Chapter 23 - Distractions

Chapter 23 referred to 7 Bible passages to help us focus on the subject of “Distractions”, as follows:

Luke 6:46-49
2 Timothy 1:1-14
Proverbs 3:1-18
Ephesians 6:10-20
John 5:1-15
James 3:13-18
Luke 10:38-42

Prayer:

Try to use some of the ways of adoration and meditation to aid you in freeing your mind from all the things that would invade your mind as you would pray.

Hymn:

The hymn for Chapter 23 was “Sweetly Resting” by Mary D. James. (If you are not familiar with the song, just Google the hymn name and you will get multiple sources to read and/or hear it, as well as its history.)

Benediction:

“Father, you are full of compassion. I commit and commend myself unto you, in whom I am, and live, and know. Be the Goal of my pilgrimage, and my Rest by the way. Let my soul take refuge from the crowding turmoil of worldly thoughts beneath the shadow of your wings; let my heart, this sea of restless waves, find peace in you, O God. Amen.” (St. Augustine in Little Book of Prayers)

Meditation Selections:

The meditation selections included excerpts from the writings of Igumen Chariton of Valamo, Evelyn Underhill, Henri J. Nouwen, M. Basil Pennington, Andrew Murray, Harry Emerson Fosdick, Morton T. Kelsey, George MacDonald (edited by C. S. Lewis), and Brother Lawrence. (Googling their names may give you some insight into their backgrounds and experiences, if that's of any interest to you.)

Some of the interesting quotes from the meditations included:

· “You must not allow your thoughts to wander at random, but as soon as they run away, you must immediately bring them back…. St. John of the Ladder says of this, ‘You must make a great effort to confine your mind within the words of prayer.” (Ed. Note: St. John of the Ladder is quoted in honor of Bill Schmidt. LOL)
· “Most of our conflicts and difficulties come from trying to deal with the spiritual aspects of our life separately instead of realising (sic) them as parts of one whole.”
· “Moods are worth attention. I am discovering … that I am subject to very different moods, often changing very quickly.”
· “… ‘Think glorious thoughts of God – and serve Him with a quiet mind!’ …the more glorious and more spacious our thoughts of Him are, the greater the quietude and confidence with which we do our detailed work will be.”
· “How completely we are dependent on the coming and abiding presence of his grace.”
· “… I lack the urgency and desire to pray. … so also will I deliver you from the sin of prayerlessness – only do not seek the victory in your own strength. … Be assured of this – I will teach you how to pray.”
· “… the privilege of prayer, the supreme opportunity of friendship with God kept vital by deliberate communion…”
· “One has to set aside time for silence and then turn toward it with composure, letting go of immediate things a little at a time in order to enter a world where dreams and also the energy for life are born.”
· “… the pilgrim must be headed back from the sidepaths into which he is constantly wandering.” · “Let it be your business to keep your mind in the presence of the Lord. … the will must bring it back in tranquility.”

What do any of these quotes (or any of the meditations in Chapter 23 not quoted) mean to you?


Please post your responses to the blog site:
(http://lhcndeeperlifeclass.blogspot.com/).

Thanks for your participation.

John

Chapter 4 (first session) Discipline

Chapter 4 referenced 7 scripture passages dealing with discipline in the Bible (with my personally assigned title for each passage):

• John 3:25-36 (Certifying God as truthful)
• Luke 12:35-48 (Readiness and Responsibility)
• Matthew 25:14-30 (Risk and rewards)
• Romans 12:1-2 (How to know God’s will)
• Luke 2:41-49 (Acting on God’s will)
• Deuteronomy 27:1-8 (Publishing God’s will)
• I Thessalonians 4:1-12 (Sanctification is God’s will)

The hymn for the week was "Sweet Will of God". (If you are not familiar with the song, just Google the hymn name and you will get multiple sources to read and/or hear it, as well as its history.)

The meditation selections included excerpts from the writings of Annie Dillard, Virginia Stem Owens, Emilie Griffin, Edward J. Farrell, Albert C. Outler, Tilden H. Edwards, Henri J. Nouwen, Evelyn Underhill and Brother Lawrence. (Googling their names may give you some insight into their backgrounds and experiences, if that's of any interest to you.)

