Devotions
Devotions
The Missing Link of Spiritual Formation
We all were formed into the people that we are today by influences of the past. While we cannot excuse or sinful behavior we can understand how we became who we are in order to overcome false concepts in order to become who God is calling us to be. (Romans 8:28, 29) (Not Frankenstein Christians)
Read from Max Lucado
Yet in the matter of ideal character, in all its infinite diversity, there is a mystical sense in which our Savior embraces the whole human race. Nobody becomes anybody else when he aims at imitating Jesus. He grows nearer to his highest self when he becomes more like his Lord. For all the partial ideals of life which give to it an infinite variety blend into a perfect unity in the perfect character of Jesus. (Morrison 12/29)
“We are to be sure , reconciled to God by Jesus' death, but even more, we are saved in the sense of entering into His eternal kind of life, not just in some distant heaven, but right now in the midst of our broken and sorrowful world. When we carefully consider how Jesus lived among us in the flesh, we learn how we are to live - truly live-empowered by Him who is with us always even to the end of this age. “
(Living Streams pg 3)
(1Peter 4:1 - AMP) SO, SINCE Christ suffered in the flesh for us, for you, arm yourselves with the same thought and purpose [patiently to suffer rather than fail to please God]. For whoever has suffered in the flesh [having the mind of Christ] is done with [intentional] sin [has stopped pleasing himself and the world, and pleases God],
His Intimacy with the Father
John 5:19, 30 , John 14:10,
Luke 3:21 One day when the crowds were being baptized, Jesus Himself was baptized. As He was praying, the heavens opened,
(Luke 6:12) One day soon afterward Jesus went up on a mountain to pray, and He prayed to God all night.
Mark 1:35 Before daybreak the next morning, Jesus got up and went out to an isolated place to pray.
(Luk 9:28,29 NLT) About eight days later Jesus took Peter, John, and James up on a mountain to pray.
And as He was praying, the appearance of His face was transformed, and His clothes became dazzling white.
"We all hunger for a prayer filled life, for a richer, fuller practice of the presence of God. It is the Contemplative Stream of Christian life and faith that can show us the way into just such intimacy with God. This reality addresses the human longing for the practice of the presence of God." (SLW pg 24)
Defining the Complemplative Tradition
"the complemplative life is the steady gaze of the soul upon the God who loves us" (SLW pg49)
Fundamental Characteristics and Movements of the Contemplative Tradition
1. Love(comes slowly increasing with much fluctuation, grows deeper more steady, stronger)
2.Peace (passes understanding, frequently interrupted initially, eventually overcomes distractions)
3.Delight (God laughs into our soul and our soul laughs back into God, ebbs and flows)
4.Emptiness (intense longing, yearning, searching and not finding)
5.Dryness God seems hidden, heavenly communion of an ascetic sort, alone with the Alone)
6.Fire (a steady flaming passion, disobedience or neglect are very painful, purifying fire)
7.Wisdom (knowing or inflowing of God Himself, knowing His glory, John 17:3)
8.Transformation (God gradually "captures the heart," the will, then the mind, the imagination and the passions
Major strengths of the Contemplative Tradition
1. It constantly flames our first love (Revelation 2:4)
2. It forces us beyond a merely cerebral religion, insisting on the insufficiency of intellect and pushing into the realm of our senses.
3. It stresses the centrality of prayer, silent and unceasing, abiding in His presence (Psalm 16:11)
4. It emphasizes the solitariness of our life with God. Our growth in grace must contain a good dose of solitude. (Psalm63:1,2)