Thoughts from class...

A question from class that has me.......thinking :)

Why do you think the Spiritual Disciplines are seen by many people as “optional add-ons for super Christians”?
I’m going to risk sounding heretical here.
The disciplines are, to a large degree, excluded from the Gospel we preach. We live in a culture where comfort is the ultimate commodity. Marketing efforts on the part of corporations (and, dare I say, churches) have blossomed. We hear that we are sinners, Jesus loves us and died for us, and that this death mysteriously makes it possible for us to shimmy into heaven when we die. We may even hear that being on God’s side will assure us material provision, comfort…even luxury. Some of this is good and true, but rarely have I heard the Gospel presented as an invitation to an ongoing journey, commitment, and struggle – “For your sake we are being killed all day long” (Rom. 8:36) is not a popular verse in evangelistic efforts. I have to wonder how much of the gospel we hear proclaimed today is merely the illegitimate child of our desire for fulfillment and the marketing schemes of twist doctors and image consultants.
We want people to buy into Christianity, so we do what can to make it appealing. Play up the good stuff, exaggerate a little, and play down or completely ignore the “unpleasantries.” After people are in, they may hear about courses or special schools for “discipleship” that require major time and commitment, but rarely (in my experience) of discipleship as the Way of living in the midst of our lives. So the assumption is easy to make: Discipleship is an extreme sort of lifestyle for an extreme sort of person and the rest of us are simply “not ‘built’ to be spiritual giants” (Reading Room article).

Lessons learned in raquetball...so far.

Ok, so....my brother talked me into taking a raquetball class at the athletic club...haha. Said no at first, but he said he'd pay for it - so what was there to argue with except my own pride? I've never been much of an athlete - too slow on my feet, and my eyes don't get along well with my hands - so I went into it rather....hesitantly. The first class was Tuesday. And again today. It's a challenge, and normally I'd have backed off or not even tried at all. But there's a smidgen of newfound courage in me these days, and I'm actually having fun!
After these first two classes - and with my new MSFL class ("Disciplines of the Spirit"), there are a few things worth noting....

1 - I'm not expected to play like a pro! I'm a beginner...and that's okay. My trainer does not expect immediate greatness -but a good effort and lots of fun. God's the same way, I think. He knows what I am....he knows what I am currently capable of. He also knows what I have the potential to become.
2 - Change comes incrementally. As I practice serving, my trainer helps me tweak the little things I'm doing that prevent me from really doing it well. As I practice receiving, he shows me how to adjust the way I stand, how I hold the racquet. This is similar to what happens when we engage in spiritual disciplines - little (sometimes big!) tweakings. These add up....to major change and total restructuring of how we "play the game."
3 - This desired change in how I play racquetball comes as I spend time with my trainer and with the other students in the class. On the first day of class, we were given printouts of the court layout, rules, etc. Our trainer told us very plainly, "Read 'em if you want, but the only way to really learn it is to get out there and play." The same goes for learning the Jesus Way. There's a place for study and structure...but real change comes when we spend time in relationship with God and others traveling the Way.
4 - Little victories are celebrated. I made a shot this morning that really wasn't all that great - but I did make the shot, and our trainer yelled, "Alright! Great shot, Barbara!!!" It wouldn't be helpful for him to scold me or for me to berate myself for the (many) times I flub things - and it would take a lot of the fun away. So too, as we move into life with the disciplines, small victories are celebrated. Self-condemnation is harmful to the process and sucks the joy completely out of the Journey.
5 - I don't return serves very well....and noticed that often I don't really expect to hit the ball! I figure I'm that bad! :) But because I'm not really thinking I'll hit it, when I do...my grip on the racquet is bad and thus the return is bad. Times that I expect and really intend to hit the ball...the return (sometimes - lol) kicks butt! As we engage in spiritual disciplines, do we really expect change? Do we really believe God will work in us to make the necessary changes?
6 - (there are more points in this than I thought there'd be!) My skills do not improve by comparing myself to others in the class. Our trainer's been playing for years - he's GOOD. My brother's already taken the class before - so he's pretty good. Two other guys in the class are, like, natural athletic types (grrr...). Comparing my skills to theirs gets discouraging pretty quickly! And the same is true of our Journey with God. Others' experiences of the disciplines, God's Precence, etc., are not the standard. There is no standard. There is dynamic, unique relationship (I'll have to follow up on this with another post.....).

