I love springtime. I know it is hard to talk about or think about spring right now as we stand on the edge of winter. But, let’s try.

I remember being a little girl standing in my front yard on Easter Sunday. As a child, we didn’t go to church accept on the major holidays, so I am decked out in my Easter dress (with hat!). I cannot remember going to church that day but I can remember the smells. I remember that damp, early morning smell. Do you know what I am talking about? It’s that rich smell of earth and dew. It is mixed with the smell of newly mowed grass…a smell that’s fresh and clean and sticks to the bottom of your shoes. It lingers when you get in the car. Those smells take me right back to that morning. It’s a lovely memory.

What if God moves in our lives like that? Like a gentle wisp of fragrance? But to notice it I need to pay attention. I have to be aware. I have to gather in the subtle evidence with all my senses.

Be attentive…allow the fragrance of His love to permeate your life. Then, when you face the edge of winter in your spiritual life, you will be able to recall its sweet scent and know that spring is just around the corner.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Wili-Hybrid http://www.flickr.com/photos/wili/614590890/

hope

2011-12-08T00:01:00.000-05:00

We see the signs
but cannot always
divine their meanings.

You call us to move forward
not always knowing
whether what we grasp
in our hands
will prove to be
a seed of hope
or a thorn in our flesh.

Train our fingers,
that what brings life
we may with persistence hold,
and that which wastes
our souls
we may with grace release.

Jan Richardson
Night Visions

Photo by Mayr at http://www.flickr.com/photos/mayr/2264724288/

listen

2011-12-07T06:41:00.002-05:00

listen
Life is chaotic.
It’s loud and constantly moving.
No time alone.
No space.
No intentionality.
Just moving from thing to thing….task to task.
Keep moving.
Don’t stop.
It may pass you by.
The world may fall off its axis.

What? Be still?
Learn to listen?
Why?
God’s voice?
Afraid of what I might hear…
condemnation,
fear,
shame,
rejection….
But…what if…
He wants to speak something different into my life….
like love,
acceptance
forgiveness
peace,
joy,
value.
That is what He is offering.

I only need to listen….
Listen and accept.
Be still,
listen
and
hear.

deb

Photo by Art from (Me)lia http://www.flickr.com/photos/artfromm/3813798951/

plans

2011-12-06T00:01:00.002-05:00

Speaking of Mary right after finding out she was carrying the Christ-child:

“The events themselves will be her guide and teacher. She does not need to figure it out and plan accordingly, the plan will be given by God through life’s encounters. Reality is her teacher. That is why she could hear angels. And that is why she could hear Elizabeth.”

Richard Rohr, Radical Grace

I have been told that I am not strong in the area of strategic planning. This is not news to me. Begin to talk about strategy and direct outcomes and I glaze over. I use to think that it was because I was not gifted in that area and that may still be the truth. But I am coming to understand that it may be something more. Perhaps dependence on God.

My desire is not to run ahead, not to figure out what the next step is but to wait and see what step God uncovers. How does He want me to proceed? Does He want me to go left or right? Take the fork in the road or stay straight?

This passage from Richard Rohr describes beautifully how I try to listen and discern God’s leading. It does not mean that I don’t prepare – it just means that I don’t have a pre-determined outcome in mind. Remaining open to surprises helps me remain open to possibilities I might otherwise miss.

Where, in your life, might God be inviting you to allow life events be your guide? How are life’s encounters speaking to you? Pay attention and may you also hear angels.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Ambigel http://www.flickr.com/photos/ambigel/324912564/

struggle

2011-12-05T00:01:00.000-05:00

Move over the face of
my deep,
my darkness,
my endless restless chaos,
and create,
O God;
trouble me,
comfort me,
stir me up
and calm me,
but do not cease
to breathe
your Spirit into
my wakening soul.

Jan Richardson

No matter how I feel, no matter what I am going through, He is there and can redeem it.
What are you struggling with today? What is troubling your spirit? What has you losing sleep? What has your stomach in knots?
Notice it and offer it up to Him….let it rest there.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by CoffeeNut http://www.flickr.com/photos/nmc1007/5513339430/

love letter

2011-12-02T00:01:00.000-05:00

I am a little pencil in the hand of a writing God who is sending a love letter to the world.

Mother Teresa

What an incredible thought…that I am part of a love letter that God is sending to the world. That my life speaks of who He is and how He loves me. It also is a big responsibility. I think of those times when I am less than gracious with a store clerk…or the person who cuts me off in traffic…or the people in the grocery store who block the aisle with their cart while they are having a conversation with someone else.

I want to always be aware of the fact that my life is being observed. There are people who are watching to see if Jesus has really made a difference in my life or if I only know the right words to say. I definitely want my life to be part of that love letter to the world.

I invite you to think about how your life, uniquely, speaks of His love for those around you. Take some time to reflect on that beautiful truth.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by Stephanie: http://www.flickr.com/photos/stephanie_in_love/4254709763/in/photostream/

know thyself

2011-12-01T00:01:00.000-05:00

“You try being alone without any form of distraction and see how quickly you want to get way from yourself and forget what you are.”

J. Krishnamurti

There is a sweet little cottage I use sometimes to get away for a couple of days. When I go there, I take the first hour or so to unpack and set up – put my food away, get my books and journal out and organize my things. I take some time to settle in. I sit, I write, I read, I pray. Then I eat. Yes, I said I eat. I don’t eat big meals but I seem to snack...a lot. Then I sleep. Not only do I sleep at night but I nap – something I never do at home. What is that about? I think it may be partly due to exhaustion. But I also think it has to do with not wanting to be with myself.

Don’t get me wrong. I kinda like me. I have grown on myself over the years. But I am not use to my own company...only my company, for long periods of time. It is rare that I am all alone without any distractions. Several years ago, being all alone for a weekend would have been inconceivable. Being alone without TV would have been akin to torture. But, I have been practicing being with myself. It sounds so much more spiritual to say I go away to be with God – and I do. But I also am with myself and that has been a practice that has been at times uncomfortable and at other times, beautiful. I am still getting used to me.

When is the last time you were alone for more than a day without any distractions? How much do you like to be with you? Are you good company for yourself? Or do you want to just leave yourself behind for better company? Consider spending some time with yourself in the near future. Invite God to come along as you get to know yourself. Granted there will be parts of yourself you won’t enjoy seeing but God will show you other parts – the parts that reflect Him and you will be glad you decided to spend time with the person that is….. you.

