Do you trust that he is gentle and kind with your weakness and neediness? Probably there is a part of you that judges you for your failings and your weaknesses. If so this Inner Critic blocks you from fully receiving and responding to the unfailing love of the Lord. Come to me now, acknowledge and accept who I want to be for you: a Savior of boundless compassion, infinite patience, unbearable forgiveness, and love that keeps no score of wrongs. Quit projecting onto Me your own feelings about yourself.
At this moment your life is a bruised reed and I will not crush it, a smoldering wick and I will not quench it. James We see this integration of solitary prayer and authentic relationships modeled by our Bible heroes. For instance, David composed lament psalms in desert caves and he sought ministry from the prophet Samuel and soul friends like Jonathon. When we go on retreat we hope to experience spiritual renewal, closeness with God, or to receive a profound message from the Lord.
We may find ourself in a Dark Night of the Soul, as I did when at age 22 I went on a retreat for three days of solitude, silence, and fasting in a monastery. This was the case for Brennan on an eight-day silent and directed retreat that he took when he was 43 years old.
He wanted to dedicate that year to the Lord and so he started his retreat on January 2, Bone-weary and lonely. Have abandoned any attempt at prayer: It seems too artificial. The few words spoken to God are forced and ring hollow in my empty soul. There is no joy being in His presence. An oppressive but vague feeling of guilt stirs within me. Somehow or other I have failed Him. Maybe pride and vanity have blinded me; maybe insensitivity to pain has hardened my heart. Is my life a disappointment to You [Lord]?
Are You grieved by the shallowness of my soul? I groaned through two hours of desolate prayer each morning, another two in the afternoon, and two more at night. Always scatterbrained, disoriented, rowing with one oar in the water. What did he do? How did he deal with feeling so dry and desolate day after day on his retreat? I read Scripture. I paced the floor. Tried a biblical commentary. For the next thirteen hours I remained wide awake, motionless, utterly alert. At ten minutes after five the next morning I left chapel with one phrase ringing in my head and pounding in my heart: Live in the wisdom of accepted tenderness.
He says when someone is tender towards you it makes a huge difference. Tenderness is mercy for broken people. It was this retreat that led him to write this precious book about the life-changing Abba experience. He was totally cut off from people, ministry work, media, entertainment, and even reading material. All he had with him was his Bible and a journal. Why would he make such a dramatic disconnect from his normal life and ministry in society?
Why be in seclusion for so long? Brennan was engaged in soul work with God. He actually wanted to recall painful memories from his childhood and other deep feelings about himself and his life. Each morning he met with a psychologist for therapy who helped him to awaken his repressed memories and to process his emotions. To get people to like him, Brennan says he became a good boy, well-mannered and deferential.
Through hard work he excelled in school. We can see ourselves in he who was a drunk and a liar, a divorcee and an ex-priest who broke his vows to the Church.
Our sins may differ. But Manning acknowledged something we often do not. Those who identify with Manning relate to him precisely at the point he admits consciousness of his own brokenness, his own sin, and names his failings. Doing so gives others permission to do the same, to stop pretending, to come face to face with mercy. Here is revelation bright as the evening star: Jesus comes for sinners, for those as outcast as tax collectors and for those caught up in squalid choices and failed dreams.
He comes for corporate executives, street people, superstars, farmers, hookers, addicts, IRS agents, AIDS victims, and even used car salesmen. Jesus not only talks with these people but dines with them—fully aware that His table fellowship with sinners will raise the eyebrows of religious bureaucrats who hold up the robes and insignia of their authority to justify their condemnation of the truth and their rejection of the gospel of grace.
His wife, Molly, is a Methodist elder. Connect with him on Twitter: bsimpson. Your browser does not support HTML5 audio. Not to make people with better morals but to create a community of prophets and professional lovers, men and women who would surrender to the mystery of the fire of the Spirit that burns within, who would live in ever greater fidelity to the omnipresent Word of God, who would enter into the center of it all, the very heart and mystery of Christ, into the center of the flame that consumes, purifies, and sets everything aglow with peace, joy, boldness, and extravagant, furious love.
This, my friend, is what it really means to be a Christian. He took his woes to God. I believe and I doubt, I hope and get discouraged, I love and I hate, I feel bad about feeling good, I feel guilty about not feeling guilty. I am trusting and suspicious. I am honest and I still play games. Aristotle said I am a rational animal; I say I am an angel with an incredible capacity for beer. To live by grace means to acknowledge my whole life story, the light side and the dark.
As Thomas Merton put it, "A saint is not someone who is good but who experiences the goodness of God. It obliterates the two-class citizenship theory operative in many American churches. For grace proclaims the awesome truth that all is gift. All that is good is ours not by right but by the sheer bounty of a gracious God. While there is much we may have earned--our degree and our salary, our home and garden, a Miller Lite and a good night's sleep--all this is possible only because we have been given so much: life itself, eyes to see and hands to touch, a mind to shape ideas, and a heart to beat with love.
We have been given God in our souls and Christ in our flesh. We have the power to believe where others deny, to hope where others despair, to love where others hurt. This and so much more is sheer gift; it is not reward for our faithfulness, our generous disposition, or our heroic life of prayer. Even our fidelity is a gift, "If we but turn to God," said St. Augustine, "that itself is a gift of God. If I am not in touch with my own belovedness, then I cannot touch the sacredness of others.
If I am estranged from myself, I am likewise a stranger to others. We listen to people in other denominations and religions.
We don't find demons in those with whom we disagree. We don't cozy up to people who mouth our jargon.
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