REFLECTIONS
Insights from God’s Word into Today’s World
Throughout our journey over the past three weeks in adopting the various means of grace, we come to the final discipline which we will cover, namely, meditation. In essence, Christian meditation entails both intently focusing on God and His Word and being mindful of His presence throughout the day. In practice, most of the spiritual disciplines which we have adopted throughout the past three weeks entail meditation, or can be used in the practice thereof.
Whether you are walking around the neighbourhood or hiking in the mountains, walking awakens your life with Christ as it revives body and soul. God Walk explores walking as spiritual formation, walking as healing, walking as exercise, walking as prayer, walking as pilgrimage, suffering, friendship, attentiveness, and more . . .alongside the God who, incarnate in Jesus, turns to us as he passes by‒always on foot‒and says simply, “Come, follow me.”
Up until this point in this 21-day Journey, ‘Means of Grace,’ we have focused on our vertical relationship with God. And there is good reason for that. But Jesus wants our lives to spill over with His Love and Life to touch more and more people with His Grace. And so we have included one ‘outward’ ‘means of grace’ so we “Do not forget to show hospitality to strangers…” (Hebrews 13:2).
In a world which values “hustle culture” and idolizes the concept of being as busy and productive as possible, it would seem that being still and alone with God would come as a superfluous luxury. However, as is often said, Jesus is completely counter-cultural. In fact, if one were to observe Jesus’ life, one would be deeply challenged by his example in retreating to be alone with God. Join us as we look how we can follow in Jesus’ steps in meeting alone with God.
To prime yourselves for Sunday’s exercise on Lectio Divina, I sent through the first reading on Thursday evening from Sacred Rhythms-arranging our lives for spiritual formation by Ruth Hayley Barton. This is the second part, sections called Moving from Head to Heart and Encountering God in Scripture, slightly summarised. The last section of this chapter deals with the actual exercise which we will do on Sunday when we get together.
In our current series called, “Walking with Jesus”, in which we look at what it means to follow Jesus and how we can behold him better and become more like him, the notion of walking calls back to the metaphor of describing our relationship with God as a journey. As pilgrims on a journey of knowing God and growing in His likeness, we must also remember that our paths are not always idyllic strolls. In fact, hardships and trials are found along the path and it is in these trials that we are both humbled and exposed to a far more profound experience of God’s goodness and grace. In light of this, we ask ourselves: What does it mean for us to pray, “Lead us not into temptation, but deliver us from evil”?
To prime yourselves for Sunday’s exercise on Lectio Divina, I’m sending you two readings over two days from the same chapter. The excerpt below is taken from Sacred Rhythms‒arranging our lives for spiritual formation by Ruth Hayley Barton. The chapter title is, SCRIPTURE: Encountering God through Lectio Divina. This is not the full chapter and I have shortened the two sections and highlighted five lines. There are another two helpful paragraphs, shorter that what you have below, titled Moving from Head to Heart and Encountering God in Scripture. I will send these two through by Saturday and you will get other notes on Sunday, at our meeting, which guide you through the exercise step by step with a short Scripture passage of 6-8 verses maximum.
As we start our journey of experimenting with the means of grace, we will look to pray and learn to “riff off” of the Lord’s Prayer. We will post some thoughts from John Smed’s book, ‘Journey in Prayer’, regarding each line of the Lord’s prayer to help you plug in to the heart of Jesus behind this prayer.
Over the next 21 days, we will be experimenting with various ‘means of grace’ so that we can see Jesus more clearly so that we may draw on his grace all the more and thereby live in greater intimacy with God. To start us off, Craig gives some helpful insights on how we can best connect with God through reading the Bible.
In this ‘exercise’ below, which will take you 5 minutes to read, I am encouraging you to experiment with a way of praying that will ignite your prayer life. Just do it for one week. Don’t contemplate it or put it off for another time. Start today or tomorrow morning. 5 minutes to spark an exercise that can change your way of relating to God and make this year a one to remember for all the right reasons. I would appreciate your feedback after doing this for a week!