Grace and peace,
Deb

evening prayer

2011-11-30T00:01:00.001-05:00

Let me fall asleep
as who I am,
and awake
one small uncluttered step
closer to you,
one small step closer
to the person I want to be ~
it will be enough.

John Kirvan

Photo by John Underwood http://www.flickr.com/photos/jonpartech9610/6075749919/

lost

2011-11-30T00:01:00.000-05:00

“They needed 40 years in the wilderness to learn the ‘holy art of being lost’.”

Barbara Brown Taylor

Obviously she is talking about the Israelites. 40 years. Slow learners? It might be easy for us to say yes to that question but really – aren’t we all slow learners when it comes to the ‘holy art of being lost’? This is not the lost that we think about when someone doesn’t know God. It is more the lost that says we still need to be led, we need to be guided.

It is a subtle thing that happens as we are longer in our faith. We think we know. Know what? Know the right answers. Know what God is doing. Know exactly what the scripture means. Know who is in and who is out. Know just what the right thing is to say to make sure you are ‘in’. Know how God would feel about certain things. Know that our way is the only right way.

We lose our innocent and childlike wonder about who God is. We lose the awe of discovery. We lose site of the fact that God is God and we are not. We lose the ability to embrace mystery. We lose the chance to be teachable – because we think we already know.

Will you risk allowing yourself to experience the holy art of being lost? Of being open and moldable? Of being teachable and responsive to whatever God may have for you?

Take a risk – get lost today.
Grace and peace –
Deb

grace

2011-11-29T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Some of us carry the early memory of our own wrongdoing long after God and others have forgiven us. Not realizing it, we hold onto regrets. We forget that time and grace wash clean.”

Emilie Griffin
Small Surrenders

When I spend time with women, it seems we are all too aware of our failings. It is helpful to take some time to recognize how damaging it can be when we refuse to accept the forgiveness of God. We are bound by chains of shame and regret. Those chains inhibit us from giving all we have and all we are to God. Our focus is more about our shortcomings than God’s ability to redeem them.

What chains are binding you today? What wrongdoing have you held onto? Consider taking it to God and leaving it there. Let grace wash it clean.

grace and peace,
~ Deb

mid-day prayer

2011-11-28T00:01:00.000-05:00

God, by whom we are guided in judgment,
and who raises up for us light in the darkness.
Grant us, in our doubts and uncertainties,
the grace to ask what you would have us to do,
that your spirit of wisdom may save us
from all false choices and
in your straight path we may not stumble.
Through Jesus Christ our Lord,
~ Amen

The Collect for Grace

celtic prayer

2011-11-26T00:01:00.000-05:00

I arise today
embraced in the arms
of God the Father,
empowered by the strength
of God the Spirit,
immersed in the love
of God the Son.
I arise today
in the company
of the Trinity.
Father, Spirit and Son,
I arise today.

~ John Birch

surrender

2011-11-25T00:01:00.000-05:00

“All you know is that you are being led, being guided, being loved, being used, being prayed through – and you are no longer in the driver’s seat.”

Richard Rohr, The Naked Now

This is surrender. We don’t work our way into this place. We offer ourselves to it. We can put practices into place that remind us to surrender, remind us to open ourselves completely to God. Only in vulnerability and abandon can we create space for the Spirit to move and to transform us.

What does surrender look like to you? Consider making this quote into a prayer –

God –
I desire to be led, I want to be guided, I yearn to be loved, I chose to be used and I long to be prayed through. Continue to teach me how to get myself out of the way and stand amazed at Your work in and through me.

Photo by Helje http://www.flickr.com/photos/helje/4411190782/

walls

2011-11-24T00:01:00.000-05:00

“…..Falling in love is as ordinary and normal as our breathing. But it is also always special. It is special because it wakes us up. It thrills us and hurts us and makes us conscious of being alive. It lets us know that no matter how dull and distracted our minds may have been, our hearts are wide awake.”
“…It happens as we wish yet always remains beyond our control. We know that love is beyond our control because it keeps hurting us. We would like to experience the joy and energy of love without being vulnerable to its pain, but there is no way to do that. To love is to care, to care is to give ourselves, and giving ourselves means being willing to be hurt.”
Gerald May, The Awakened Heart
Life is about living and feeling. It is about being able to take it all in. If we are afraid of being hurt, we will build a wall around our heart to protect it. But – if we are not willing to risk hurt, we cannot receive love.
Where, in your life, have you built walls to protect yourself? What has the cost been? Consider offering those places, where you have been hurt in the past, up to God so that you may begin letting love in. It is worth the risk.

Grace and peace ~
Deb

Photo by -spoon- http://www.flickr.com/photos/lchifi/231115148/

trust

2011-11-23T00:01:00.000-05:00

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are quite naturally impatient in everything
to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way to something
unknown, something new.

And yet it is the law of all progress
that is made by passing through
some stages of instability –
and that may take a very long time.
And so I think it is with you;
your ideas mature gradually – let them grow,
let them shape themselves without undue haste.
Don’t try to force them on,
as though you could be today what time
(that is to say, grace and circumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make of you tomorrow.
Only God can say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you
And accept the anxiety of feeling yourself
in suspense and incomplete.
PierreTeilhard De Chardin

I so believe in the slow work of God. Both in my own life and in the lives of those I see for spiritual direction, God seems to work in a slow, meandering way. That isn’t to say it is not purposeful. He knows where He is leading you…where He is leading me. But that path is often obscured, veiled if you will.
Can you trust the ‘unknown’? Can you accept ‘the anxiety of feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete’? Can you trust in the slow work of God? What would look different in your life if you could relax into His movement in your life, no matter what the pace?
Grace and peace-
Deb

Photo by cuba gallery http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/5949819558/

nature

2011-11-22T00:01:00.002-05:00

"God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars".
Martin Luther

Nature is revelation that speaks to us everyday of God and His love of beauty. It surrounds us. From the moment the sun rises in the morning and its brilliance drowns out the stars, His creativity is on display. Trees, animals, mountains, rivers, rocks, oceans, canyons, vistas, flowers, beaches, deserts, forests, plains, gorges, fish, birds, sun, moon and stars. Everyday there is an endless array of gifts for us to view, that reflect God.

Look for Him today in the created order.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by -yury- http://www.flickr.com/photos/yury-prokopenko/3722582543/

doors

2011-11-21T00:01:00.000-05:00

“No one’s spiritual practice is exactly like anyone else’s. Life meets each of us where we need to be met, leading us to the doors with our names on them.”

