The Journey of Discernment: Moving from Partly Cloudy to Clarity

How can we ever know God’s will? This has been a question people have muddled through for centuries. Our angst comes when we are faced with a particular conundrum—a dilemma of competing choices that impacts us personally. We need to make a decision but it feels more dark than light; more cloudy than clear. We live in the mud rather than experiencing a break-through. We want to know--but just can't figure it out with certainty.Should I marry this person? Should I take this job or that job?   Should we move to another city or stay put here? Should I retire or keep working? These questions force us to stop and think through a particular cross-road in life before we move on to acting. It’s those of us who have the tendency to bulldoze our way through doorways of possibility that get into trouble. People have regrets and have to live with regrets.Just last week when I was speaking to a group of business leaders, a man in his 70’s came up to me and said, “I’ve been reading your blogs. I have one thing to say, “Don’t retire. It’s the greatest mistake of my life. I should have never stopped working.” I was stunned to hear him say this but realized that his comments were really an invitation for me to pray more about my decision ahead. It was a signal to think very carefully about my own decision to “reposition” (read the blog I wrote about 'repositioning or retiring) myself. When we make quick decisions, we come to realize that we would have done better and been better had we thought the decision through more deeply.Discernment comes from the Greek word, “diakrisis,” which translated means “to separate” or “to sift through.” We need to learn how to “do” discernment because so many of us want the answers and we want to know on our timetable. It's like we have in our psyche, the erroneous idea that major decisions can be made in 15 minutes or less--then announced--then followed.  Discernment is a lost practice in today's quick world of quick answers and living by Twitter.  It's as if, we want to know God's will but want it sent in 140 characters. We are more shaped by our culture than truth and when it comes to making good decisions, we need to exercise great caution. We want to be able to “sort through” experiences, lists of pros and cons, strengths and weaknesses and then come to a conclusion based on our reason, logic or gut.  Spiritual discernment does not offer us easy answers but invites us into a process of laying down what we thought and how we thought good decisions are made to a journey--a journey of discernment.I am being cautious because, I have spent a life-time building what is my work. A wrong decision could be disastrous and impact people I love and care for a great deal.  I am a "founder" meaning that I have pioneered this work along side of Gwen and there is this disease called, "founder-itis" that I know I have. This disease says, "It's hard to let go of what you started." I'm in a process of working through laying down and repositioning. Some of you are as well.It is my observation that men, in particular find it hard to lay down their work.  Perhaps this is a part of our curse.  Our work gives validation, significance and love, to be honest.  And as a man ages, perhaps some women as well, it is just plain hard to lay down our work. So we choose mantras like, "I'll die with my boots on.But the journey of discernment is not just a left-brain exercise. When may seem linear and logical may not be very spiritual. This journey is moving from a Western mindset of “figuring out” a way to go forward to developing a posture of listening. It is moving away from needing to know—to needing to be in the presence of God. This is the all-important shift we need to make in learning to discern and I needed to shift my own need to know—to learning to be with God to listen—to listen to His voice and to listen to my own true self telling me what door is right.As I entered my 60’s , I began to notice more clouds than clarity. I remember having great clarity in my 50's. But almost on my entree to my next decade of life, the clouds came and the sun seemed to go away and hide. Things, that I once felt sure of seemed to be shifting to a certain unknowing. I suppose I thought that in time that I things would clear themselves up. But after a couple of years of walking in the forest more than in the light, I knew I needed something—or someone to help me. Confusion, lack of peace and anxiety bubbled up within me—more than at any other time in my life or work. For the first time in my life, waves of depression would wash over me leaving me lifeless and limp.  Finally, the straw that broke the camel's back happened on our Staff Team, when a key staff person resigned leaving it back on my shoulders. I was losing confidence. I was losing my grip that I knew I needed to have as a leader, founder and guide to many others. I knew I needed help. I needed a companion to walk with me through the clouds and into more clarity.An Intentional Journey of DiscernmentFor ten months now, I have been on an intentional journey of discernment. I chose to engage an ancient retreat method where I would slow down my need to know the future and enter into a long, slow, season of prayer where I would learn how to listen. I would learn how to listen to God. I would learn how to listen to my own heart and my own desires. I would learn how to distinguish the movements of God within my own four-quadrant heart and notice God moving me forward and through darkness to more clarity.So, I chose a trained, seasoned veteran of such things. I began to work with someone out of my box—out of my comfort zone—out of my normal way of thinking through things.  I had grown tired of groups, denominations and labels of people who think they know everything and have their act together.  Such arrogance and pride disturbed me greatly.  