spiritual life

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How’s Your Day Going?

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“Praise be to His glorious name forever; may the whole earth be filled with His glory.” – Psalm 72:19

Early one morning I asked God, “How is Your day going?” Here’s what I thought He might be saying:

“Oh, Bev, I am so sad at the unrest on Earth. These problems (killings, racial conflict, riots, wars, poverty, deceit, sickness, death) are all a result of generations of sinfulness. The centuries-long threads of mistakes, unforgiveness, and attitudes are weaving together a tapestry that becomes darker and uglier as time goes by. Someday I will untangle it all and recreate the picture as it was meant to be, but not yet.

“In other ways, it’s a great day. The sun is shining, the rivers are flowing, the oceans are waving, and trees are growing. And that’s only the Earth. There is a huge universe you don’t even know of. I can’t tell you about it in ways you would understand, so someday I will show it to you!”

Did you ever wonder how God’s day is going? It’s OK to ask Him. He loves to share His heart with us Earthlings!

“If we cooperate with Him in loving obedience, God will manifest Himself to us, and that manifestation will be the difference between a nominal Christian life and a life radiant with the light of His face.” – A. W. Tozer

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Change Me

“Be the penetrating light which illumines my intellect,

the gentle motion which attracts and directs my will,

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“. . . a longing fulfilled is like a tree of life.” – Proverbs 13:12

the supernatural power which gives energy to my body.

Complete in me Your work of sanctification and love. Make me

pure
transparent
simple
true
free
peaceful
gentle
calm
and burning with charity toward God and my neighbor.

Amen.”

This prayer (written by a woman known simply as Sr. Carmela of the Holy Spirit) touched me because it describes so much that I, too, want to pray.

Look at those words of peace, freedom, and calm, resulting, at the end, in loving God and others. Do they resonate with you, too? If so, I invite you to join with me in praying this borrowed plea often and sincerely. Only God can make the changes in us that we so desperately need.

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He’s First

Do you ever wish God would just write His will across the sky so you can understand it clearly? Something like that happened to me a couple of weeks ago. Actually, it wasn’t the sky He wrote on, it was a mountain.

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“My soul yearns for You in the night; in the morning, my spirit longs for You.” – Isaiah 26:9a

I got up, started the coffee in preparation for my early morning time with God, and began a conversation with Him as the coffee began to brew. As I waited, I looked out the kitchen window toward the mountains to the southwest. A prominent snowfield was visible on one of them and had melted into the shape of a giant “1”. I looked again thinking I must be seeing it wrong. But, no, it was really a “1”. God had written His will on the side of a mountain for me to see: He wants to be first in my life!

As I prayed, I realized He wants to be the first one I think of when I wake up in the morning, the first one I turn to when I need help, the first one I recognize when something good happens in my life, and the only one I ever worship.

The snowy “1” remained there for the rest of our stay in the mountains and was a many-times-a-day reminder of God’s perfect will for me – and for all of us who are His children. When we make Him first, we are less afraid, worried, and frustrated and more often filled with love, joy, and peace. It’s the best way to live!

“Every happening, great and small, is a parable whereby God speaks to us, and the art of life is to get the message.” ~Malcolm Muggeridge

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There’s So Much More!

What do we really know about God? All we can know is what He reveals: first, through creation, the Bible, and Jesus’ life and teaching. But there’s more: He seems to keep revealing Himself as we keep wanting to know Him better.

"As the heavens are higher than the earth, so are my ways higher than your ways and my thoughts than your thoughts." - Isaiah 55:9

“If You are pleased with me, teach me Your ways so I may know You and continue to find favor with You.” – Moses to God in Exodus 33:13

It’s a great adventure to experience God’s ongoing revelation of who He is. For example, He shows us His

  • . . . pleasure when He knows we are turning our hearts toward Him.
  • . . . joy when we discover something in His creation we never saw before.
  • . . . love when He answers a prayer way beyond what we even dared to ask.
  • . . . guidance when He brings wisdom from an unexpected source.
  • . . . grace when we try to overcome a sinful habit and fail yet again.

None of this revelation is predictable, manageable, or even made clear in Scripture, but it seems God is constantly showing us more about who He is and how He wants to relate to us. Because He never changes, we can be sure that what we have yet to learn will be consistent with what we already know. We can count on Him always to be loving, merciful, holy, just, faithful, and gracious.

We will never know all there is to know about God and what we do know is filtered through a dimly-lit mirror, but sometimes He shows us a little more. Mysterious? Yes. But also exciting. And the best part: He’s not hiding. If we want to know Him, He will never disappoint. Every time He shows us more of Himself, our response will be  amazement and thanks!

“The biggest human temptation is to settle for too little.” – Thomas Merton

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Stormy Weather

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“In the end I chose to let Him love me and then chose to trust that love.”  – Peter *

Sometimes life is stormy. And when the storm comes, we usually struggle for awhile, then we pray, asking God to stop the wind and relieve our pain.

Instead, maybe the scenario should be more like this:

Think of yourself in a big wooden boat with Jesus – just the two of you. He looks at the sky and tells you a storm is coming, it’s time to go down into the hold. You remember that He did that when He was with the disciples, so you follow Him gladly.