Barbara Brown Taylor

I have been reflecting on this topic for some time now. I have been in conversations revolving around about how, when, and why God heals. It has made me consider what in my life I should ask healing for. I completely believe that God can heal. But, I also believe that He can and will teach me beautiful things in the midst of the difficulties. My trust and faith have not been diminished by the difficulties….in fact, I feel they have grown deeper.

For whatever reason, I am content to be at the door with my name on it. What door is God leading you to?
Grace and peace ~
Deb

Photo by John Faherty Photography
http://www.flickr.com/photos/johnfahertyphotography/2654949076/

cooperation

2011-11-19T00:01:00.000-05:00

“The core task of all good spirituality is to teach us to “cooperate” with what God already wants to do and has already begun to do (Romans 8:28). In fact, nothing good would ever even enter our minds unless in the previous moment God had not already “moved” within us. We are always and forever seconding the motion.”

Richard Rohr

What do the shower, the few minutes before I fall asleep and the few moments when I am waking up have in common? Those seem to be prime times for me to hear God’s voice. Are those particularly active times for God or are they times when, for whatever reason, my intellect, my thinking, does not get in the way of what God wants to say? Ok…I know that saying God activity level has anything to do with my showering is just bad theology so we’ll just say the variable is on my end.

Whatever the reason, these seem to be the times when the puzzle pieces come together for me. There will be something I need to decide or pull together or figure out. I can make charts, lists, graphs, etc, with little to no progress. Then I can be falling asleep and “BAM”…there it is.

The past couple of weeks I have been struggling with a particular issue. I was being asked to do something that I felt pretty resistant to. I tried to do it but felt something was ‘off’. I kept trying to ‘figure it out’ to no avail. Then, as I was going to sleep, the reason became very clear. It made sense.

I am becoming more and more cognizant of the fact that these are times God speaks to me. And, it usually is revealed in a way that surprises and amazes me. I am trying to learn to lean into God when I have a decision to make or a situation to figure out. I need to remember that He initiates, and I respond. The more aware I can become of the fact that I am cooperating with God (and not the other way around) life becomes less tangled, less pressured.

Have something on your mind? A decision to make? A situation to work through? What would it be like to stop thinking about it, over and over, and offer it up to God, asking Him to speak when the time is right? You never know - it may make for some very interesting showers…..

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by jfpeck http://www.flickr.com/photos/44442915@N00/3035887375/

presence

2011-11-18T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Spirituality is the sacred center of which all life comes, including Mondays and Tuesdays and rainy Saturday afternoons in all their mundane and glorious details.”

Christina Baldwin

God is everywhere and in everything. Every moment has something of Him in it. All we need to do is be aware and be looking for it.

He is not only found in those activities we see as ‘sacred’ but also in the mundane….the everyday tasks we do with out even thinking about. Brushing our teeth, making our bed, doing the dishes.

When we begin to see life through these eyes, everything is sacred. Celebrate the sacred in your life.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Andrew @ Cuba Gallery http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/6229389973/

serenity

2011-11-17T00:01:00.000-05:00

God grant me the serenity
to accept the things I cannot change;
courage to change the things I can;
and wisdom to know the difference.

Sometimes this is really hard for me. I am getting better at accepting things I cannot change. And I am getting better at changing the things I can. Where I struggle, at times, is knowing the difference.

A friend of mine, Pastor John Stringer, explained it this way; he drew two concentric circles. Inside the smaller circle is ‘my responsibility’….the outer circle is labeled ‘my concern’. Whatever falls within the smaller circle are those things I have some control over. What falls in the outer circle are things that I care about but, ultimately, have little control over. When he shared this with me, it was evident that I had spent a lot of my time and energy focused on those things I have no control over.

Now, I try to take some time and assess where my energy needs to be expended. Is the situation that is bothering me something I can do anything about or is it out of my control? Once I sit down and take the time to think it through, I am better at letting go of those things I can’t change or move forward on the things I can impact.
Are there things in your life that you are frustrated by? Things you want to change but don’t seem to be able to? Maybe they are things you can’t change…you have no power to change. Consider weighing the circumstances by this standard…figure out what falls within your realm of responsibility and what falls within the area of your concern. If you can do something to change the situation, do it. If not, offer it up to God in prayer and ask Him to work as He chooses. These decisions will create an atmosphere of serenity in your life.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Erroba http://www.flickr.com/photos/erroba/2218528689/

fear

2011-11-16T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Fear not that your life will come to an end…fear rather that it will never come to a beginning.”

Cardinal Newman

For many years, I lived my life in such a way as to avoid my fears. I’d only try things I felt I would succeed at. I wouldn’t fly (on two separate occasions I took a train across the country for three days – one way!). I would hear God speaking to me but I was like Moses….I was full of excuses about why I couldn’t do what he was asking me to do….why he must have had me confused with someone else.

Over ten years ago I heard God asking me to step out. To fly. Not metaphorically but literally. He was asking me to get on a plane and fly to Romania. Not Ohio, but Romania. The Romania that is over there across the ocean. The ocean….that place where you really can’t land a plane. But this time, I said ‘yes’. It was a big, fat, scary yes, but a yes all the same. It took prayer, friends, and Xanax to ‘git ‘er done’. It was one of the hardest things I have ever done but also one of the most life changing. That one decision opened up a world to me that I could have only imagined before. It helped shape the ministry God wanted me to be involved in and also impacted my confidence to say ‘yes’ to Him even when I doubt my own ability.

This past year, I said another big ‘yes’ to God. I sensed Him asking me to develop a new ministry. He has given me the vision and asked me to step out and develop it. I am not sure what the outcome will be but I said ‘yes’. Our doors opened in September. I recognize that this ministry is His…I’m only managing it for Him.

Are you living your life held back by fear? Do you sense God asking you to do something? What is holding you back? I invite you to give your fear to Jesus and trust Him to carry you through whatever He is calling you to do. Risk it. Consider living an outrageous life with Jesus. May your prayer be - "God - I want to trust you more than I don't want to believe in myself."

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Leelawadee http://www.flickr.com/photos/yaspal/2812709301/

dependance

2011-11-15T00:01:00.000-05:00

“May all your expectations be frustrated. May all your plans be thwarted, that you may experience the powerlessness and poverty of a child and sing and dance in the love of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.”

