God of Our Dreams

God, Guidance, Prayer 0

When we hide from God our true goals and agendas, we cannot really hide them, but we can prevent ourselves from enjoying the comfort of knowing that God is “on the case” and working on our behalf. We can rob ourselves of the comfort of an ongoing collaboration with God, in which we both try to work to meet “our” goals. The problem, of course, is that we often assume that our personal goals and God’s goals for us are at opposite ends of the table. We do not trust that our dreams come from God and that God has the power to accomplish them. Instead, we act as though every idea we have is born out of self-will, and even in the most willful of us, this is never the case. God inspires us with desires and dreams. God gives us goals and agendas. God is prepared to help fulfill our goals and dreams. One more time it comes back to the questions of prayer. When we pray, “Please give me knowledge of your will for me and the power to carry it out,” we are often shocked by the fact that what is clarified for us is some very personal intention. We pray for God’s will only to discover how sharply we long for a partnership of our own with another human being. We pray for God’s will, thinking we will be pointed toward heaven, only to find that we are pointed squarely back into our career with a clear idea of what it is that we must do next to move ahead further.

God is not otherworldly. God is not flaky and airy-fairy. God is grounded in reality, and as we pray to God, we become more grounded, not less. As we ask to have our life run by God, we become more comfortable, not less, with the actual details of that life.

— Julia Cameron, Faith and Will, p. 76-77

God Can Handle It.

God, Prayer, Trials 0

One bold message from the book of Job is that you can say anything to God. Throw at God your grief, your anger, your doubt, your bitterness, your betrayal, your disappointment — God can absorb them all. As often as not, spiritual giants of the Bible are shown contending with God. They prefer to go away limping, like Jacob, rather than to shut God out. In this respect, the Bible prefigures a tenet of modern psychology: you can’t really deny your feelings or make them disappear, so you might as well express them. God can deal with every human response save one. God cannot abide the response I fall back on instinctively: an attempt to ignore God or act as though God does not exist. That response never once occurred to Job.

— Philip Yancey, Grace Notes, p. 348

Surrender

Faith, Letting Go, Prayer, Trials 0

In order to find a silver lining, we must be willing to look for one. At the very least, we must be willing to recognize one when it appears. We must be willing to be comforted in order to be comforted. We must maintain an openness to spiritual realities. We must be teachable in order that we may be taught. It is for this reason that the great prayer is “Thy will be done.” The surrendering of our independent spirits to a higher good makes it possible to find a path through darkness. “Thy will be done, O Lord. Thy will be done.” This is the prayer of the dark night of the soul. This is the prayer of surrender.

— Julia Cameron, Faith and Will, p. 43

Glad to Hear from Us

God, Guidance, Prayer 0

If God is with us every moment, then we can ask for direction at all times. There will never be a moment in which our prayer is unheard, although we may hurry onward, not taking time for an answer. To know God takes a beat. We must reach out and allow the time to feel that what we have reached out to has reached out back to us. Most of us are too hurried to know God. And yet we act as if God is too hurried to know us….

If God is always there and always available, then we are the ones who lag behind. Perhaps we do what I do and tag base with God only in the morning, forgetting about God the rest of the day, just going from thing to thing without taking God into account. Is it possible that in light of this, God gets lonely? Is it possible that God misses us? I think it is possible. I think that God is always glad to hear from us.

— Julia Cameron, Faith and Will, p. 8

Every Moment

God, Guidance, Prayer 0

If God is with us every moment, then we can ask for direction at all times. There will never be a moment in which our prayer is unheard, although we may hurry onward, not taking time for the answer. To know God takes a beat. We must reach out and allow the time to feel that what we have reached out to has reached out back to us. Most of us are too hurried to know God. And yet we act as if God is too hurried to know us.

— Julia Cameron, Faith and Will, p.8

Showing Up

Growth, Prayer, Writing 0

As with physical exercise, much of the benefit of prayer comes as a result of consistency, the simple act of showing up. The writer Nancy Mairs says she attends church in the same spirit in which a writer goes to her desk every morning, so that if an idea comes along she’ll be there to receive it. I approach prayer in the same way. Many days I would be hard-pressed to describe a direct benefit. I keep on, though, whether it feels like I am profiting or not. I show up in hopes of getting to know God better, and perhaps hearing from God in ways accessible only through quiet and solitude.

— Philip Yancey, Prayer: Does It Make Any Difference? quoted in Grace Notes, p. 39

Being Time

Life, Peace, Prayer 0

I’ve long since stopped feeling guilty about taking being time; it’s something we all need for our spiritual health, and often we don’t take enough of it….

When I am constantly running there is no time for being. When there is no time for being there is no time for listening. I will never understand the silent dying of the green pie-apple tree if I do not slow down and listen to what the Spirit is telling me, telling me of the death of trees, the death of planets, of people, and what all these deaths mean in the light of the love of the Creator who brought them all into being; who brought me into being; and you.

— Madeleine L’Engle, Walking on Water, p. 12-13