Once there, a ferocious storm breaks out. You are afraid and are being thrown from one side of the boat to the other. Panicking, you ask Him to calm the storm like He did before. He doesn’t seem to respond. But He reaches out, pulls you gently toward Him and holds you so you are no longer being tossed about.

Then He speaks quietly, “The storm will pass, but I am not going to stop it from running its course. Instead, we’re going to stay here together. With Me you will be safe. And when it’s all over, you will trust Me more. The kind of trust I want you to have can grow only in the storm.”

Can we trust Him to take us through the storm? To hold us close when it’s darkest? To love us enough to do the right thing for us at the right time? We can. We learn that in the storm.

“We wait in hope for the Lord; He is our help and our shield. In Him our hearts rejoice, for we trust in His holy name.” – Psalm 33:20-21

 *From The Fisherman by Larry Huntsperger

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Joy!

At the time of Jesus’ birth, an angel announced, “I bring you good news of great joy that will be for all the people.”

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“For you shall go out in joy and be led forth in peace; the mountains and the hills before you shall break into singing and all the trees of the field shall clap their hands.” – Isaiah 55:12

That joy is for us, too! Have you found it? If so, you know it is not in the right gift under the tree, the perfect meal, or even the year-end bonus. These things delight for a time, but don’t give the deep-down, long-lasting, more-than-emotional, bubbling-over joy the angel was talking about.

The angel-announced joy was about an entirely new way of life that Jesus would bring – a life lived out moment-by-moment with Him. When we are in touch with our Creator, sensing His nudges, feeling His comfort, realizing His wisdom, and obeying His direction (even when it’s hard), there is joy.

True joy is recognizable by its awakening within us a desire for something that is beyond ordinary – maybe hearing music that sings to your soul, maybe in particular relationships, maybe in a resonating phrase or idea in a book you are reading, maybe in a neon sunset or a starry sky, maybe . . . what is it that makes your heart overflowingly happy?

Do you recognize God in your beyond-ordinary moments? He is there. We know authentic joy only because of relationship with the Eternal. Thank You, Jesus, for being the joy of Christmas and every day thereafter!

“Joy is God in the marrow of our bones.” – Eugenia Price

 

 

 

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He’s Not Giving Up

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“God loves each of us as if there were only one of us.” – Augustine

Sometimes I think that if I were God, I would be ready to give up on me. I just am not where I want to be in my spiritual life and I imagine He must be getting pretty tired of me coming back to Him with the same old sins to confess and the same old worries to present. Sometimes, it’s discouraging.

Then He speaks something like this to me:

“You are securely connected to Me.

• I will never change my mind about you.
• I already know who you are and how you will finish.
• I will never let you go.
• I will never stop blessing you.”

He makes no excuses for me, but He accepts me as I am. He knows I am dust and I will fall. He knows I am weak and I will stumble. But still He lets me feel His love and, when I open myself to receive it, I am ready to begin again. He always welcomes me back.

He will never give up on me. And He won’t give up on you, either. Not ever. It’s OK to be amazed at that!

“When the cares of my heart are many, Your consolations cheer my soul.” (Psalm 94:19)

 

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Glimpses of Another World

“If I find in myself desires nothing in this world can satisfy, the only logical explanation is that I was made for another world.” – C. S. Lewis

“The soul can split the sky in two and let the face of God shine through.” – Edna St. Vincent Millay

There is another world intersecting with ours every day. We usually are oblivious to it, but I am learning that we don’t have to be.

Jesus is the door to that world and we often feel closest to it when we pray, or praise, or think on His Word. Another key component for me, though, has been in practicing awareness:

  • God reveals a little of Himself in the flower we hold, in the waves of the sea, or in the stars on cloudless night. Are we paying attention to His creation?
  • God’s image is in every person we meet, though they may not know it. Are we aware? Are we looking for Him in them?
  • There is a bigger purpose behind everything we do and everything that happens to us. Can we sense it?

As we become more and more attuned to the intersecting world, we realize how absolutely real it is. It makes the world we see, as C. S. Lewis also says, seem like “only shadows” of the reality that exists. What is truly amazing is that God sometimes pulls back the curtain to give our souls a glimpse of the invisible. It is then we realize that our deepest desires can be met only in the world we cannot see. A taste leaves us longing for more. Awareness, living mindfully, can help us see the unseen.

“So we fix our eyes not on what is seen, but on what is unseen. For what is seen is temporary, but what is unseen is eternal.” 2 Corinthians 4:18

 

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Delightful Saints

As for the saints who are in the land, they are the glorious ones in whom is all my delight. (Psalm 16:3)

God delights in saints – those who are committed to relating to Him and living out that relationship in their day-to-day lives. I do, too.

I have many saints who bring cheer, support, and joy into my life: My husband, my spiritual mentor (who is now with Jesus), my ministry mentor, my lifelong friend, my book-reading friend, my compassionate friend, my hospitality friend, my “I’ll do anything to help” friend, my psychologist friend, my praying friend, my friend who is a light in a dark place, my daughters.

Who are the “saints who are in the land” for you? I hope you have a long list. They are the ones who make our lives rich, full, interesting, challenging, and fun. Thank you, Lord, for putting some special saints on life’s path with me!