A prayer offered by a friend for Henri Nouwen

Complete dependence on God is what I want. I think about, I can even do it for a few moments at a time. Then I forget. Especially when things are going well. But, in those times when I feel as if things are out of control, my thoughts turn to God. Those times increase my dependence on Him. But I want more than just a ‘lifeboat’ mentality. I want to be fully aware of God’s presence and sovereignty in my life every day. May it begin today.

Grace and peace,
Deb

just breathe

2011-11-14T00:01:00.000-05:00

We don’t need to be reminded to breathe,
but we can learn to be more conscious
of this precious gift of the breath of life.

Wherever you are,
and whatever you are doing,
take a minute to become aware of your own breathing.
Don’t change its rhythm, just notice it.
Just doing this will help you become more calm,
and refresh your perspective on life.
It will also become a relief to your body,
and may even reduce your blood pressure.

Now take it a step further:

Each time you breathe out,
consciously let go, or express, any anxiety or concerns
you may have.

Each time you breathe in,
breathe in the power and the love of God,
and the life of God’s creation,
which sustains you constantly,
whether you are aware of it or not.

Practice this rhythm for a few minutes
whenever you have an opportunity.
Return to it whenever you can
and especially whenever you are feeling stressed.

Margaret Silf
The Gift of Prayer

gifts

2011-11-12T00:01:00.000-05:00

gifts ~
unexpected,
un-asked for,
appear out of nowhere.

You give to express
your love,
your concern,
your desire for me.

like a rose left on the doorstep.

feb 07

grace and peace,
deb

Photo by lia_ro21 http://www.flickr.com/photos/24117329@N06/2337218572/

waiting

2011-11-11T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Waiting is certainly a kind of prayer, especially if you can stand howling, wide open spaces.”
Barbara Brown Taylor

Why is waiting so hard? I think it is because we realize, in the waiting, that we are not the one in control. It is a helpless place.

I have several friends in the midst of waiting right now. Waiting for medical results. Waiting for work situations to change. Waiting for husbands to come home. Waiting for a child to return. Waiting. Waiting can seem like a howling, wide open space where we can’t seem to find the boundaries, the edges. It feels too open, too spacious. It feels as if we might just get lost in the waiting, unable to find our way back.

Patience is always attached to waiting. It describes how we are waiting….or not. Are we pushing against the waiting or are we resting in the waiting? I think that might be what patience looks like….resting. Which, seems to come right back to trust.

Are you ‘waiting’? What are you waiting for? The test result? That phone call or email? That job offer? What would it look like to wait patiently? To trust in the waiting? To sense God’s loving arms wrapped around you in the middle of the howling, wide open space?

Consider praying not only for your situation but also for your waiting. Resist making the waiting a negative place but consider allowing the waiting to be a place of formation – the waiting itself a place of rest and trust.

Grace and peace –
Deb

sorrow

2011-11-10T00:01:00.000-05:00

My heart aches for the burden you bear.
I cannot fathom its depths.
Pain untold as you witness your children languish in their own choices.
Sometimes I carry judgment ~
I want you to deal with it the way the way I would. Or would I?
How can I know how I would react?
I try to imagine but the pain of it keeps me from staying there.
If I am unable to even pretend how it feels,
how can I bring any judgment to you?

How can I love you?
How can I support you?
How can I be Jesus with skin on to you?
How can I invite myself into your pain, your world?
How can I truly be myself with you when I am in a place of blessing?
How can share my joy?

I think all I can do is leave you to the Father and ask Him to hold you – hold you in all your pain – the pain I am too frail to hold.
He knows….
how to love you,
how to support you,
how to be in your world of pain.
Because of Him I can try to enter in.
A poor substitute but He can cover my lack.
My hearts aches for the burden you bear.

Love,
deb

Photo by Venusienne http://www.flickr.com/photos/venusienne/240718655/

presence

2011-11-09T00:01:00.000-05:00

day has come.
night releases her hold on the earth
and allows light to illuminate the land.
and so every 24 hours, a day that has never been before.

a new beginning.
a fresh start.
a chance to be present.
a chance to be real.
a chance to be open.
a chance to be.

i take this for granted.
i forget.
i move and do without thinking, automatic.

may i not waste today.
may i be present.
may i be real.
may i be open.
may i be.

Grace and peace,
Deb

awareness

2011-11-08T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Man’s walled mind has no access to a ladder upon which he can, of his own strength, rise to knowledge of God. Yet his soul is endowed with translucent windows that open to the beyond.”
Abraham Heschel

God wants to be known by me. He wants to be pursued by me. He wants to be desired by me. He gives me ample opportunity to see Him. All I have to do is be aware of the ‘translucent windows’ that give me glimpses into His presence. It may be in the form of a rainbow or a sunset. It may be in the coo of a baby. It may be in the sweet smell of a springtime rain. It may be in the power of lightening or the quiet hush of a new snowfall. It may be in vibrant color of a tropical fish or in the majesty of a mountain. It may be in the beauty of the Word or in the soothing words of a friend.

The evidence is everywhere…I just need to be looking. I invite you to join me today in looking for Him, in all the different ways He reveals himself.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Ms Soccer_Roo http://www.flickr.com/photos/roosfotos/107299791/

solitude

2011-11-07T00:01:00.000-05:00

“Our language has wisely sensed the two sides of being alone. It has created the word ‘loneliness’ to express the pain of being alone. And it has created the word ‘solitude’ to express the glory of being alone.”

Paul Tillich

Loneliness is epidemic in our world. We can feel lonely in a room full of people. We can feel so disconnected from others. We long for connection, for intimacy.

Solitude is rare in our world. It is a choice we make to create room in our spirits for God to dwell, to work. It is a place where we sit with God….a place to connect with Him and allow intimacy to develop.

Loneliness is inner emptiness.

Solitude is inner fulfillment.

Loneliness is pain.

Solitude is glory.

Loneliness is a place of hollowness.

Solitude is a place of formation.

I invite you to spend some time today in solitude, asking God to create a place of formation inside of you where your relationship with him may deepen and grow.

Grace and Peace,
Deb

Photo by Eldho Nasrani http://www.flickr.com/photos/49572524@N06/4555863120/

choice

2011-11-05T00:01:00.000-04:00

“The ancient tension between judgment and mercy is found everywhere in the world. While we may experience it most immediately in our own minds and hearts, this tension informs our medical systems, our political ideologies, even our religious beliefs. If people are basically bad, then they will need to be fixed, shaped, purged of sin, and punished. If, on the other hand, people are essentially good, then we need to be nourished, supported, encouraged, and taught.”

Wayne Muller

What would a shift in my perspective change? What if I were more prone to extend mercy than to pronounce judgment?

