Part of our training for anyone serious about long-term work with TEN3, whether as a teacher, administrator, or writer, is to read through Imitation of Christ and The Practice of the Presence of God. I read both soon after I joined TEN3. Imitation of Christ spoke very strongly to me, because I was in a situation (not related to TEN3) in which I was being very frequently rebuked and criticized, and was not used to that at all. Imitation taught me to take the rebukes graciously and learn some meekness through them, which was clearly what God wanted to teach me at the time. But I don't remember The Practice at all. I think it's time I revisit it. It has dawned on me I don't quite know how to live God's joy when life is, well, ordinary, and especially when I'm not excelling. I'm used to meeting whatever challenge is set before me, and doing it all with excellence, and instead I find myself in a messy house, behind on my thank-you cards, forgetting my meetings, and fretting about finances. It's time I learned from this man who found God in dishwashing. So here's my first gleaning. Perhaps you'll join me in this spiritual journey. If so, you can find his book available for free here.
Conversation 1
"During that winter, upon seeing a tree stripped of its leaves and considering that within a little time the leaves would be renewed and after that the flowers and fruit appear, Brother Lawrence received a high view of the Providence and Power of God which has never since been effaced from his soul."
Well, there's plenty to be convicted of right there. When is the last time I looked at God's wonderful works for what they are that they might impact me like that? So I prayed to see God's work in something around me, and had to look no further than on my bosom at my son. A few weeks ago we took the hour's trip to visit my grandmother in the nursing home and introduce him as her first by-blood great-grandchild. I broke down crying silently in her room because, though she did respond a little to my voice, she was too ravaged by dementia to open her eyes. It broke my heart to think that she started her life as healthy, hopeful, and nurtured as my little Nathanael, and is reduced to this, immobile, every breath a groan, scarcely able to put four words together. But today, looking down at my baby reminded me that God is making all things new. My grandmother will rise again, and with Christ's life she may be as vibrant and hopeful as a laughing baby. What a gift indeed Christ has given us to hope for, life so new and vibrant, never to fade again, but retaining also our hard-won maturity! What a beautiful victory Christ has won for us, that all the curse of sin--aging, death, want, strife--will be undone, and all that remains will be life full of both exuberance and wisdom, love both childlike and purified, joy both fresh and adamantine.
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