Freely, lightly, full of joy......taking baby steps!

Butterflies on stampede in my stomach...

Yeah, ok..... keep breathing, Barb. It really is ok. Right now. Stay in the now. Deeeeeeep breathe.

Our second MSFL class officially opened tonight. Maybe it's just the typical "new class" anxiety, but right now I'm feeling pretty overwhelmed.

Yesterday I read something really great in Benedictine Daily Prayer. From the Psalms....that He knows me through and through. My resting and my rising. Every purpose in my heart. When I walk or lie down.
"Before ever a word is on my tongue you know it, O Lord, through and through. Behind and before you beseige me, your hand ever laid upon me...
O where can I go from your Spirit, or where can I flee from your face?"
Climb the heavens...
Lie in the grave...
Fly through to dawn...
journey to the end of the world....

Even there Your hand would lead me.

Even here your hand is leading me. Even here.

I am more and more certain...assured...that God is conducting the symphony of my life. When that first class started, He brought the theme of "letting go" before me. It's grown stronger and stronger. The same things I'm studying in my friday group are what this second class is kinda based on - the discipline of submission. Which requires letting go. This theme is coming at me from every direction. From my Fenelon readings, too.
"In this life there is no finished symphony..." But there is a symphony...playing continuously. Conducted by the Divine Hand.

Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner. I am Yours, save me. Free me from care for myself. Let my life be motivated more and more fully only by Your unspeakably great love for me...teach me to love You. To let go of everything else...and love only You.

Desolation?

Honestly, I have no idea what to write.

There's a lot swirling around inside. The last few days have been characterized by what Ignatius might have called desolation (thank you, Chris, for sharing this link - it's been a lifeline). Without digging too much up - I don't knwo how helpful hashing it all out again would be - here are some of my journalings...perhaps it will be helpful to anyone who might read it.

Hopelessness. Extremely complex thought patterns (trying to figure “me” out). Loss of vision. Emotional ups and downs. Absence of a real sense of His presence. Ick. Desolation? One reason desolation comes is “our own negligence of spiritual discipline. ‘We are tepid and slothful.’” Seems strange to admit this after several weeks of the most deep, life-changing, formational “class” I’ve ever taken. But it’s true, I think.
“In this life there is no finished symphony…”
Has the desolation of the last few days been the fruit of neglecting disciplines that would help me remember this fundamental truth? Disciplines of chastity? In other words, have I been careless in the placement of my hopes and affections?

Bear in mind, Rolheiser (The Holy Longing), isn't looking at chastity as purely to do with sexual abstinence. Rather, he sees it as relating to many and varied aspects of life. Patience is key in his description of chastity. Interestingly, it looks like Ignatius saw patience as key in surviving desolation...

“To be chaste is to experience people, things, places, entertainment, the phases of our lives, and sex in a way that does not violate them or ourselves. To be chaste is to experience things reverently, in such a way that the experience leaves both them and ourselves more, not less, integrated…
…we are chaste when we do not let impatience, irreverence, or selfishness ruin what is a gift by somehow violating it. Conversely, we lack chastity when we cross boundaries prematurely or irreverently, when we violate anything and somehow reduce what it is. Chastity is respect, reverence, and patience. Its fruits are integration, gratitude and joy. Lack of chastity is impatience, irreverence, and violation. Its fruits are disintegration of soul, bitterness, and cynicism” (The Holy Longing 202).
I’m really thinking this is at the root of the complexity of my thought life, the fear of not changing….being driven by desires for my future, becoming the “right” sort of person by the time such-and-such happens. Discontent now to become what I should be by then, if that makes any sense. But…then there’s the nagging question: If I am so discontent now, will it be any different when that time (whatever it may be) comes?

