the sensation of life
I am feeling it now, resistance to prayer. To pray, in the manner in which I pray, is to stop and to sit down, to relax and to let go. This is what I wrote about last month: relax and trust. But I don't want to. It hurts. As I relax, muscles that have been … Continue reading 3 reasons to pray: 1
But these two ways of describing the mystery of God—the way of darkness and the way of light, the ambiguity of silence and the transparency of articulation—can never be separated. There is danger in posing a sharp dichotomy between apophatic and kataphatic approaches, as if one were superior to the other, as if the higher … Continue reading Read from the heart
[This is the conclusion to Monday's post, Trust Me.] So, in what can we trust? Firstly what it is not: I cannot trust that I will find a parking space. I cannot trust that I will get that job I want. I cannot trust that my life will go well. I cannot trust that I … Continue reading Trust Me (conclusion)
The God of the Bible is ever an elusive one. The only guarantee of divine availability is God's own promise to be present to those who empty themselves in perfect trust.Belden Lane The Solace of Fierce Landscapes p.63 God, I have been thinking about trusting You, and what trust means, for some months, if not … Continue reading Trust Me
Prayer is a subversive activity. It involves a more or less open act of defiance against any claim by the current regime. Eugene Peterson: The Contemplative Pastor, p.10 The 'claim of the current regime' is multiple and multiply overwhelming: improve: today's achievement is never good enough tomorrow (something I learnt from working in the NHS); … Continue reading Prayer in the intersticies
Anxiety, holding Magnifying Glass. Studio Shot Anxiety is excitement without breathing.Fritz Perls So here we are: 11 Ways of Dealing with Anxiety. It took a while! Here's where we have been: BreatheFeel into this bodyMeeting with stillnessPrayerPauseTalkingWritingWalking and NatureDoing the dishesIdentifying fallacious reasoningSuffer the childThe next step Here are some things I have learnt in … Continue reading 11 Ways of Dealing with Anxiety: Roundup
Anxiety, holding Magnifying Glass. Studio Shot This is the tenth instalment of 11 Ways of Dealing with Anxiety, an ongoing experiment in meeting yourself with tenderness. If something hurts me, the hurts I suffered back then come back to me, and when I feel guilty, the feelings of guilt return; if I yearn for something … Continue reading 11 Ways of Dealing with Anxiety:
10. Suffer the child
Lift your heart up to the Lord, with a gentle stirring of love desiring God for his own sake and not for his gifts. Cloud of Unknowing, Ch.3 (tr. William Johnston) I wake up anxious, feeling layers of loss, the mess I call my life, a failure, ashamed to be me. I am sure some … Continue reading Soft heart, trusting heart
(repeated St Anselm’s, Kennington, 17 March 2013) Making a good space My daughters can create chaos on the living room carpet, with dressing-up clothes strewn, books and magazines they have finished reading, drawings and pencils, and various animal soft-toys they have been making up stories about and role-playing with, sweet-wrappers and bits of cut-up paper. … Continue reading Sermon: St Peter’s, Vauxhall
I have been rereading The Shape of Living by David F Ford. I am trying to put into practice something he says. Shape of Living by David F Ford There are two great simple truths about Christian desiring. The first is that God desires us.This is perhaps the hardest truth of any to grasp. Do … Continue reading On being loved and desired