May 18-Sunday-Ps.31 is one of the great psalms, and Jesus alludes to it at the cross.Indeed, the Psalms provide us with a sterling prayer book. f we use the Psalter to guide our prayers, by using them or rewriting them, or using them as a template, we get a course in spiritual path finding. V. 15’s “my times are in your hand” could be an invitation to avoiding responsibility for one’s life, or it could also be a source of real relief for those prone to being too dutiful.
Monday-"Creator of the Universe, preserve us from our own presumption. Do not let us close ourselves into ourselves but open us continually into You. Let us be more in love with You than with our notions of You. Let us stop claiming to know everything so that we may understand something. Increase in us kindness. Make us people who care and who take care, who venerate the truth and recognize each other. Draw us with an irresistible beauty!" (Terri Davis)
Tuesday-“The greatest honor we can give Almighty God is to live gladly because of the knowledge of his love.” ― Julian of Norwich Where are you aware of the love of God? where do you find yourself living gladly? What makes you glad, or must it well up despite circumstances?
Wednesday-It is at the bottom where we find grace; for like water, grace finds the lowest level and pools there.” Richard Rohr I like this quote, as I imagine grace being poured on us from above. When have you found grace at the low end of the pool? How do you define grace, or do you only know it when you encounter it?
Thursday-What does love look like? It has the hands to help others. It has the feet to hasten to the poor and needy. It has eyes to see misery and want. It has the ears to hear the sighs and sorrows of men. That is what love looks like. Saint Augustine. Here Augustine moves past our sense of love as sentiment, as feeling as primary. He sees love in action. perhaps love in action can spur feeling.
Friday--Years ago a retired farmer told me you can;’t be a sissy and get older. Aging brings very few physical benefits. I am not sure that the increase of perspective and wisdom balances the scales of physical decline vewy well. It gets harder when it seems our resilience is not what it used to be either. How have you learned to cope with physical decline? Where do you handle it well and not so well? does your religious life help or hinder you in that task?
Saturday-We just read Haggai 1, where it speaks of drinking and not being sated and making money and putting it in a bag full of holes.Right away, susie said that it sounds like 2014. It does seem many of u are on an economic carousel, where we gain one moment and lose the next. Where do you seek lasting value across the board? Where do persistent hungers dog your spiritual path? when is dissatisfaction a welcome part of your path?
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