As I'm continuing the readings for class this week, I'm beginning to see that this time of desolation has carried purpose. I have a feeling there will be more blog posts on this topic....

Blank slate

We must never presume that we see. We must always be ready to see anew. But it's so hard to go back, to be vulnerable, and to say to your soul, "I don't know anything."
Try to say that: "I don't know anything."
Maybe you could think of yourself as an erased blackboard, ready to be written on. For by and large, what blocks spiritual teaching is the assumption that we already know, or that we don't need to know.
We have to pray for the grace of beginner's mind. We need to say with the blind man, "I want to see." ~Richard Rohr

Got this in an email from CAC recently. I've had trouble really absorbing so much of what we're reading and discussing in class. True, it's a lot of information to hold - and the focus isn't really on amassing knowledge. But, I think there's a tendency to kinda "Yeah, yeah"-read a lot. having been raised in church (where, unfortunately, know-it-all attitudes abound), I can read on two different levels. The easiest is to brush over the words...looking at the text as familiar stuff I've heard before. Sometimes I have to very intentionally slow my reading pace and keep in mind - "No, this is fresh and new. God's here reading with me, just waiting to renew my vision for formation, for church, for life."
Reading with the grace of a beginner's mind.

Paschal Mystery

Darkness...Suffering...Pain...Death...

...is a living, growing thing,
to be loved and handled
with diligence and grace.

...easily crushed by control,
smashed by resistence,
withered by defensiveness,
shattered by hurry.

...a gift to be loved,
nurtured,
entrusted to the earth
of God's full knowledge and love
to grow in ways
we cannot manipulate
or neatly manage.

ONLY the Maker knows
how to unlock the treasure
hidden within a seed.
Only One is the power
that explodes
sprout,
root,
leaf,
and blossom...
the form of new,
creative,
redemptive Life.


Life lived in the reality of the Paschal Mystery is a cross-shaped life. A life deeply rooted and upward reaching, extended out with open arms in love for others. A creative, redemptive tension compelling me to ascend the exhilarating heights, to explore the darkest depths of life. Root creeping deeper, branches reaching higher.

Pain will come.

Death is certain.

And new life is born.

Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me. Lead me to the Cross.



"The paschal mystery is the mystery of how we, after undergoing some kind of death, receive new life and new spirit....It begins with suffering and death, moves on to the reception of new life, spends some time grieving for the old and adjusting to the new, and finally, only after the old life has been truly let go of, is new spirit given for the life we are already living....The paschal mystery is the secret to life. Ultimately our happiness depends upon properly undergoing it" (The Holy Longing 146-48).

This is very, very deep....and very, very wide. I need to soak in all of this for a while.

Broken record

Been thinking more about the whole "letting go" thing (yeah, still). Sounds like a broken record - but a good one.

Got home from work and played around some with Bunter (my brother's English bulldog puppy) in the hallway. He's got this toy...he loves it. It's (was) a green plastic ball. Bunter lost no time in crushing it into a flat, chewed, crumpled thing. Anyway. Home from work. Hallway. We play this game - he's standing midway through the hall with Green Thing in his mouth (can't really get his teeth into it 'cause it's hard plastic). I'm at the open end of the hall.....creeping toward him, saying slowly, "I...gonna...gets...it....!" (yeah, it has to be those words) - and he freaks out and goes running as fast and far away from me as he can (to other side of the hall...oops, dead end). Hides his face in the corner and waits for me to get close enough to slip around me and go to the other end of the hall. He must be thinking, "Yeah the heck you're gonna gets it! Victory!!!" And the game begins again. If at any point in the game I decide to grab a different toy out of his basket, watch out!

I wonder if we, like Bunter, have our little toys and want to keep them safe in the confines of our slobbering jowls. The toys really aren't worth a whole lot....but they're ours. And we'll do whatever we have to do to keep them like that.