I became suspicious actually and wanted help in a different way--a way no one in my circles was talking about. I needed something more that a 10 week Bible study on ‘Knowing the Will of God.” I had done those kind of attempts and led those studies. This felt more raw for me. It feel more desperate. I was thirsty to really know and I needed to enter my thirst and not allow my thirst to be quenched by anyone or anything else.My Guide and My JourneyI chose to walk with a man who was trained in Ignatian Spirituality and someone who knew how to walk with someone who was a bit lost in the woods and couldn’t find his way out. I learned the old, ancient, tried and proven ways of listening to God’s voice within me. I began to distinguish and sift through the confusing feelings of self-preoccupation, worry and anxiety to the more trusted ways of experiencing a deep sense of peace, shalom and well-being. I began praying—every day for an hour—something that I had never really done before because I considered myself to be too busy and too involved—perhaps even too important. In this hour, I would listen to God in all of my life and as I practiced this, I became more comfortable with the process—even to the point of noticing a marked shift in me: I wanted to have this time. I needed to have this time. I wanted a God-listening heart.Then I went and sat in this person’s office every Wednesday at 4:00pm to talk and process together about what was happening in me and around me. With no doubt, this is the deepest journey I've ever walked to date and I have been so helped through my own rawness and clouds to a great sense of well-being. I am so glad to say, that I have moved from being partly-cloudy and into more light. It’s been like a parting in the woods where I found my path to walk in more light than I though possible. The result has been all gain and no loss. I’m still in this process at this very moment however and have not been “released” or “graduated.” I don’t think I will ever be graduated now that I am learning how to listen more deeply than ever before. I don’t want to be released from what I know now to be so true and so deeply meaningful. It’s a big shift for me to quit thinking of “moving on” or moving to the next thing to simply relaxing and staying in this posture of heart muscle that I have been exercising for these past ten months.A God-Listening Heart is Actually Possible!When King David of Israel had died, his son Solomon had a dream where God came and said to Solomon that he, God, would given him anything he wanted. Read the text for itself and see how Solomon responded:“And now here I am: God, my God, you have made me, your servant, ruler of the kingdom in place of David my father. I’m too young for this, a mere child! I don’t know the ropes, hardly know the ‘ins’ and ‘outs’ of this job. And here I am, set down in the middle of the people you’ve chosen, a great people—far too many to ever count.“Here’s what I want: Give me a God-listening heart so I can lead your people well, discerning the difference between good and evil. For who on their own is capable of leading your glorious people?”--I Kings 3:7-9, the Message.Solomon wanted a “God-listening heart.” As I have spent this year in discernment, I am realizing, perhaps more than ever before that I, too, want a God-listening heart. I need that kind of heart. I needed to move away from all I knew and amassed to be a beginner again in the deeper ways of God's Kingdom.I want to live believing that God still speaks—still has important messages to convey to me and I want to not be so busy, so involved, so committed that I can’t listen. Henri Nouwen reminds us that when life begins to feel absurd, we are losing our ability to listen to God. The root word in Latin for “absurdity” is deafness.  Life doesn't make sense anymore when we are deaf to the Voice of God. When we’re deaf to God, life feels absurd. We grown in cynicism, suspicion and are prone to burnout. I see this all the time in my work with leaders in the church and the marketplace.The once soft hearts for God have been hardened and calloused by disappointment, disillusionment and private despair. I say private because where does a leader go these days to confess their own despair at what is happening in the world today?  We all need such places to keep soft and impressionable hearts. This is what a major part of soul care is—to keep a soft, pliable, malleable heart and soul in the midst of such stress, angst and world-wide despair.When Benedict of Nursia began his humble attempt to form Christian communities after the fall of Rome, in the 5th century, he wrote to all his would-be monks, that the first rule to live by is this: “Listen with the ears of your heart.” In our world today, we are clamored with so much inner noise of shame, blame, quilt and self-talk that we can’t hear the truth.  We can't hear the Voice. It's all buzzing sounds. It’s also noisy on the outside: meetings, traffic, emails, Twitter and text. We barely have time to make sense of anything anymore.  Whoever speaks today of the ears of your heart?  That's the kind of language that captured me and still does. It is the language Solomon wanted. It is the reality I have witnessed in thirsty souls who simply want more than easy answers to pressing dilemmas.When we feel the need to move from the cloudy days of life and experience more clarity and inner freedom, this journey begins with learning to listen—trusting that the God who made us in His own image and who loves us, wants to speak with us.It’s a very big year for me. And this will be an important year in the ministry of Potter’s Inn that Gwen and I founded 17 years ago. As I begin to “reposition” this will mean that Potter’s Inn will be impacted and influenced. So I want to be careful. I want to be wise. I want to know that I do have a “God-listening heart.”It’s important when we make decisions to allow affirmation to come. Every affirmation is really an important re-enforcement that we are on the right track—that the pathway we now see with light and clarity is, indeed right. So, I have asked the Board of Potter’s Inn to join me in a “Day of Discernment.” We have asked a Benedictine Monk to spend a day with us as a Board to do group discernment. I’m excited because our Board enthusiastically agreed to have this day retreat and all look forward to this time coming up soon. We will spend a day together in the collective posture of having a “God-listening hearts” to discern—to sift—to separate the many options to seeing greater clarity the way God has for us to walk—and to walk together. It is always a comfort to walk with a few other people when making decisions gaining insight, wisdom and perspective and above all trusting the wonderful process of building authentic community with a few other people.Pray for us in the days and weeks ahead, would you?  Please continue to pray for Gwen and me in the journey ahead--the journey of discernment.Here are some trusted books I'd recommend on discernment:The Jesuit Guide to Almost Everything by James Martin. Martin gives several chapters that are outstanding to discernment.Seeking God Together by Alice Fryling   