When I consider these two ways of approaching life, approaching people – mercy and judgment – I think of Jesus and the Pharisees. The Pharisees were concerned only with the law. They were experts on judgment. Jesus was about drawing out the best in people, helping them see themselves the way He saw them, especially those who were looked on with disdain by the religious elite. He was an expert on mercy. Did he pronounce judgment? Yes – usually on the Pharisees.

Christians have a reputation for being judgmental. I wonder how many times I have contributed to that perception. My deep desire is to be more like Jesus. That means being less judgmental and more merciful. And not just in my behavior or my speech but in my thoughts….yeah – that’s the really hard part. What I know for sure is that I will be given a chance to choose today – judgment or mercy. Please God – let it be mercy.

Grace and peace –
Deb

photo by creativelenna http://www.flickr.com/photos/creativelenna/4388308190/

listen

2011-11-04T00:01:00.000-04:00

Life is chaotic.
It’s loud and constantly moving.
No time alone.
No space.
No intentionality.
Just moving from thing to thing….task to task.
Keep moving.
Don’t stop.
It may pass you by.
The world may fall off its axis.

What? Be still?
Learn to listen?
Why?
God’s voice?
Afraid of what I might hear…
condemnation,
fear,
shame,
rejection….
But…what if…
He wants to speak something different into my life….
like love,
acceptance
forgiveness
peace,
joy,
value.
That is what He is offering.

I only need to listen….
Listen and accept.
Be still,
listen
and
hear.

Photo by Maggie Buenoventura http://www.flickr.com/photos/maggybuenaventura/3286761575/

shadows

2011-11-03T00:01:00.000-04:00

Life is full of contradictions. There are these completely beautiful moments and then, before I know it, there is a shadow over it all. I live in a fallen world and part of that is my own brokenness. That causes shadows to fall over the things that bring me joy. I am, usually, caught off guard by my shadows. Then, there are other people’s shadows that fall over me, too.

Although I never want to become complacent with shadows, I need to understand that until I am with Him face to face…there will be shadows.

When shadows fall over certain aspects in your life, take the time to breathe and look for God in the midst of the shadow. Where is He? How is He speaking to you? Do you trust Him to redeem the shadow?

Shadows may…no, shadows WILL fall on your life. But know that God is as present in the shadows as He is in the sunshine.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by Engineer J http://www.flickr.com/photos/junaidrashid/430361360/

creation

2011-11-02T00:01:00.000-04:00

"God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars".
Martin Luther

Nature is revelation that speaks to us everyday of God and His love of beauty. It surrounds us. From the moment the sun rises in the morning and its brilliance drowns out the stars, His creativity is on display. Trees, animals, mountains, rivers, rocks, oceans, canyons, vistas, flowers, beaches, deserts, forests, plains, gorges, fish, birds, sun, moon and stars. Everyday there is an endless array of gifts for us to view, that reflect God.

Look for Him today in the created order.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by CubaGallery http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/4678462424/

prayer

2011-11-01T00:01:00.001-04:00

Prayer as conversation with God can be deeply fulfilling. However if it is the only form our prayer takes, we may begin to sense that something is missing. There are two reasons for this. First, prayer is by nature, more than conversation. To limit its concept to dialogue is to allow some of the most profound expressions of prayer to escape our notice. Second, our ‘conversation’, may, in practice, be less a dialogue than a monologue that borders on talking at God.

Marjorie Thompson

How is prayer for you? Is it more talking than listening? Is it a monologue rather than a dialogue?

Someone once said to me that prayer is ‘intimacy with Jesus’. I think I used to look at prayer as my ‘gimme’ list. I would see how things should be and let God know. Now I am listening much more than talking. I try to listen and hear God’s heart and then allow my prayers to rise from that place.

Listening prayer, in the beginning, is much harder than ‘talking’ prayer but the depth of the intimacy is rich.

May you fill your prayer time with silence so that you may hear His still, small voice.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by hjukkhj http://www.flickr.com/photos/41021644@N08/3829937658/

weight of the world

2011-10-30T14:14:00.002-04:00

“Don’t think God has ordained you to carry the entire space – time universe on your own back. God created it. God sustains it and God intends that ‘the government will be upon his shoulder’.”
Boston Businessman

Do you ever feel like me and think the world will fall off its axis if you don’t do everything you are doing? Most women just go and go and go. We carry everything. Stuff from the family, stuff from work, stuff from ministry. And, when we do this, we don’t have the time or the energy to focus on the things that God wants us to attend to.

I think this is part of the fall…thinking we are like God. The thinking that ‘if we don’t do it, it won’t get done’. For me, it also speaks to lack of trust in God. If I feel I have to do everything, that means I don’t think God is capable of doing it…or that He needs my help.

I am trying to relax in Him, trying to build some margins into my day so I have time for Him; not time ‘doing’ something for Him but time just being with Him.

If you say to yourself that you don’t have time to be with God, consider giving some thought to how you might have your priorities ordered. Consider letting God be God and taking some of the weight off your shoulders.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Brandon Robbins http://www.flickr.com/photos/bambino333/368289174/

holiness

2011-10-29T00:01:00.000-04:00

"As obedient children, let yourselves be pulled into a way of life shaped by God's life, a life energetic and blazing with holiness. God said, "I am holy; you be holy."

1 Peter 1:13

I invite you to take some time today and sit with this scripture. Begin by asking God to share with you what he wants you to notice and offer the time to Him. Then read the verse several times, slowly. Notice what moves you and write it down in your journal. Spend some time reflecting on its meaning for you. Offer it back as prayer to God. Finish your time with a few moments of being silent and allow His truth to sink deep in to your heart.

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by ms. ladyred http://www.flickr.com/photos/rubyg/329001856/

being in 'the flow'

2011-10-28T00:01:00.000-04:00

"Faith does not need to push the river because faith is able to trust that there is a river. The river is flowing. We are in it."

— Richard Rohr

I have a friend who speaks of being ‘in the flow’. What she means by this is being in rhythm with the Holy Spirit. She stops and asks, ‘What seems like the next right thing to do?” She pauses and listens. Sometimes she senses what she should be doing and sometimes there is no indication and she feels a freedom to do what she might want to do.

I am learning to be in the flow…to notice when I am letting go and allowing God to lead. Noticing the twists and turns, the rocks and obstacles, the whirlpools and eddys. Places of incredible beauty and places of danger. The thrill of the rapids and the easy, slow pace of the gentle current. I am trying to stop and notice where I am in the flow.