Thinking back on some discussion in class....we're wondering why? Why are we soooo intrigued with this idea of running the cosmos? Could it be simply that we, like Adam and Eve, have this screwball impulse to play God? It seems soooooo stupid to try managing all these little things of our lives, somehow imagining that we can do it better than He can. It makes so much sense to hand it over to someone big enough to take care of it all. So why? Why do we hang on to our control of things? Maybe Fenelon's words are helpful here...

Contemplative prayer is like....

Contemplative prayer beckons me to loosen my strangle-hold on life. It whispers of a freedom, intimacy and joy in life that I have only barely tasted – a life of seeing and knowing God and others for who they are, instead of what I demand them to be. This life is….(gulp) just over the cliff. All I have to do is let go. Let go of managing my schedule, my health, my friendships, my relationship with God. Letting go of the many words and feral thought-life that plague me. Simple, right?

The problem is that this “managed” life is sooooo real to me. Like the cliff. Rock solid and “safe.” I don’t know what’s over the cliff! I only know that it appears to be a very long way down. And what will happen to my tidy packaging of life if I take the leap? Over the cliff can be a frightening place.

But that is where the light shines. And in those moments of solitude and silent prayer…those times when the Jesus Prayer settles so sweetly in my heart and trickles into the air around me…those seconds when typing emails at work becomes a holy sacrament…that is when I know that in letting go, in putting my full weight into the fall, I’ll find a Hand. Simple, silent, and still. It catches me gently and there I am held above the raging waters, finally free to be my true self, to love others as they are, and to live intimately with my Abba.

So my grip loosens…my shoulders relax…and with Luther’s prayer (“I am Yours, save me!”) as my only remaining “defense,” my hands open and I’m falling.

Lord, free me from care for myself.

Random thoughts

Help! The motorcycles are invading my town!!

Seriously.

This weekend is the big bike rally. Ick. Good for some people, but for me....uh-uh. I live near a major highway, I work near a major highway, I drive from home to work on a major highway in a car that has no air-conditioning (sooo....window down if I want to breathe). Fun, fun.

On a...quieter note, we're talking in class about contemplative prayer. Everything I'm reading about it, in books or on the discussion boards, whether I've heard it before or not, is bringing the contemplative tradition alive for me. The frustrating part is that my mind isn't big enough to hold all the information!! And when you're talking about contemplation, you're talking about not having a mind so busy with finding connections and applications...but a quiet mind that nurtures a quiet heart. I want to live a contemplative life....not just know lots of cool words about it.

On yet another note - Mom stopped by (at my work) and dropped off a box from Amazon! (I'm a junkie. I need Amazon-Anon) I got Adele Calhoun's Spiritual Disciplines Handbook (for my next class) and Frank Laubach's Prayer, The Mightiest Force in the World. Having been so focused on the contemplative tradition, my mind has repeatedly been brought back to Laubach's life and work. I figured I'd explore some of his writings beyond the letters to his father.
Hmm....not that I needed any more books. I've got more books than I can handle as it is. Erasmus once said......"When I get a little money I buy books; and if any is left I buy food and clothes." That is sooooo literally me.

Mojo Wisdom

Mojo (for those of you wondering who this is, he is hands down the coolest professor I've had in my life) said something in class today....and I just had to share part of it. We're discussing contemplative prayer and lectio divina, a contemplative approach to reading Scripture. Here we go.....

"What is the relationship between head and heart—between information and transformation? For Augustine, conversion was not a matter of the intellect. He believed Christianity was true, he simply couldn’t do it. Peter Kreeft in Christianity for Modern Pagans insists: 'Christianity is not a hypothesis, it is a proposal of marriage.' (That’s my quote of the decade ;o). It is a matter of covenant commitment and submission, in other words, not of some intellectual formulae. 'You are reading?' queries Jerome. 'No. Your betrothed is talking to you, that is Christ, who is united with you.' Lectio is about passion, the burning longing and Eros Rolheiser alerts us to. 'Didn’t our hearts burn within us,' ask the two disciples who met Jesus on the Emmaus road. 'Didn’t they burn within us—when?—when he opened the Word to us, when he led us to the deeper understanding about the Christ.'"

A marriage propsal! My betrothed talking to me! Makes me want to go spend some time with the Scriptures.....