Pondering Means Not Hurrying

“But Mary treasured up all these things and pondered them in her heart.” Luke 2: 19In a single verse, we are privy to what Mary actually did—after she was told that she was going to have a baby and that her baby would have a sacred role in God’s plan for humanity.We see in Mary’s response an action that is beautiful, humble and meaningful. She doesn’t rush around telling her closest friends what has happened. She doesn’t make a plan. She doesn’t fret, worry or let her nerves get the best of her.Mary’s heart reveals two needed postures in today’s frenzied world with 24/7 news in the ever-ready, always on world we live in today. Mary “treasures” the information she has been given. Then, Mary “ponders” it.To treasure and ponder both the seen and unseen things of our lives grounds us. By treasuring and pondering truth, we develop and grow a contemplative soul—a soul that ponders the invisible; a soul that responds rather than reacts and a soul that is anchored in a bigger picture of life than just the urgent, pressing and hurry.[tweetthis]There are five components needed to grow a contemplative soul.[/tweetthis] These five components have been the foundation for Gwen and me in our life in our sabbatical and post-sabbatical. 

1. We need silence. In today’s world of outer noise and inner confusion, silence helps us find our heart. It’s only 18” between our head and our heart but that journey is said to be one of the longest journeys in the world. Silence helps us de-clutter our minds; center our hearts and work through the mental congestion where it seems there is always a sort of committee meeting happening in our minds. Silence is necessary to grow a pondering heart. Without silence, we are told that it is virtually impossible to live a spiritual life.  Every day, seek to spend 10-20 minutes in silence. Start with 10 and grow your time to be more like 20. Most spiritual masters encourage us to spend 20 minutes in quiet---learning to treasure the Presence of God in our midst. There what’s unimportant in our lives grows smaller while what is really important becomes larger and Great.  By far, the very best book I've read on silence this past year is Martin Laird's "Into the Silent Land: A Guide to the Christian Practice of Contemplation."

2. We need Solitude. Solitude is not just being alone. It is understanding the movement of beginning alone and entering the realization that you are not alone—really. You are in God’s presence. As Mary spent time “pondering” her aloneness was transformed in hearing again and again what the Angel actually told her. She relished in that experience. We can relish in ours. When we learn how to “do” solitude, we are entering a movement on which all spiritual mothers and fathers would agree: Without solitude, we cannot find our heart or True self. Solitude grounds us from the applause of people, the scaffolding of position and power and helps us leave the tyranny of the urgent to connect with the Ground of our Being.  I'd highly recommend, Henri Nouwan's The Way of the Heart to help you grasp the classic understanding of solitude.

3. We pray. I’ve found that prayer is the great stumbling block for most people who follow Jesus. We either don’t pray at all or our prayers are more quick rescue pleas from some situation we are hoping to avoid. Prayer is conversation. It is dialogue not monologue. It is a two way, reciprocal conversation where we speak and God speaks. The Ancients said, “God’s first language is silence” and if all we hear is silence from God in our prayers then we posture ourselves to experience a sort of Grand Silence—a quiet that assuages our aches and fears. The silence brings us to Presence. As we “ponder” and “treasure” we articulate what is stirring. We give words to the wordless feelings we experience. We connect. We sit in our connection.  The book that rocked my world this past year on prayer is Cynthia Bourgeault's Inner Awakening.

4. We become slow. There is an art of slowing that our culture is missing today where everything is fast and instant. The cult of speed causes us to move so fast that we speed by Heaven in our midst. No one who lives with “hurry” as a mantra has time to “ponder” and “treasure” and thus, we miss the richness of a feeding that can be ours. Walk slowly. Move slowly. Be attentive to your taste buds rather than scarfing down our food where there is barely time to taste or “taste and see that the Lord is good.” For more on slowing please read: The Jesus Life by Stephen W. Smith. There are chapters describing the way of the table and the rhythm of life that helps one foster a contemplative heart.

5. We experience consolation. A person who nourishes a heart to “ponder” and “treasure” is a person who learns where the source of consolation really is and how consolation works in the soul of a person. Ignatius of Loyola said that if a person spent time every day to notice how they were consoled by the love and grace of God every single day for three months, they would never, ever be the same again. This is the practice of examining your day---and tracing back through the seen and unseen events of your day and noticing how God was seeking to console you—the way a mother would console a fretting child. Does he do it through beauty? Does God do it through a conversation or something you notice? And the opposite is also true: how did you experience the desolation of God’s seeming absence? Where did it seem that you were totally on your own with God no where in sight?  Jim Manny's book is a classic on this!

  As we enter these days of Christmas an in anticipation of the New Year--- Mary can become a teacher for us—a mentor we need to become less busy and deeper in our hearts!  

Listening to the Word

There is an art to deep listening!

As moderns, we think we know how to read most books.  Yet in our fast society and driven cultures, we graze over books rarely having a moment to sit with what we are reading. We think that reading the Bible through in a year will actually help us.  But it's interesting that Americans are really the only culture that promotes such a thing.  There is a better way to read---a way that ushers you into an experience of encounter that is too deep for words!

Lectio Divina means literally, “Sacred” and “reading.” It is not reading fast. It not reading for information. It is not Bible study. It is the slow art of deep listening. In the ancient way of reading the Scriptures in a sacred way, we simply read a short text of the Scriptures slow. Not everything good is fast. By repeating what you read a few times we are invited into the passage we read. To listen deeply, you  may read the passage several times--perhaps listening to the same passage four times.  It's as if, once is clearly not enough. We read to be read by the Scriptures, not to just gain information.

Reading the Bible in this way is really a child like experience—an invitation to become like a child and hear something very important. Remember when someone might have read to you when you were a child? It elicits feelings of being connected; being with someone; being wanted in a way because someone was taking the time to do this with me—for me—to me.

It’s very similar when we learn to practice reading the Scriptures this way. When we read the story about Jesus calming the Sea (Mark 4:35-41), we read it slowly to see things; to hear things; to smell things; to feel things. We can and will miss the deeper meaning in a single reading of the passage. When we slow down and read the passage several times, we may see ourselves in the boat or in one of the “other boats” that were in the exact same storm. When the boat begins to sink, we may see ourselves frantically bailing out water or holding on for dear life. But as Jesus stands up to quiet the sea, we find ourselves wondering if He might turn to the storm within our own hearts—our work situation; our marriages; the storm of our finances and the storm of today’s fragile world. Everything is possible when we read the Scriptures with new ways and new ears to really listen—to listen very deeply to what is being read.