Right now, there is a bend in the river up ahead. I can’t see around the bend but I am trusting that God knows that whatever it is, it is just what I need for this point in my life.

Are you in the flow? Have you taken time to notice where you might be in the river? Are you in a place of trust or a place of pushing? Perhaps this is an invitation from God to just begin to notice…..

Grace and peace,
Deb

becoming

2011-10-27T00:01:00.000-04:00

“In the care of souls, I am far more interested in who people are and who they are becoming in Christ than I am in what they know or what they are doing.”

Eugene Peterson

I need to live this out. I do need to be more concerned with who people are than with what they know or what they do.

But the line that moves me the most is “who they are becoming in Christ.” I am ashamed to admit that I often focus on who they have not yet become. Why do you think we do that to each other? Not give each other the benefit of the doubt. Not look at each other through the lens that God uses.

And…not only do I do that to other people, I do it to myself. It is so much easier to see what I am doing wrong…how I am falling short than to think of who I am ‘becoming’ in Jesus.

This quote challenges me to love others and to love myself. It challenges me to be more gentle and more gracious in my responses to the sin and brokenness I see in others….and in myself.

May you see the person that you are becoming in God. May you see the beautiful work He is doing in others….may you recognize redemption when you witness it.

Grace and peace,
Deb

http://www.flickr.com/photos/aspenbreeze/3897438118/
photo by aspenbreeze

stillness

2011-10-26T00:01:00.000-04:00

Thursday, October 14, 2010
be still

“Living without speaking is better than speaking without living. For a person who lives rightly helps us by silence, while one who talks too much annoys us. If, however, words and life go hand in hand, that is the perfection of all philosophy.”

Abba Isidore of Pelusia

I think I talk too much. I talk less now than I used to, but I think it is still too much. I sense God calling me to talk less and listen more…not only to Him, but to others as well. I have been aware of this for the past two years. Sometimes I am more conscious of it than others but it is becoming more natural.

One problem with being an extrovert who is discovering the beauty of silence and solitude…people want to know if you are “ok”. Once you find yourself turning down some invitations, being quiet during dinner or measuring your words in conversation, they assume there is something wrong. Sometimes I am disciplining myself, being careful to speak with purpose and not just fill the space with words. Sometimes I am in a ‘quiet’ mood and sometimes, I even sense God asking me to be still, in the midst of being with others.

I wonder how many people I annoyed with going on and on about something? I wonder if there were times when someone wanted to say “Would you just be quiet”? I wonder if there were times when it seemed as if all I did was talk about myself….

What I know is that God is calling me to a place of being still…both in my spiritual life and in my social life.

Is He inviting you to a place of quiet? What would that look like for you? What would change? Consider practicing stillness….and see how God speaks.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by idg http://www.flickr.com/photos/magdalengreen/368332569/

everyday sacred

2011-10-25T00:01:00.000-04:00

“Spirituality is the sacred center of which all life comes, including Mondays and Tuesdays and rainy Saturday afternoons in all their mundane and glorious details.”

Christina Baldwin

God is everywhere and in everything. Every moment has something of Him in it. All we need to do is be aware and be looking for it.

He is not only found in those activities we see as ‘sacred’ but also in the mundane….the everyday tasks we do with out even thinking about. Brushing our teeth, making our bed, doing the dishes, hanging out laundry.

When we begin to see life through these eyes, everything is sacred. Celebrate the sacred in your life.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by korinekphotography
http://www.flickr.com/photos/korinekphotography/2099826936/

living life

2011-10-24T00:01:00.000-04:00

“The great affair, the love affair with life, is to live as variously as possible, to groom one’s curiosity like a high-spirited thoroughbred, climb abroad, and gallop over thick, sun- struck hills every day. Where there is no risk, the emotional terrain is flat and unyielding, and despite all its dimensions, valleys, pinnacles, and detours, life will seem to have none of its magnificent geography, only a length. It began in mystery, and it will end in mystery, but what a savage and beautiful country lies in between.”

Diane Ackerman

What life like for you? Something to be endured or something to be explored? I can find myself caught up in the drudgery of everyday, ordinary life and things can begin to creep in…like discontentment, frustration, envy, weariness….you get the picture. It can seem dull and dreary. Black and white.

And then, there are times when I feel as if I am awakened to the mystery and beauty that is my life. Everywhere I look, I am surprised by beauty, by glory, by breathtaking views, and marvelous made individuals. I open my eyes and the world is full of color, texture and adventure.

What has changed? Nothing except my perspective. I want to have a great love affair with life...with my life. Even on those days that hold pain and sorrow, valleys and detours, I want to drink it in and be aware of each moment, noticing how the God of the universe is meeting me in the midst of it.

I invite you take a few minutes today and pay attention to how you are looking at your life. If you notice that it is black and white, offer a prayer to God asking Him to show the beauty that lies below the surface. If your life is awash in color, stop for moment and offer a prayer of thanks.

Consider living in the moment and galloping over the sun-struck hills that are the landscape of your life, a savage and beautiful country.

Grace and peace ~
Deb

photo by Cuba Gallery http://www.flickr.com/photos/cubagallery/3962027734/

trust

2011-10-22T00:01:00.000-04:00

"In the West, religion became preoccupied with telling people what to know more than how to know, telling them what to see more than how to see."

Richard Rohr

Think back over most of your ‘Christian education”. Is this true for you? Were you taught more what to know than how to know? More what to see than how to see? It was true for me.

When we tell others what they need to know about God, we take away their belief in their ability to hear from God themselves. They can become dependent on others to tell them what they should believe and how to live that belief out. I wonder how many times this leads to fanaticism at worse or lemming-like behavior at best.

When we are told what to see, we are robbed of the gift of discovery and wonder. We don’t even try to see….we just accept what we are told. Life in this mode is un-inspiring and predictable. Is it any wonder that some people walk away from a Christian life that has become more about right behaviors than about a dynamic, exciting relationship with the God of the universe?

When we teach people how to know and how to see, we trust that God will teach them, God will show them what He has for them….which, surprise, surprise, may not be what we think they need to know or need to see. Trust is deepened all around – us in trusting God’s movement in their lives and them trusting that God wants to communicate with them directly. It is like the saying, “Give a man a fish; you have fed him for today. Teach a man to fish; and you have fed him for a lifetime”.

Give people the tools to discover and discern God’s movement and they will find the journey with Him dynamic, energetic and full of surprises.