The deconstructive effects of silence/solitude

"When we discover ourselves "hidden with Christ in God," we don't need any kind of self-image at all. I hope this doesn't sound too esoteric, because it isn't; it's what happens in true prayer.
This is what will happen when we expose ourselves to silence and stop exposing ourselves to the judgments of the world; when we stop continuously "picking up" the energy of others; when we stop thinking about what others think of us and what they take us to be. We are who we are in God—no more and no less." ~Richard Rohr

I usually thing of silence as....quiet. There's inner silence, outer silence....there's even a sort of an undertone of silence that can be heard regardless of the noises going on around you. But it's even more than this. Mulholland (Invitation to a Journey) defines silence as "the deep inner reversal of that grasping, controlling mode of being that so characterizes life in our culture...relinquishing to God our control of our relationship with God"(pp 136-137). Nouwen (Way of the Heart) says that silence keeps us from becoming entangled in the world, from extinguishing the inner fire of God's Spirit, and from slipping into the wasteful use of words that is so prevalent in our world.

Solitude has a more outward quality to it. Going to a place apart...alone. But it is even more than this. Both Mulholland and Nouwen look at solitude as an unmasking of sorts. The (sometimes painful) tearing away of the many faces, fluffs and scaffolds wrenched, hammered, and soaked into us by the surrounding culture/society. It is the "furnace of transformation," where all that is not truly me is incinerated, completely demolished. Gee. Sounds like fun.

Silence, Nouwen says, is solitude in action - solitude taken out of a place apart and carried into the daily grind. Silence "completes and intensifies" solitude. So they are inseparably linked. And they work together at the task of creative demolition. What a beautiful mess.

Spiritual Formation.....one definition.

Spiritual Formation is the ongoing incarnation of Jesus though a graceful emerging of His character and life in, through and around us.

In response to God’s love for us, with Christ as the example, we live to conform to the will of God. But, it is not by our own will or strength, but by the Spirit of God working in us, daily working out our Salvation. Thus, we grow into the relationship God has called us to, with Him, and with the community before, around, and ahead of us. Amongst these relationships we live out God’s call to serve, understanding that service is an outpouring of the work God is doing in us. This way of life, is one that brings life. God is offering it, it our responsibility to choose it.

There are 7 components of this formation:

1. Transformation – a journey of being transformed into the image of Jesus, with humility, gratitude, obedience and trustworthiness ("until Christ is formed in you." Gal 4:19b) (Genesis 1:26 “. . . Let us make man in our image. . .”)

2. Conformation – conforming to the will of God in obedience; living an incarnate life, seeking a different path, a complete change ("For those God foreknew he also predestined to be conformed to the likeness of his Son ... " Romans 8:29) ("If you love me, you will obey what I command." Jn 14:15) (Romans 12:2 “And be not conformed to this world . . .)

3. By the Spirit –with the grace-filled Spirit of God working in us ("continue to work out your salvation with fear and trembling, for it is God who works in you to will and to act according to his good purpose." Phil 2:12-13)

4. Relationship - growing into a relationship with God, with our neighbors, and with a church community. Because “we are Christ’s body”, and we are the “skin” of God here on earth, this community is a central and essential aspect of faith and formation. ("Love the Lord your God with all your heart. . . Love your neighbor as yourself" Mark 12:30&31) ( … "Submit to one another out of reverence for Christ" Eph 5:21) ( … "Let us consider how we may spur one another on. . . let us encourage one another" Heb 10:24&25)

5. For the sake of others - becoming in the image of One who gave Himself completely, absolutely and unconditionally for others ("love your neighbor as yourself" Mark 12:31 … "My command is this: love each other as I have loved you. Greater love has no one. . ." John 15:12&13) One responsibility as we grow is to "radiate the compassion and love of God... in our actions" (HL, 102). "The last thing that Jesus asked of us before he ascended, was that we go to all peoples and nations and preach his presence" (HL, 102).