Cell by cell, our brains need to hear things layer upon layer, so that WHAT can actually change our lives actually WILL  really change our lives. We will feel as the disciples felt on the Emmaus road when they confessed "Did not our hearts burn within us as he spoke to us?"  Reading and by read by the Word nourishes a flame of meaning within us.  An old Greek philosopher said that “Repetition is the mother of all things.” To repeat something is how we as humans learn. Once is simply not enough. We need to hear something really important more than once. We may not be listening the first time. We may be distracted. I may have been focused on an email I should have sent before I even sat down to read the Bible. We’re not fully present. So reading the Scriptures slowly and repeatedly, allows us to hear with our hearts not just speed read with our minds.

Quadrant by quadrant, our hearts begin to burn with clarity, insight--knowing that we have been "spoken" to.  We read the Scriptures so that what is being read by move through our heart, quadrant by quadrant--until the Word can penetrate into the deepest, most hidden quadrant—that quadrant Jesus was concerned about most in a human being’s heart.  Jesus, himself, spoke about what’s way down deep—in the fourth quadrant of our hearts—where no one knows what’s really there—not even ourselves. He explained it clearly, “It’s what comes out of a person that pollutes: obscenities, lusts, thefts, murders, adulteries, greed, depravity, deceptive dealings, carousing, mean looks, slander, arrogance, foolishness—all these are vomit from the heart. There is the source of your pollution.” If the source of our pollution is down deep, then doesn’t it just make sense to participate in reading the Scriptures in a way—to that THEY can sink down deep to cure the source of the pollution?   So, doesn’t it really make sense, to let the pure, clean and transforming Word sink way down to the place where transformation really needs to happen? The slowing down of how we read the Scriptures is important so that we can actually be read by the Scriptures. Just to read a passage might bring inspiration. But transformation happens when the Word sinks deeply and ushers us into real change—changing our desires as well as our habits.  Why would we want to skim the passage then--only noting what we've already seen before? This way, even a single word might become our daily bread--the bread that will really sustain us and nourish us!

Henri Nouwen has reminded us, “The Bible is a sacred book and must be read in a sacred way.” Our modern way of reading almost anything began in our grade school experience where we were all taught to read for comprehension—to read so that we might pass the State’s standardized test. But reading the Scriptures in an ancient way not only requires us to re-learn how we actually read the holy book but also requires us to surrender old ways; old styles; and old, long held, gripping ways we go about reading the Scriptures and also being read by them.

There are four things we need to surrender when we begin to read the Bible in an sacred way:

1. We must surrender our desire for power and control.

   In a retreat I attended, people made comments after the various movements of the Lectio way of reading together. Often, the leader might ask, “After I read it the first time, share a word or phrase that seemed to stand out; seem to somehow get your attention.” But as I listened closely to the responses of those sharing, most of the comments seemed more about power and control than about being deeply spoken to in the Lectio. When we read the Scriptures in a way to be read by the Scriptures, it is the power of the Word, not the power of our sharing that matters. The Power of the Word is yielding to the fact that there actually is a Word for us to first listen to before we react to the word.

   We are so quick to speak—and our quickness in speaking may be rooted in our subtle ways of sharing what we already know—some podcast that we recently listened to; some sermon we just heard; some book we just read---that in our sharing our “insights”—we may be sharing facts and statements that seem to underscore OUR importance—not the importance of the Word.  When we learn to respond--not to react to that we have just heard, we are allowing the deep work of listening to happen in us.  It's true in a conversation and it's especially true in a conversation with God through reading the Bible. What someone ELSE said about the passage is simply NOT the agenda here. What God said to you is the crux of the matter. We can forget this.

   It seems odd that power and control can disrupt what people really hear—but it does. We should learn to be careful as we enter reading the Bible in a way so that the power belongs to God and the control is of the Spirit—not of a person.

2. We can surrender to our desire for affection, esteem and approval.

   It truly is amazing and concerning how the human ego can show up in all it’s self-perceived glory—even in something so holy as the reading of the Scriptures. What we share may actually be veiled and smug statements that are more about our self. We think if we say something funny, people might begin to like us or accept us. We surmise that if the insight we share is really deep, people might be impressed with us and seek us out. Someone might notice us. And isn’t it really the entire point of a Lectio to let the Scriptures be noticed and not an extrovert?   Our words can so easily get in the way of someone who is truly in the poster of listening deeply so that they might be spoken to. If we surrender our desire to speak up and get noticed, then we find ourselves in the posture of truly receiving; truly being ministered to; truly being served the very Bread of Life.

3. We learn to surrender our own desire to change any situation, person ---even our own self.

   How often have we all had the experience of sitting in a sermon; experiencing a class or participating even in a Lectio with the hope that the person next to us—might REALLY get it—this time. After all, we’ve already “gotten it” we assume. By our own desires and also efforts, we perhaps think we might manipulate the Spirit to “really speak,” really convict or really get to someone. We can lay this down and as we lay our desires to have someone else change, we posture our own hearts that we can, ourselves be spoken to. Why? Because our motive is not about anyone else—other than ourselves. We are the beggars who need the daily bread.

