The Foundation of the Spiritual Life

Soon afterwards

Elizabeth his wife became pregnant

and went into seclusion for five months.

“How kind the Lord is,” she exclaimed,

“to take away my disgrace

of having no children!”

(Luke 1:24-25, The Living Bible)

Dear friends, even though I am talking like this I really don’t believe that what I am saying applies to you. I am confident you are producing the good fruit that comes along with your salvation. For God is not unfair. How can he forget your hard work for him, or forget the way you used to show your love for him—and still do—by helping his children? And we are anxious that you keep right on loving others as long as life lasts, so that you will get your full reward. Then, knowing what lies ahead for you, you won’t become bored with being a Christian nor become spiritually dull and indifferent, but you will be anxious to follow the example of those who receive all that God has promised them because of their strong faith and patience. (Hebrews 6:9-12, TLB)

The French author Simone Weil  writes in her notebook: “Waiting patiently in expectation is the foundation of the spiritual life.” Without patience our expectation degenerates into wishful thinking. Patience comes from the word patior which means “to suffer.” What seems a hindrance becomes a way; what seems an obstacle becomes a door; what seems a misfit becomes a cornerstone. (Henri Nouwen, Out of Solitude)

Prayer

Lord, give us patience so that we may truly see obstacles as doors, the “not-quite-rights” of life as a foundation, our suffering and indifference as eventual gateways to your salvation, to goodness, and to meaningful service. Make the challenges on our spiritual journey into opportunities to say “yes” to your love and to your help. Amen. 

Advent action

Advent is marked by a spirit of expectation, by watchful alertness. Prepare the way of the Lord by making an Advent calendar of ways to help others or positive changes in your own spiritual life. Don't plan too precisely, however; leave room for God's input. 

(from Advent and Christmas Wisdom from Henri Nouwen)

From Sabbath to Hope

In such places [as the woodlands], on the best of these sabbath days, I experience a lovely freedom from expectations - other people's and also my own. I go free from the tasks and intentions of my workdays, and so my mind becomes hospitable to unintended thoughts: to what I am very willing to call inspiration. The poems come incidentally or they do not come at all. If the Muse leaves me alone, I leave her alone. To be quiet, even wordless, in a good place is a better gift than poetry (Wendell Berry, This Day, Introduction).

 A good relationship has unfilled, unplanned time, when expectations are allowed to rest. In a good relationship with our Sabbath-giver, expectation draws us forward into life. When it is life-giving, it is hope. When it is death-dealing, it is dread. Some time must be spent out of the sun and rain of different expectations in this shelter-rest of sabbath.

Only in this do we find freedom. We find we are not tethered to our expectations, but we can ride them for a while, letting them bear us into new and better places. Expectation can only become hope when we can rest. Otherwise we find that we are pushed instead of invited, tied down instead of free. Dread is the result.

In the midst of rest, we find we have unintended thoughts. We will find out whether we have been tending to our thoughts or letting them grow into distorted and grotesque weeds of the mind. Rest allows us time to tend our thoughts and dig up the weeds that are intruders in the ecology of our life with God. Then rest can become a garden of delight, where the unintended thoughts are beautiful and surprising, helpful and holy. What grows in the mind rested on God is hope, the wordless silence allowing the relationship we have with God to speak and create anew.