6. Engaged – a process in which we much be involved, active, and receptive to God’s Word, leading, and will (". . continue to work out your salvation. . . it is God who works in you. . . Phil 2:12b & 13 … ".) (. . let us throw off everything that hinders. . . and let us run with perseverance. . . Heb. 12:1b) ( … "You need to persevere so that when you have done the will of God, you will receive what he has promised" Heb 10:36) Part of this engagement component is a disciplined life – using and developing spiritual disciplines for growth; releasing ourselves in a consistent manner to God for His transforming work in our lives ("Take my yoke upon you, my yoke is easy and my burden is light" Matt 11:29 & 30) ( . . ."live a life worthy of the calling you have received" Eph 4:1) (James 1: 2 - 4 "Consider it pure joy . . . so that you may be mature and complete, not lacking anything")

7. Wholistic: "channeling our energies/longings – the fire inside - to bring integration and wholeness; saying 'yes' to God at each point of unlikeness; nurturing preference and shadow sides; coming out of our brokenness into wholeness in Christ" ("Forgetting what is behind and straining for what is ahead, I press on . . ." Phil 3:13b & 14) (". . . become mature, attaining to the whole measure of the fullness of Christ" Eph 4:13b)

(This is the definition my team came up with this week.....Go BLUE!)

Aw, yeeeaaahh...

I just got my plaaaaaaaane tickets for the first January residency (J-term). We got some of the details yesterday....it's going to be amazing. The speakers/leaders, the place (Philadelphia)....and the people - my cohort members and I will be meeting face-to-face for the first time. That is exciting.

"Everything we do spiritually is to help wake us from slumbering forgetfulness."
~MoJo

waking up

Something in me has been "sleepy" for so long. Inattentive. Bland. But now....I feel like I'm slowly coming awake.
The reading I've been doing for class has certainly been part of it. But I am moved to tears as I think about the community developing in our online classroom. There is such openness... received with such love. As I read others' thoughts on the dicussion boards, I begin to see that so many things I have struggled with are not completely unique to me. I'm not alone in my weaknesses, my desires. Some of the posts have even opened my eyes to struggles/desires in me...that I didn't realize I had! What grace. Oh God, we are broken. Make us worthy vessels for your Spirit. Teach us to receive your grace and turn again to pour it out for each other.

If I had a year to live...

Dr. Mojo (my professor) asked this question yesterday. It's been on my mind a lot.

If I had a year to live, I would...
-Stop comparing myself to others and instead ask How is God speaking to me through this person?...And worry much less about what people think of me...and more about other people and their needs.
-Talk less, listen more...attentively.
-Make (particularly family) relationships right before God.
-Spend a lot more time with God and with others - that whole being/doing thing again!
-Publish a kids' story that's been sitting on my desk for a couple years.
-Take dance lessons.
-Cancel my health insurance :)

It's hard to really put yourself in this frame of mind, you know? It shouldn't be, though...since life really is a fragile thing and every breath a gift. It should be near the surface of our awareness continually. Teach us, dear Lord, to number our days that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.

SAU - Week Two?!

Starting my third week already. Week 1 was orientation...getting used to the interface, where to find things, etc. I've taken so many online classes before that it's coming easily. And my job situation is such that I can check the discussion boards before the new posts pile up on me. I feel kinda guilty, really....so many in the class have been struggling with the technology aspect of it and with having so many new posts to read - feeling very overwhelmed. I don't know how to help.

This week's reading was in Invitation to a Journey, Streams of Living Water, and Out of Solitude. Rich, rich, rich! I wish I'd kept better notes. Oh, well. I'll begin again on the week three readings.
The assignment this week is to write, submit, and discuss our Personal/Spiritual Profile and Narrative. A spiritual autobiography of sorts. I thoroughly enjoyed writing it...there was a lot of digging around, and some of it hurt. Some things I really, really, really, really didn't want to post in front of the whole class, but that couldn't be ignored as a major spiritual turning point in my life. In the interest of authenticity and brokenness, I "let it all hang out."

Starting the reading for next week now...in The Holy Longing and Invitation to a Journey. We'll be defining "spiritual formation".....and it only gets better!!

