Live your Life

Live your life

“Live your life so that the fear of death can never enter your heart. When you arise in the morning, give thanks for the morning light. Give thanks for your life and strength. Give thanks for your food and for the joy of living. And if perchance you see no reason for giving thanks, rest assured the fault is in yourself.”  Ascribed to Chief Tecumseh, Synthesis Today quote, August 3, 2018, www.synthesispub.com

Aaron Burden  Unsplash

Gratitude is definitely a secret to a Spirit filled life.  Those in 12 step groups believe that you will most probably not go back to your old addiction, what they call “a slip” if you stay in a life of gratitude each day. Whenever someone in recovery is not doing well, the most suggested remedy is to start making a gratitude list every day, especially at night.

I live with Balbir Matbur’s teaching that “he travels in a boat called Surrender. His two oars are Forgiveness and Gratitude.”  As long as I can surrender to a power greater than myself and am willing to forgive and remain grateful for what I have been given, I live a life of peace. My blood pressure stays more normal. I am less likely to become irritated at all of life’s hiccups, my computer is not working, someone has said something unkind, I have expectations of myself and others that are not being met, my body is not working the way it should, I am not getting my way, my plan done for the day.

 I begin to live a life believing there is a grand plan better than my own.

My husband and I once made fun of an older man who was a friend of his father who would so often said, “you must have an attitude of gratitude.” Well, we both know now that there is no greater wisdom for living than this simple jingle.

Joanna joannaseibert.com

Buechner: Memory, Eucharist

Buechner: Memory, Eucharist, Jesus

“There are two ways of remembering. One way is to make an excursion from the living present back into the dead past. The old sock remembers how things used to be when you and I were young, Maggie. The faraway look in his eyes is partly the beer and partly that he's really far away.

The other way is to summon the dead past back into the living present. The young widow remembers her husband, and he is there beside her.

When Jesus said, "Do this in remembrance of me," he was not prescribing a periodic slug of nostalgia.” Frederick Buechner, Originally published in Wishful Thinking and later in Beyond Words, Frederick Buechner Quote of the Day, August 1, 2018.

Debby Hudson   Unsplash

Buechner gives us two ways to remember, going back and bringing memories forward. The going back to past memories can allow us to relive a scene from our lives. Anthony de Mello writes that sometimes that scene was too powerful to experience at the first time. As we relive it, we can participate in it again and again perhaps with a greater sense of its meaning.

Bringing memories forward is like doing active imagination with a friend or someone you deeply loved who has died. You imagine their presence with you. My experience is sometimes you will feel their presence even without trying to imagine it. Buechner believes that when Jesus said, “Do this is remembrance of me” (1 Corinthians 11:24) ,   Jesus is calling us to bring him back into our presence and know and feel his love so that we might go out and do the same for others. 

Some believe that Jesus is actually present in the bread and wine at the Eucharist. Others believe that the bread and wine are messengers or symbols reminding us of Jesus’ presence and love in our lives. Either way, the God of love is present.

Joanna   joannaseibert.com

Arthur: Lectio Sacra

Arthur: Literature for the liturgical season of Pentecost, Lectio sacra

This book “is a journey of the imagination guided by poets and author, both classic and contemporary, who have known the things of God but speak in metaphor.” Sarah Arthur, p. 7,  At the Still Point, Paraclete Press. 2011.

At the Still Point is a literary guide of daily and weekly readings and prayers by well-known authors for the long green liturgical season between the Day of Pentecost and Advent compiled by Sarah Arthur. She has also written companion similar guides for Advent, Christmas and Epiphany   (Light Upon Light) and for Lent  Holy Week, and Easter (Between Midnight and Dawn).

 In these twenty-nine weeks between the day of Pentecost and the first Sunday in Advent, Arthur hopes to open up our imagination as she exposes us to brief excerpts or short works of writers well known to us as well as some authors we may not know but should! Arthur warns us that as we encounter some of the readings in this anthology, there should be an alert: “Warning: Powerful Spiritual Moment Ahead!” Arthur suggests that we read each passage not as something for our English Literature class or for pleasure, but as liturgical pieces for worship and especially prayer.

Each week begins with an outline for the next seven days consisting  of an opening prayer, scripture readings, readings from literature, a place of personal prayer and reflection, and a closing prayer.  Arthur suggests applying the ancient principles of lectio divina or divine reading that we used reading scripture now as we read the weekly poetry and fiction writings she has prescribed.  We read the passage, meditate on it, pay attention to a word or phrase that connects to us, and finally rest in God’s presence with what we have experienced. It has been helpful to me to carry that word or phrase with me during that day or perhaps the whole week.  Since this process is now being used for literature and poetry rather than scripture, Arthur has christened it holy reading or lectio sacra.

I invite you to journey with me with Sarah Arthur during this ordinary season with an extraordinary spiritual practice of daily worship and prayer.

Joanna joannaseibert.com