Grace and peace ~
Deb

photo by edwardrodriguez http://www.flickr.com/photos/pureenergy25/2302615615/

pain

2011-10-21T00:01:00.000-04:00

"Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional.”

There is pain in life. There is no way around it. This isn’t the way it was meant to be. There was no pain in the Garden.

All I need to do is look around…I am not living in the Garden any longer and so I have pain in my life. Thinking I can avoid pain is not choosing to live in reality.

I think what I do with the pain I encounter in life is the key. I am trying to look at pain through a different lens. Instead of asking “Why?” or even “What is God trying to teach me through this?”, I am trying to ask the question “Where can I see Jesus in this pain? How is He holding me in the midst of it?” I don’t just want to endure it…to get through it so I can learn the lesson on the other side. I want to be present during it, to be aware, to look at God’s hand in it.

Are you in the midst of a painful time? Are you struggling with why something painful happened in the past or why something painful is occurring right now? If so, I invite you to sit with God and ask Him to reveal Himself in the middle of it all…how is He carrying you even though you may not be able to sense Him? Consider journaling about those questions and resting in God as He slowly reveals the answers.

Grace and peace,
Deb

photo by karen brodie photograpy
http://www.flickr.com/photos/silverstar2501/2632871429/

receptivity

2011-10-20T00:01:00.000-04:00

“Contemplative practice is a skill, a discipline that facilitates a process that is out one’s direct control, but it does not have the capacity to determine an outcome. A gardener for example, does not actually grow plants. The gardener practices finely-honed skills, such as cultivating soil, watering, feeding, weeding, pruning. But there is nothing the gardener can do to make the plants grow. However, if the gardener does not do what a gardener is supposed to do, the plants are not as likely to flourish. In fact, they might not grow at all. In the same way a sailor exercises considerable skill in sailing a boat. But nothing the sailor does can produce the wind that moves the boat. Yet without the sailing skills that harness the wind, the boat will move aimlessly. Gardening and sailing involve skills of receptivity. The skills are necessary but by themselves insufficient. And so it is with contemplative practice and the spiritual life generally.”

Martin Laird

The spiritual disciplines are not what create intimacy with Jesus. They create the space to nurture intimacy with Jesus. When we spend time in silence, solitude, prayer, lectio divina, etc., we open ourselves up to what God may want to do within us. The very act of being still in God’s presence is an act of surrender…surrender to our agenda, surrender to our dependency on words, surrender to Him. And the more we practice surrender, the more we open the way to true transformation.

Consider today what you are practicing that puts you in a place of surrender to God, that says to Him –“I am yours…do with me as you like.”

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by TropicalLiving http://www.flickr.com/photos/tropicaliving/3019532658/

silence

2011-10-19T00:01:00.000-04:00

As a rule, most people are afraid of silence. That’s our major barrier to prayer and to depth. Silence and words are related. Words that don’t come out of silence probably don’t say much. They probably are more an unloading than a communicating.
Yet good words can also feed silence. But even the word of God doesn’t bear a great deal of fruit—it doesn’t really break open the heart—unless it’s tasted and chewed, unless it’s felt and suffered and enjoyed at a level deeper than words. If you look for the citations of Mary Magdalene in the Gospels, she acts, waits, listens, and asks, and hardly ever “says.”

If I had to advise one thing for spiritual growth, it would be silence.

Richard Rohr

I'll keep my thoughts to myself and let you be in silence with this....

Photo by lia_ro21
http://www.flickr.com/photos/24117329@N06/2780334551/

unforgiveness

2011-10-17T00:01:00.000-04:00

"Not forgiving is like swallowing rat poison and waiting for the rat to die.”

Anne Lamott

Living in a state of unforgiveness is poison to my soul. Why do I think that continuing to hold something against someone else hurts them? The reality is that often they don’t even know that I am upset. I’ve kept it to myself and feed it just a little each time I see them. Or, what about those things I am holding from years ago?

Although it is true that I can release someone else by forgiving them, the one I truly set free is me.

There is an antidote for the poison of unforgiveness….let it go.

Grace and peace,

Deb

Photo by Velvet of Scars http://www.flickr.com/photos/velvetofscars/4653647913/

blessed be your name

2011-10-15T00:01:00.000-04:00

Blessed Be Your Name
In the land that is plentiful
Where Your streams of abundance flow
Blessed be Your name

Blessed Be Your name
When I'm found in the desert place
Though I walk through the wilderness
Blessed Be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be Your name
When the sun's shining down on me
When the world's 'all as it should be'
Blessed be Your name

Blessed be Your name
On the road marked with suffering
Though there's pain in the offering
Blessed be Your name

Every blessing You pour out
I'll turn back to praise
When the darkness closes in, Lord
Still I will say

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your name
Blessed be the name of the Lord
Blessed be Your glorious name

You give and take away
You give and take away
My heart will choose to say
Lord, blessed be Your name

I apologize for the hit and miss of my posting this week. I've been preoccupied. On Tuesday, my daughter Brooke gave birth to a beautiful baby girl. Caia Lillian was born at 8:50 am. She is a gift. A big gift. She weighed 11 lbs 1 oz. Yeah - a big gift. As I have spent a large amount of time with Brooke and Caia this week, I have been reflecting on the mother-daughter relationship, and on the nature of living life. God gives and God takes away. Less than two months ago, I said goodbye to my mom. On Tuesday I said hello to Caia. Pain and beauty mingled together.

The Lords gives and the Lord takes away. Blessed be the name of the Lord.

May you be able to sing the same doxolgy today.
grace and peace-
Deb

reliance

2011-10-13T00:01:00.000-04:00

“May all your expectations be frustrated. May all your plans be thwarted, that you may experience the powerlessness and poverty of a child and sing and dance in the love of God the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit.”

A prayer offered by a friend for Henri Nouwen

Complete dependence on God is what I want. I think about it, I can even do it for a few moments at a time. Then I forget. Especially when things are going well. But, in those times when I feel as if things are out of control, my thoughts turn to God. Those times increase my dependence on Him. But I want more than just a ‘lifeboat’ mentality. I want to be fully aware of God’s presence and sovereignty in my life every day. May it begin today.

Grace and peace,
Deb

trust

2011-10-11T00:01:00.000-04:00

“Don’t spend a lot of time imagining the worst-case scenario. If it doesn’t happen, you have wasted time and energy and, if it does, you will have lived it twice.”