Thank you, Abba, for leading me to this path. Strengthen my friends and me by your grace to enter Your Community...to breathe in the readings and let them infuse our daily living.

Standing By

In Rembrandt’s painting of the prodigal, the character(s) I identify with may vary from day to day, moment to moment, depending on who I am with, what I am doing, my hormonal balance, the weather conditions, and just about anything else! Sometimes I feel the brokenness of the prodigal; sometimes the anger and judgment of the brother; and every once in a while I offer someone the love of the Father. Overall, though, I am generally the man in the very back. Hidden. Awkward. Not quite fitting in anywhere. Looking on the scene with longing. Learning by others’ actions the value of being “defective,” wrecked, broken.

Who are you?

First "official" day of class at SAU...

John O'Donohue's blessing "For a New Beginning" - A near-perfect expression of my heart...and a prayer for all beginning this journey together:


In out-of-the-way places of the heart,
Where your thoughts never think to wander,
This beginning has been quietly forming,
Waiting until you were ready to emerge.

For a long time it has watched your desire,
Feeling the emptiness growing inside you,
Noticing how you willed yourself on,
Still unable to leave what you had outgrown.

It watched you play with the seduction of safety
And the gray promises that sameness whispered,
Heard the waves of turmoil rise and relent,
Wondered would you always live like this.

Then the delight, when your courage kindled,
And out you stepped onto new ground,
Your eyes young again with energy and dream,
A path of plenitude opening before you.

Though your destination is not yet clear
You can trust the promise of this opening;
Unfurl yourself into the grace of beginning
That is at one with your life's desire.

Awaken your spirit to adventure;
Hold nothing back, learn to find ease in risk;
Soon you will be home in a new rhythm,
For your soul senses the world that awaits you.

Out of Solitude - Part 3

Henri Nouwen's three meditations on the Christian life presented in this little book seem so simple - and so deep. The book is divided into three sections: Out of Solitude, With Care, and In Expectation. Here are my thoughts on the third part:

John 16:16-22
True and deep caring for others can be painful. It does not make for an easy life. We do not have within ourselves adequate resources to sustain such a life over the long haul. As we immerse ourselves in the pain and suffering of others, we must cling to hope – confident expectation that redemption will come.
“Without expectation, care easily degenerates into a morbid preoccupation with pain and gives more occasion for common complaints than for the formation of community (p. 53).”

Expectation as Patience
“…What seems a hindrance becomes a way; what seems an obstacle becomes a door; what seems a misfit becomes a cornerstone (p. 55)… That is the great conversion in our life: to recognize and believe that the many unexpected events are not just disturbing interruptions of our projects, but the way in which God moulds our hearts and prepares us for his return (p. 56).”
Expectation – hope – gives strength to climb the mountains of suffering we embark on when we commit to care. The caring is, then, a passage of sorts. A transition. A movement from one way of life to another; one realm to another. A passage requires patience and perseverance. So many stories tell us how the characters are transformed – usually through difficulty of some kind – into a whole new way of being. Images come to mind of the difficult journey for Frodo and Sam as they travel through Mordor to take the ring to Mount Doom. They persevere, they keep going, and they have hope.
Patience is necessary even when circumstances are not overtly painful. When things don’t turn out as we expected, or when our lives seem utterly boring and off-track – these are also times that we must look up in hope and press on with patience.
But what comes first? There is no patience without hope, but can there truly be hope without patience? “…patience is the mother of expectation (p. 59).”

Expectation as Joy
“A man or woman without hope in the future cannot live creatively in the present (p. 59).”
By patience and perseverance we know that our hopes will come to pass. This sets joy in our hearts! When we have something to look forward to, the dull dreariness of today fades – things look brighter. Nouwen compares it to receiving a letter from a loved one, with news that we will see each other soon. There is expectation and joy (probably accompanied by a sudden awareness of the impending housecleaning tasks). Without the joy of our hopes, our patience will be very short-lived.
“…Our intimate relationship with God can become deeper and more mature while we wait patiently in expectation for his return (p. 61).”