4. We can surrender our modern ways of approaching the Scriptures and embrace the ancient ways.

   When the Bible tells us that “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God” we need to adjust then to the fact that there really is a power that comes from the simple act of listening to someone read the Scriptures.  In our age of light shows and smoke machines--even in worship services, I know it seems odd to say this, but it's simply true. Yet, we are perhaps in our modern times, transmitting the dis-ease of the soul called:  “Attention Deficit Dis-order” and we cannot be still, sit still or really listen unless it is in PowerPoint, loud and perhaps in a rap like cadence. The Lectio experience invites us to simplicity---to turn off iphones and to not use PowerPoint and to simply do the simple thing of the forgotten art of listening. We can learn to grow the ears of the African elephant to literally wrap our ears around a text because we know way down deep that THIS word is what will really fill us; THIS Word is what will really speak to us; THIS WORD is what is really eternal and not cultural and not a way people “use to” hear from God. No, we can hear today if we learn how to surrender to how we actually listen. Culture is shaping us in far, far more ways than we are aware.  Being shaped by the Word is our opportunity here--resisting the shaping of cultural and relevant ways.

In Lectio Divina, we learn to open ourselves to the love and presence of God.  People can get in the way of our opening ourselves.  So we need to be careful to not be a distraction for the love and presence of God.

Lectio is a simple practice that offers rich and wonderful moments in our relationship to God.  To protect this practice a few guidelines are important to ensure we experience what God offers us.

Finally, the one who is reading the Scriptures assumes a very hidden role. You become the flute which the air moves through. It’s the air that matters, not the flute. So, for the ones who lead the Lectio, we can always remember, “It’s not about me.” And when we surrender to that posture, we realize it’s not about our insights---there should be none shared by the one who leads. The leader simply is there to read---not to share their own insights. Their actual physical position, posture and influxes of the voice might also get in the way of someone actually hearing what is important for them to hear. Because we cannot know what God wants to speak to someone else—we, as the reader, seek to remain neutral as if we are simply the vessel. The Lectio is the time to take off the teaching hat; the preaching voice and the group leader’s attempts to get everyone to participate. Some may remain silent—because something too deep for words has perhaps just happened. Lectio is not the time for community building. It’s not the time for teaching. Lectio is the act of surrender our many words for the One, true Word—the Word that changes everything. 

Recommend Resources to help you study this more:

Too Deep for Words by Thelma Hall.  Perhaps the single best reference on Lectio Divina I am aware of now. As I checked just now, there are used copies for a penny!  Go to Amazon to Get it!   

Opening To God by David Benner.  I love this book's wonderful survey of how to enter into the movements of Lectio Divina.  Get it on Amazon Now!

The Lectio Divina Guide - A simple guide a created to get you started.

Five Reasons Why I Pray at Fixed Hours of the Day

Growing up a Baptist, I never even heard of the Fixed Hour Prayers, the Daily Office or Divine Office until I, like Paul, learned to put aside childish spiritual ways and be a man in my spiritual journey. In my spiritual tradition, spontaneous and heart felt prayers were what was admired. As a boy, I remember my father driving us home from church chiding a fellow deacon because he read his prayer during worship—an act that no one who walked closely with God should ever do. To my father and for me, it was unthinkable that saying a prayer would not be heart-felt, said at the moment and spontaneous.  God forbid! Growing up for many of us in our spiritual lives involves re-thinking or perhaps learning for the first time how important praying is a regular and consistent times of the day.In my long journey now of walking with God, there is no practice I enjoy more and no prayers I like to pray more than old prayers and in addition, in order to live with rhythm and to make space for God in my life, I practice Fixed Hour Prayers or Daily Office as much as I can. Let me explain. Here are five reasons why I do this and you might want to do it also:

1. Praying at a  regular times of the day is an ancient practice revealed in the Bible.

The prayer book for the early Christians was the Psalms. They prayed the Psalms and knew the psalms and shared the Psalms as their primary source of spiritual encouragement. The Psalmist said, “Seven times a day do I praise thee.” Psalm 119:164. Most pastor and missionaries that I work with rarely pray. Most do not pray with their spouses and few pray as a family. The same is true of marketplace leaders and small business folks. Who has time to pray once, much more SEVEN times a day? Most of us feel fortunate to say a quick prayer before we scarf down our corn flakes or power drink because we need to be on to the next thing.We are too busy to pray. Yet, praying at fixed times of the day is the primary way to call our attention back to God—to become aware and awaken to a different cadence of life than power, money and self-promotion.[tweetthis]Fixed hour prayers call busy and ordinary people to live in a daily rhythm of putting ourselves in the presence of God in a conscious and meaningful way.[/tweetthis]It's called Fixed hour prayers because our spiritual fathers and mothers chose regular and consistent times to come together, drop what they were doing and turn to God. There are several different versions of what times people actually practiced fixed hour prayers but in general, there is a morning time, a noon-time, an end of your work time and a before you go to sleep time.  Of course, people have added to these and subtracted from these.  Some times of prayers are strict such as in monastic communities. Some, like myself, find a more relaxed and less structured way to practice this ancient way of praying. We are much more tolerant and forgiving and we do it as we can and when we can. At our work of Potter's Inn, we do this on our Soul Care Days and in our retreats. Its often the highlight for many guests to first learn about this--then engage in the doing of Fixed Hour prayers. Yet to be honest, we are not all on the same page when it comes to this.  What I can tell you is that this one practice has brought my marriage more together. It has given Gwen and I something we do together which closes the gap between us. It is a simple, non-threatening way to share our hearts and some time.One man at our retreat pulled me aside to say, "You taught me about this years ago. I want you to know that fixed hour praying is the best thing that my wife and I have EVER done in our marriage. It's brought us together in a way I never thought possible."  I hear this alot as people engage in this practice. 

