Learning to Be Astonished

Note one of the exercises in this section: "Go in your backyard, or a park, and simply observe. As you look at these living creatures (trees, grass, stones) think of what Chesterton said, that each blade and leaf and pebble is what it is because God made it. The leaf is not green by necessity; God tells it to be, and keeps telling it to be. Practice seeing the world in this way."

Before you dismiss this as "too imaginative" think about this scripture: "All things were created through Christ and for him. And he is before all things, and in him all things hold together." (Colossians 1:16-17)

O Lord, how manifold are your works!

In wisdom you have made them all;

the earth is full of your creatures.

May the glory of the Lord endure forever;

may the Lord rejoice in his works. 

(Psalm 104:24,31)

Consider this poem by Mary Oliver:

Messenger

My work is loving the world.

Here the sunflowers, there the hummingbird -

  equal seekers of sweetness.

Here is quickening yeast; there the blue plums.

Here the clam deep in the speckled sand.

Are my boots old? Is my coat torn?

Am I no longer young, and still not half-perfect? Let me

  keep my mind on what matters,

which is my work,

which is mostly standing still and learning to be

  astonished.
The phoebe, the delphinium.
The sheep in the pasture, and the pasture.
Which is mostly rejoicing, since all the ingredients are here,

which is gratitude, to be given a mind and a heart
  and these body-clothes,
a mouth with which to give shouts of joy
  to the moth and the wren, to the sleepy dug-up clam,
telling them all, over and over, how it is
  that we live forever.

Perhaps we can practice "learning to be astonished." This is not all that we need to know, but I think she is pointing to how we need to live. Knowing what and Who we know, it seems that we should find ourselves free to practice seeing the world differently, learning to be astonished.

Great grace and Small Gifts

Further Up and Further In

From our discussion of the chapter on John Bunyan, "Exercising the Gift," I thought I might put a couple of quotations and thoughts. First, I just wanted to put a Dallas definitions:

• Manifestations of Divine Power: you will see accomplished by your words and actions what cannot possibly be explained by your efforts and talents.

Also here are some ways which Bunyan discovered and learned his spiritual gift:

• He found out how he had been helpful to others. "Some of the saints had good judgment and holiness of life seemed to feel that God had counted me worthy to understand the blessed Word and that he had given me some measure of ability to express helpfully to others what I saw in it. So they asked me to speak a word of exhortation to them in one of the meetings."
• He tested his gift, exercising it to see if others received spiritual benefit. "I began to see that the Holy Spirit never intended that people who had gifts and abilities should bury them in the earth, he commanded and stirred up such people to exercise of their gift and sent out to work those who were able and ready."
• He was aware of how the Tempter would discourage him.  "In this work, I had different temptations. Sometimes I would suffer from discouragement, fearing that I would not be of anv help to anyone and that I would not even be able to speak to the people. At such times I have had a strange faintness seize me. At other times I have been assaulted by thoughts of blasphemy before the congregation."
• He noticed and rejoiced in his gift. "When I saw that they were beginning to live differently, and that their hearts were eagerly pressing after the knowledge of Christ and rejoicing that God sent me to them, then I began to conclude that God had blessed his work through me. And so I rejoiced. Yes, the tears of those whom God had awakened by my preaching were my solace and my encouragement."

Remember to pray for other peoples's gifts and try to encourage each other by noticing their gifts at work. "Gifts are desirable, but great grace and small gifts are better than great gifts and no grace. . . . Blessed is everyone to whom the Lord gives true grace, for that is a certain forerunner of glory."

Up Next

"The Sacramental Life (also known as The Incarnational Tradition) employs the material world to make real the spiritual world. In living incarnationally (embodying our spirituality) we participate in the physical sacraments of the church and live as God's people on earth, thus eliminating any material/spiritual dichotomy."  (Foster, Smith; Introduction to The Sacramental  Life)

We will be reading and discussing G.K Chesterton, A Magical Universe for our next meeting.  I look forward to this next stream.  We can learn so much about how to live our lives in a sacred manner.