Some of the interesting quotes from the meditations included:

• …life … in time is not a stumbling from one ecstatic epiphany to another. The enormous task is to keep your eyes open, your wick trimmed, your lamp filled, your powder dry. … There are no two ways about it. You’ve got your eyes open or you don’t. … Whatever the great human enterprise currently in hand, the point is to watch. All the rest is addenda. Seeking the kingdom is the essential (thing).
• Prayer is a matter of keeping at it. The rewards will come no other way. … You should have it firm in your mind that prayer is neither to impress other people or to impress God. … The goal, in prayer, is to give oneself away. The Lord loves us – perhaps most of all – when we fail and try again.
• Prayer tomorrow begins today or there will be no prayer tomorrow. … Prayer is a journey, a path that is created only by walking in it. (Editor’s comment: Prayer is not a fly-over.) … Eventually one is led out to the desert where one discovers the new creation and becomes a new creature.
• The denying ourselves, and the taking up our cross, in the full extent of the expression, is not a thing of small concern: It is not expedient only, as are some of the circumstantials of religion: but it is absolutely, indispensably necessary, either to our becoming or continuing His disciples.
• …spiritual discipline…is to aid human digestion of the Holy, so that we do not 1) reject his nourishment, 2) throw it up by not allowing room inside for it, 3) mistake “artificial flavors” for the real thing, or 4) use its strength for building an ego empire.
• Yes, I notice, maybe only retrospectively, that my days and weeks are different days and weeks when they are held together by these regular “useless” times (time with God). God is greater than my senses, …thoughts, …heart. …when I feel this inner pull to return again to that (time with God), I realize that something is happening that is so deep that it becomes like the riverbed…
• …being a disciple means living a disciplined life…
• You do not have to sit outside in the dark. If, however, you want to look at the stars, you will find that darkness is necessary. But the stars neither require nor demand it.
• One way to recollect the mind easily in the time of prayer… is not to let it wander too far, …(but to) …keep it strictly in the presence of God.
• Some of us are more naturally night people or morning people. …Most important though is not the number of times or duration (of our prayers), but on deciding on some time and duration and sticking to it, at least for a trial period of a few weeks. …we treat it like brushing our teeth: it is just something we “do”, without agonizing over it each time.
  

What do any of these quotes (or any of the meditations in Chapter 3 not quoted) mean to you? I look forward to your responses.

John

Chapter 3 Addressing God

Chapter 3 selected 7 scripture passages to illustrate how God was addressed by some of the people in the Bible (with my personally assigned title for each passage):

Luke 10:25-28 (The testing lawyer calls Him “Teacher”)
Matthew 6:1-4 (Give confidentially, except for the Father’s knowledge)
Exodus 20:1-17 (The Ten Commandments – “I am the Lord your God”)
John 1:1-18 (the Word)
Proverbs 8:22-36 (I, the Lord, was there before…)
Romans 5:1-11 (God as Christ, showing faith, grace, hope and reconciliation)
Luke 18:9-14 (Approaching God in different attitudes)

The hymn for the week was "O God, Our Help in Ages Past".
(If you are not familiar with the song, just Google the hymn name and you will get multiple sources to read and/or hear it, as well as its history.)

The meditation selections included excerpts from the writings of Anthony Bloom, Abraham Joshua Heschel, Annie Dillard, Harry Emerson Fosdick, Martin Buber, and Kenneth Leech. (Googling their names may give you some insight into their backgrounds and experiences, if that's of any interest to you.)

Some of the interesting quotes from the meditations included:

• …think of the warmth, the depth and intensity of your prayer when it concerns someone you love or something which matters to your life. …Does it mean that God matters to you? No, …it simply means that the subject matter of your prayer matters to you.
  
• What is decisive? Decisive is not our “feeling” but our “certainty” of His being close to us… Decisive is not our emotion but our “conviction”. The true source of prayer…is not an emotion but an insight…insight into the mystery of reality…
  
• It is all right – believe it or not – to be people.
  
• Nothing could be more intensely individual than the prayers of the Bible. …There are as many different ways of praying as there are different individuals.
  
• “How can you bring yourself to say ‘God’ time after time?” …It is the most heavy-laden of all human words. None has become so soiled, so mutilated. …But we may not give it up. …We cannot cleanse the word ‘God’ and we cannot make it whole; but, defiled and mutilated as it is, we can raise it from the ground and set it over an hour of great care.
  
• Jesus is clearly encouraging a relationship with God which is marked by childlikeness.
  
• Unless we can find the right name for God, we have no free, real, joyful, open access to Him. …There are moments when the sacred writers…burst out with something which has the quality of a nickname (a “personal name”)… Remember the Psalm in which…suddenly David bursts out, “You, my Joy!” That is the moment when the whole Psalm comes to life, …evidencing a personal relationship.
  

What do any of these quotes (or any of the meditations in Chapter 3 not quoted) mean to you? I look forward to your responses.

John