2. Praying at regular times of the day helps order my day; lessen the chaos and calls me back to what really matters in life.

Like you, I live a full life. My day is full of appointments, meetings and errands. Yet, when I know that my time of prayer is coming, I have the opportunity to stop what I am doing and this stopping is my primary way of structuring my life for what really counts. I stop. I pray. I reflect. I pause. Then I move back into my life. But the stopping and praying orders my internal chaos and loosens the chains I feel when I live by the tyranny of the urgent.  Gwen sets her time of prayers on her iphone. A bell rings and calls her to pause, pray and look up.  We need these reminders. I have some recommendations for you at the end of this blog.The famous painting by the French artist, Jean Francois Millet, “The Angelus” reveals a couple standing in the field, stopping to pray. They have evidently just heard the church bells sound out the chimes that everyone needs to stop. Everyone needs to pray. Everyone needs to lift up their eyes from the working world to their God and say a few words. I love this painting. But without church bells, we have nothing telling us to stop. We have nothing helping us live in rhythm. We have nothing telling us to live for something more than money. Praying at regular, fixed times of the day, gives internal order to a chaotic life.  The collapse of time, where everything is busy and everyone is over-committed is in my opinion the number one reason the wheels of the buses are flying off of our lives and we are collapsing in exhaustion and fatigue---with no time for God or being with God.

3. I pray the Fixed Hour Prayers because as I pray—I find myself in community.

For me, the most powerful motivation for praying a regular times of the days is this: When I pray at Fixed Hours, I am reminded that I am not alone. But how does this happen? It happens to me because I know that many of my friends across the world are practicing what I am practicing. I begin praying alone but somehow find myself in the midst and company of a holy few--a group of men and women, who like me, are doing what pilgrims have done for thousands of years.I have a close friend who lives in Africa. When I pray at regular times, I know that David is praying—or has already prayed the same and exact prayer I am about to say. I realize that my friend, Fil, who lives in North Carolina has prayed the prayer I am about to say—but he said it in his own time zone which is two hours before me. I also realize that my friend who lives in California will soon be opening up his prayer book and talking to God about the exact same thing I just told God. We come together in prayer and in the praying a gap of time and years is closed.It’s uncanny how this works—but it does work. I have the deepest sense of community by praying at regular times of the day and this mystery is deep, profound and comforting. Every time I pray like this, I am not alone.

4. I pray at fixed hours because it is easier than not praying at all.

In my work with leaders, you’d be surprised at how man times I hear pastors, missionaries and other Christian leaders who try to do it all well, confess that they rarely, if ever pray. Many will try to have a “quiet time” or will attempt to read the Bible for a few moments. But then an inner committee meeting begins in their heads telling them; shaming them; nagging them to do something more important. So prayer is dropped and their inner life runs a muck.Prayer is perhaps the greatest practice of the spiritual life that people struggle with. The disciples sure struggled with prayer.  Ignorant of how to do it, they pleaded with Jesus, "Teach us to pray."  That same plea, I think, is the private plea of most people I encounter--in the church! We just need help and cannot assume we actually know how to pray; when to pray and what to pray. Fixed hour prayer is a mentor to us.Let me be truthful, we often do not know what to pray or how we should pray. As a result of these two traps, we often do not pray at all. When we follow historic, ancient prayers, we don’t have to make up holy words or try to impress God. We simply say that is right there before our eyes and hearts. We enter a long-standing chorus of men and women who have gone before us that have discovered what I am discovering. Fixed hour prayers really work. Fixed hour prayers really help.

5. I pray at Fixed hours because Jesus prayed at Fixed hours and so did Paul and Peter and the early church.

A few years back, I wrote the book, “The Jesus Life.” The writing of this  book changed my life. I fell in love with Jesus all over again and I realized that Jesus’ ways of living were really pathways for me to live. The early followers of Jesus were not called Christians but followers of “the way.” We are told this five times in the book of Acts! I believe we modern folks, have lost our way. We’ve traded ancient and proven ways for modern day shortcuts to almost everything in life that is dear to us.Jesus prayed the Psalms. So, it’s this simple. If I want to be like Jesus, I need to pray the Psalms. Knowing that Jesus prayed at regular times of the day motivates me to want to do the same. When I realize that the early church did this, I want to follow in their way. The modern church has lost it's footing here. We have failed people by ignoring this ancient way of talking to God and being with God.Paul and Peter prayed at fixed hours ( Acts 3:2 and 10:9). It’s not odd or weird to realize that as the early followers of Jesus began to embrace and integrate their new way of living that they felt it important to pray at regular times of the day.When I realized this—I was greatly helped. When I read about Daniel who we’ve heard stories about in the lion’s den praying at Fixed hours, I was also encouraged (see Daniel 6:13).I’m afraid, we’ve thrown the baby out with the bath water. In our attempts to accomplish more and to live productive lives, we’ve abandoned ancient spiritual practices that offer us hope and a renewing of our inner life. Fixed hour prayers is one such practice that truly can revolutionize your life. I think you should join me and thousands of others in this practice and just see what you think. I'd like to know your thoughts---your resistance and your celebration of this way of praying! Here are some resources to help you begin or continue the practice of Fixed Hour Prayers. 

1. Explore a Community in Europe living by FIxed Hour prayers and join them with an APP!
2. Here's the OnLine Version I used every day- and multiple times and it has an APP also!
3. Here is the Daily Office produced by Phyliss Tickle and sits by our chairs in our home. We use this far, far more than any other version. It's easy to use and has an excellent Introduction to Fixed Hour Prayers we use at Potter's Inn.