We will be meeting at the Sierps on September 8 and 6:30 pm.

Whatever you do, do it all in the name of the Lord Jesus, giving thanks to God the Father thorugh him.  (Colossians 3:17)

Seeing Things in Their True Light

We must accept anyway he chooses to communicate with us and respect any way it pleases him to unite himself with others. . . .  Let us proceed each one along our path to the same goal, united in purpose and by means of God's order which, in its great variety, in is us all.  (de Caussade)

I hope we can encourage each other in our individual, yet also group, journey with Jesus.  Although quite unique, we share the same Lord who walks with each of us and teaches us.  I am privileged to walk with each of you and all of you.

I am hoping we can discuss some of the Reflection Questions this Friday (18th, 7pm) at the Sierps.  I am thinking we can also spend some time in the scripture reading as well.

"Let us see things in their true light and rise above them to live purely in God himself" this week.

The Spirit-Empowered Life: The Prayer of Examen

As a way of becoming more away of the movements of the Spirit in your life, I recommend the prayer of examen.  Here's a little blog entry I did on it a while ago:

Examen Examined

Weekly Assignment: Sharing the Joy

1. Read: (slowly and thoughtfully) Sadhu Sundar Singh: Sharing the Joy on the weekend.
2. Study: reflection questions talk them over with someone or journal abut them on Monday of Tuesday.
3. Practice: Pick one suggested exercise to try at the end of the week.
4. Pray: Respond to God about the material and lift up other group members.
5. Gather: Next Friday at Sierps at 7-8:30 pm.

Just a couple of quick videos of Dallas talking about:

The Gospel of the Kingdom

Grace and Spiritual Disciplines

Look forward to our gathering on Friday!

Matt

Weekly Assignment and the Curse of Superficiality

This week we'll begin exploring the World-centered Evangelical stream.  We are starting with E. Stanley Jones.  Looking forward to seeing you all.

Here's something I wrote yesterday for my blog.

The Curse of Superficiality



The curse is that we find our desire too weak to carry us beyond the shallows of human existence.  We long for more than what we are given in life, but cannot obtain it, because the superficiality takes us to the wrong places in the wrong ways.

Weekly Assigment: From Devotion to Prayer

Here are some images of devotion I picked up from our meeting on Monday:

• like a whole burnt offering completely consumed in fire for God
• like an eagle on the wind, with the right form and right positioning
• like being dug up and planted in new soil (actually in Psalm 1, the tree is "transplanted" by streams of water)
• the reason we do what we do

Quoting again from the beginning of the section:

For many people today devotional means ethereal, otherworldly, irrelevant.  To still others it implies sentimentality, superficiality, and an unwillingness to face the hard realities of life. . . .  [Devotion] aims at the transformation of the human personality. [It] seeks to touch the heart, to address the will, to mold the mind.  [It] calls for radical character transformation.  [It] instills holy habits.

We leave the first section behind of "preparing for the spiritual life" and go on to the first quality of such a life: being prayer-filled.  Before we leave, though, we must remember that what we learned about discipleship, deep passions for God, and devotion are the foundation we build on.  The disciplines of the spiritual life presuppose another life has indeed invaded our being.  None of the disciplines will yield the fruit we long for without the spiritual life that takes the disciplines and makes them into fruit like love, joy, and peace.

Such a life is not hard to find.  Jesus said it has been provided already by him.  We need to merely accept him and follow him and we will be in the middle of that new life, that life in Christ, that spiritual life.  We do not make it happen, but the "ball is in our court."  Christ has paid for the trip; we just need to go with him by doing as he says and seeking to know him more and more.

The contemplative life or the prayer-filled life is about hearing and obeying Jesus.  We will find it is much more than following commands, however.  His voice also delivers us and teaches us and keeps us company in the cool of the day.  We pray to know Christ as he speaks to us and to love hearing his voice.

We begin with George A. Buttrick, A Simple Regiment of Private Prayer.  We will meet ot talk about it on November 6, 3 pm at the Filer's.