Michael J. Fox (paraphrase)

Last year, I was tuned into one of the morning shows and saw in interview with Michael J. Fox. He struggled with sitting during the interview, his body displaying the effects of Parkinson’s Disease. Despite the huge changes this disease has brought into his life, he sees it as gift. In fact, he calls it the gift that keeps on taking. He has a remarkable attitude.

I often, when teaching, speak on the subject of being in the moment. In class, we look at the fact that we spend the majority of our time either thinking about something that has happened in the past or projecting what may happen in the future. When we are absorbed in either of those places, we are not present in the now and we are missing what, essentially, is our life.

When the interviewer asked him about what the future may hold for him, Fox shared the above quote. It stopped me in my tracks. I can find myself considering the worst case scenario. I tell myself that if I envision it and, if it happens, I will be prepared. I do this on amusement rides (what if a bolt breaks), airplanes ( what is that vibration?!), eating foods in foreign countries (exotic parasites), self-diagnosis (jaw pain becomes brain cancer), just to name a few. In the past I had already considered that if it didn’t happen, I had wasted time and energy thinking about it. I had not thought that, if I am obsessing about bolts, I am missing the fun of the ride. And, I certainly had not considered that if it did happen, I would have lived it twice! I am thinking that is not so good.

I believe my best option is to be in the now, in the present, and trust that God will give me what I need when I need it. The way I live my life everyday displays either my trust in God or lack thereof.

Can you think of an area of your life that keeps you projecting into the future? Can you stop running the worst case scenario and trust Him with the outcome? Perhaps you can pray this prayer with me today….

May I, today, be present to what God has for me in this moment and trust Him for whatever tomorrow brings.

Grace and peace,
Deb

http://www.flickr.com/photos/jakig/2047616146/
photo by jaki good

lament to my friend

2011-10-10T00:01:00.000-04:00

My heart aches for the burden you bear.
I cannot fathom its depths.
Pain untold as you witness your children languish in their own choices.
Sometimes I carry judgment ~
I want you to deal the way I would deal…
Or would I?
How can I know how I would react?
I try to imagine but the pain of it keeps me from staying there.
If I am unable to even pretend how it feels,
how can I bring any judgment to you?

How can I love you?
How can I support you?
How can I be Jesus with skin on to you?
How can I invite myself into your pain, your world?
How can I truly be myself with you when I am in a place of blessing?
How can share my joy?

I think all I can do is leave you to the Father and ask Him to hold you – hold you in all your pain – the pain I am too frail to hold.
He knows….
how to love you,
how to support you,
how to be in your world of pain.
Because of Him I can try to be Jesus with skin on.
A poor substitute but He can cover my lack.
My hearts aches for the burden you bear.

Love,
deb

photo by my baby mia http://www.flickr.com/photos/miadefleur/4435750769/

prayer

2011-10-08T00:01:00.000-04:00

“If prayer is seen as just another thing to do, another duty, another time to please someone else, it is important to reframe it. Silence and solitude is a time and place to relax and rest in God’s arms. It is a time to love and be loved. Even if one doesn’t feel this love, the idea of love should be held in the mind until it falls into the heart.”

Robert J Wicks

Prayer is more than talking at God. It is being in communion with Him. It is being loved by Him and expressing quiet love to Him. May you carve out some time, sit with Him and sense His love for you today.
Grace and peace ~
Deb

Photo by sarah jannah http://www.flickr.com/photos/sarahjannah/4022562787/

walk to the edge

2011-10-07T00:01:00.000-04:00

“If we are called by God to holiness of life, and if holiness is beyond our natural power to achieve (which it certainly is) then it follows that God himself must give us the light, the strength, and the courage to fulfill the task he requires of us. He will certainly give us the grace we need.”

Thomas Merton

I have sensed God’s call, in the past for me to go somewhere (or many somewheres!) or to do something (like fly to those somewheres) that seemed way beyond my ability to do it. He invited me to go to the end of what I thought I could do so that I would need to lean on Him. As afraid as I was, I did it. And He did indeed meet me there and provide what I needed (maybe not what I wanted which was to be unconscious on the flight but definitely what I needed, like friends to hold my hand and tell me it would all be ok).

Then, about eight years ago, I sensed His call into a new vocation. That one took me a bit longer to respond to because I couldn’t accept that He was really offering this to me. When I finally accepted it and began the work, it became more than I could have ever imagined.

Again, He is moving and inviting me to more. I now, again, stand at the edge of what I know and what I think I can do. I am being invited to step the off the edge and trust that He will hold me. I do not possess inordinate amounts of confidence, especially in areas I have not ventured into before. But, I believe this is all part of God’s plan for me. It means I have to trust Him to meet me and also to give me what I need to walk into what He is asking. It reminds me of who is God and who is not.

I am standing at the edge and waiting – though this time it is not to work up enough confidence to step off but waiting for Him to say “Now…” But this time, instead of biting my nails and saying to myself “You can’t really do this’, I am leaning toward the edge, hands open, looking and listening to my God to call for me into step off into the unknown, the surprise, the adventure.

What might God be calling you to? Are you listening? Do you trust Him to give you what you need when you need it? What would trust look like in this place? Take some time today and think on these things.
Grace and peace,
deb

Photo by jeroenf http://www.flickr.com/photos/linkadoor/232556927/

presence

2011-10-06T00:01:00.000-04:00

breath

2011-10-05T00:01:00.001-04:00

“There is probably no image that expresses so well the intimacy with God in prayer as the image of God’s breath. We are like asthmatic people who are cured of their anxiety. The Spirit has taken away our narrowness (the Latin word for anxiety is angustia = narrowness) and made everything new for us. We receive a new breath, a new freedom, a new life. This new life is the divine life of God himself. Prayer, therefore, is God’s breathing in us, by which we become part of the intimacy of God’s inner life, and by which we are born anew.”

Henri Nouwen

Breathe in the Spirit today ~

Photo by Bailey Hildebrand http://www.flickr.com/photos/baileyraedene/4442324288/

wait and listen

2011-10-04T00:01:00.000-04:00

“Though not every impulse is divine guidance (by a long shot), and not every inner voice is God’s, ‘within’ is where we may find what we most need, away from the clatter and buzz of the marketplace and the media, away even from the many words that can drown out the still, small voice of the Spirit who speaks to those who have ears to hear. Much of the best prayer happens in waiting and listening. What comes in those times of prayer will have an element of precision and surprise one cannot quite reach if one fills the prayer space and prayer time with the busyness of thought.”
Marilyn Chandler McEntyre

Wait, listen and see what happens….

Grace and peace,
Deb