The Wild and Peaceful Landscapes of Stillness

During Sabbatical I had some amazing adventures in experiencing the difference between the stillness I thought I knew about and had studying about and the stillness that patiently lead me to wild and peaceful landscapes within me that I had never seen or even knew existed.There is nothing like being surrounded in stillness by an endless deep ocean and a crisp blue sky that seems to stretch to eternity. I sat still; I stood still, even holding my breath so as not to miss the glory of such a sight. Creation of the Creator unfolding right in from of me and I became a silent witness. What a privilege. I was honored and to this day I hold the honor in my heart.To encounter the Creator at his work while wrapped in stillness is to not remain the same. Stillness gave me the deep awareness that while being a silent witness, being actually present with God in a glorious display of nature right before my eyes, he too was present with me in the landscape of the dark, rugged crevices of piercing grief and suffering . In stillness I experienced my presence with God in beauty and his presence with me in brokenness. We were together and it was good. Nothing fixed or figured out. Nothing healed and made brand new.Stillness gave me an experience with Companionship and Compassion and Comfort. I wasn’t alone with my isolating fears and blinding tears. Stillness ushered me into that mysterious peace that had nothing to do with understanding anything. Stillness granted me the reality of Divine Presence. Stillness let me know God in the midst of what seems to be a godless situation. Stillness made an inviting space for me to know and listen to God say, “Be still and know me”. And I did.Stillness gave me space to listen to the unexpressed voice crying out from my desolate wilderness. This is what I heard:A Prayer for Tommy*Holy, precious, purest angel face,God, please kiss him with your tender grace.Double chinButton nosePerfect little fingersSweetest tiny toes.Holy is this momentLove and sorrow flowsHearts that ache to hold himAre held by One who knows.Tommy Jacob Smith, my fourth grandchild: born March 5,2015—died, March 5, 2015

Sabbatical: Going to the End of My Rope

“You’re blessed when you are at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.”—Jesus in Matthew 5:3, MessageMost every person I know needs to dismantle their emotional programming for what it means to be happy in life. We are hard-wired to think that happiness and joy come by chasing the outer markers of success in life: a bigger house, a nicer car, a new toy. I explore this in Inside Job, my new book. We believe a lie and we make a vow that determines how we will live our life and try and try to be happy.Jesus turned this kind of thinking up on it’s head. To be happy—to be blessed—requires a total shift in our paradigm of how we view life. He offered us a paradigm shift in what is called the “Beatitudes.” These statements found in Matthew 5:3-14, are short, pithy and life-altering guidelines which help us not only dismantle our hard-wiring we’ve acquired through culture, church and family, but they help us really see how happiness is cultivated in our lives.In our Sabbatical, Gwen and I have come, face to face, with these statements--these beatitudes. Let me share one here: “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the Kingdom of Heaven.” The Message jolts us to our core and says it this way, “You’re blessed when you are at the end of your rope. With less of you there is more of God and his rule.”Blessing and happiness come by our emptying ourselves and having to rely on God in a complete and resolved kind of way. It’s when we are so vulnerable; so power-less; so weak and so empty that there is room for God to do his work. Our poverty is exchanged for his blessing. On our own, some of us try to out work and out wit God.We live as Parker Palmer has aptly coined it: functional atheism. We say believe in God and trust God, yet we live in a manic pace, stripping our souls and running our lives on empty. I had to come face-to-face with this humbling realization in our sabbatical--yet, again. We live as if our life, our work and our relationships are totally up to us. We, the, “functional atheist” of the 21st century, have soul work to do. We’d never admit it but we are more functional atheist than experiencing a faith with sustains, nurtures and shows us how to live with resilience . We live and function as if we are the ones having to push the proverbial boulder up another hill—yet again.Poverty in soul, for me meant that I had to accept let go of my grip on my work--and get out of its grip on me, my ministry and my staff. This acceptance--this consent is my daily work--my daily job. This letting go was a relinquishment of power and control. It required me confessing that I find my satisfaction in work--and not in God is not a good thing for me or anyone else around me. It is a shift towards poverty of soul for me. At times during sabbatical, I was anxious that Potter’s Inn might fail; fall apart or even die. We feel so fragile due to raising our support. Our helplessness actually fostered a deep sense of well-being---why? Because it meant letting go. Poverty of spirit meant a handing over to God all that I simply could not do and should not do.God works in us is to foster, nourish and grow a sense of contentment, inner-serenity and shalom that we live with the awareness that simply says this: No matter what my circumstances; no matter how hard this particular time is in my life; no matter how powerless I feel right now, 'All is well in my life and all will be well around me'. True contentment, my friends, is an Inside Job. In sabbatical, I left my work but I had to do my inside job.It is NOT up to me. I relinquish my efforts to be God—to be everywhere at once and to do multiple things that have stripped my soul bear and left me so empty inside. The great work of God is more than planting churches; more than sharing the Gospel; more than teaching. The great work awaiting each one of us the work of our inside job. God truly does desire our well-being. Sit with that thought for a moment and see where it might take you. What if you took a moment today and sat in your emptiness and weakness—feeling depleted and truly at the end of your rope and experienced the hands of God doing one thing: holding you. That’s it—just let yourself be held for a quiet moment. To sit, rather than DO something is an act of submission--and act of letting go--an act of well-being. Hey, I'm all for action, but even action must have it's seasons, right?In the beginning of our time “off” we felt like we truly were at the end of our rope. We were tired, worn out and experiencing some degree of burn out. So many years of pioneering and work had depleted us. A poverty within is what we had to face. As we faced our own spiritual poverty and admitted it and also confessed it—finally—we were brought low to a place of inner desperation and longing. “God, I don’t feel like I can go on. I can’t retire financially. But I’m at the end. Please God, do something. I let go now. It's time for you to do the thing that you must love to do--transform me and people like me."In that kind of confession, it seemed to have ushered us both into a journey of renewal.

Welcoming Myself Back to Work

Never have I found a more appropriate prayer for my first day back to work after a long sabbatical than the Welcome Prayer by Father Thomas Keating. At the first reading, you might be tempted to say, "What a nice prayer." And then move on. But Gwen and I have sat with this prayer on an intentional basis for the past few months. We have attempted to excavate the meaning and suck the marrow out of each phrase and sentence.It is rich. It is deep and it is transformational.Here it is:The Welcoming Prayer (by Father Thomas Keating)Welcome, welcome, welcome.I welcome everything that comes to me todaybecause I know it's for my healing.I welcome all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons,situations, and conditions.I let go of my desire for power and control.I let go of my desire for affection, esteem,approval and pleasure.I let go of my desire for survival and security.I let go of my desire to change any situation,condition, person or myself.I open to the love and presence of God andGod's action within. Amen.To Welcome this day, our first day back to work means to enter this with no regret, apprehension or fear. It, the first day, the first week and the first season is for me. It is for my good. It is not for my demise.For my healing... returning to my work is also a part of my healing and transformation as much as our season of rest has been. Now, I can live out of the fruit of what has been gathered. I can also begin to integrate these precious truths into my work--not just my time off.The Welcoming of all thoughts, feelings, emotions, persons, situations and conditions---means for me, that I believe in a God that is good and is not ought to bring me down or to step back and watch my life spin out of control. God is vested in the process of everyday encounters.I let go--much of my work over sabbatical has been right here. To learn how to let go and to release things, people, my past and my future into the hands of God. Knowing that I cannot control these things helps me to learn to loosen my grip. The three sentences in the prayer that speak of "letting go" really are the three temptations of Jesus: the temptation for power; the temptation for approval; the temptation for security. I, too, will work through these temptations as I work--and being tempted to lean into each of these areas to find love, approval and security. To let go--is my daily business.I open myself---believing in a God who is good and who loves me allows me to become open. I open myself to the love and goodness of God. It is my intention to live each day in this posture and I consent to my participation of the work of my transformation.I posted this book on Facebook recently and got many "likes." Now, I regret doing it. I don't think this prayer or perhaps any prayer can simply be liked. The Welcome Prayer undoes us. I truly believe that this prayer can't be just read and put down. It will mess with you. It has with me. And isn't this, perhaps, the greatest purpose of prayer?

Read the Directions

 A few days into my Sabbatical I got the worst cold I have ever had. The physical aches, pains and down right misery that a bad cold makes you feel, were the obvious outlets for the long accumulated and residual stress stored in my hidden, way down deep soul place. I was living proof that we are all intricately woven together by our Creator…everything is connected. As awful as I felt, there was this companioning gratitude that sabbatical was giving me time and space, that is definitely not the norm, to be as sick as I was and take as long as I needed to heal. I had never experienced a holy misery like this before and wasn’t so sure how to navigate it.Nothing gave me the soothing care that you need when your head feels the size of a watermelon, like keeping a steaming hot mug of tea in my hands, holding it up close to my face and sipping now and then. I unwrapped what seemed to be the millionth teabag and couldn’t help but laugh at what I saw. The name of the tea was Breathe Deep and on the little white tag attached to the teabag were the words: “Socialize with compassion, kindness and grace.”I know it’s sounds superficial and silly but I didn’t dismissively roll my eyes for some reason. Instead I felt a tug, a curiosity to read it again. What if I actually did what it said? No one else was around so I couldn’t pass it off in jest with someone else. I took the challenge. First of all, “Breathe Deep” was the name of the tea so I stood there and took several long deep breaths. Breathing is obviously essential to life yet is so dismissed ,as if there is no worth paying it any attention. Our very breath can actually be a simple reminder of the gift of live we so take for granted. It can be the very thing within us that can remind us of the Spirit of God with in us. It was a powerful and comforting reminder for me that day. God is as close as my breath. He isn’t way out there waiting to be beckoned. Taking deep breaths can be a true spiritual exercise to help honor the God designed connection between our body and soul. It can be so revealing of the stress we kept pent up inside and it is the provision of something so simple to relieve the stress that is so damaging to our body and soul. It’s body care to breathe. It’s soul care to breathe.   Awareness of God isn’t as complicated as we make it sometimes. Deep breaths gave me a sacred awareness of God right there in the kitchen with me. His name, after all is Immanuel, God with us.The little tag read “socialize with compassion”. Compassion means ‘to suffer with’. God is Compassion. He knows suffering and is with us in our suffering. I want to socialize, to be in that kind of company. I want to be a person who suffers with others, to show up and tell them that I am sorry they are suffering whether I can help relieve their suffering or not. The tag also read “Socialize with kindness and grace”. God is always expressing his kindness to me. His amazing grace is, to me, more than just the words to a favorite hymn. He is kind to give me a life filled with so much that I am undeserving of. I was stirred by my desire to socialize, interact with and be acquainted with this unconditional grace and kindness. I want it to be more than my theology; I want to be kindness and grace with skin on.Surprised by an encounter with God through a teabag, as silly as that may be, is an encounter that continues to inspire me to breath in, to keep company with, to socialize with God’s compassion, kindness and grace. It always helps to read the directions and this is especially true when making tea and caring for one's soul.