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Manifestation
Opening Prayer:
God of all time and place, our paths and purposes collide and boomerang throughout our lives as we search for your radiant presence. Our thoughts and actions reveal the slow and sometimes frantic quest for the revelation of who we are. Guide us as you would a little child searching for home.
Reading from Lisa Colón DeLay
Those with a passing knowledge of the desert ascetics may suppose they were some sort of super saints or perfected hermits: pious followers of strict religious rules who had purged themselves of all fleshly desire and pleasure. That is incorrect. [1]
In the lineage of the desert ammas and abbas, we too are invited to a lifetime of
practice and a commitment to intimacy with God.
While it’s true that desert hermits and monastics had lives far removed from what we experience in a typical day, the human vulnerabilities that plagued them plague us too. The real test of spiritual maturity isn’t whether it works on an isolated mountaintop cabin or a refreshing retreat center; it’s whether we have been transformed so that our maturity plays out in regular life. Untold numbers of Christians, most of whom remain forgotten by history, found stillness and peace right in the middle of the stress and chaos of ordinary life, and many still do. They are the innumerable and unnamed ordinary saints—a grand cloud of witnesses who also cheer us on from just beyond the veil….
All the desert abbas and ammas show us that one-off special insights are not what bring us spiritual maturity or peace. Through the layering of situations, struggles, and seasons, we grow more devoted, mature, and wise. The inheritance in the kingdom of heaven means possessing Christlikeness; this inheritance comes in slow disbursements that take diligence and attention to learn and receive. We accomplish this not over weeks or months but over decades—over our lifetime and even into and throughout generations. The place is slow. Let’s get accustomed to that and settle in for the long haul.
The spiritual seeds the ammas and abbas once planted in the fertile soil of seekers can still beautifully bloom now in the soil of you, more than 1,500 years later. This is how the glory of God works. You are the glory of God made manifest. [2]
Affirmations and Intentions:
May we hone the skill of patience to be still and listen.
May we speak with the wisdom of the One who breathes in us.
May we hear revelations that evoke tears in our hearts.
May we be inspired by seeing how the Divine moves in another and all things.
May we wait patiently while deep healing takes place.
May we experience gratefulness when we awaken.
Silence to add your own intentions.
Closing Prayer: Listener of our Deepest Self, the ear of your heart Is forever open to us. We call and you respond. We turn and you embrace. We look and you gaze. We search and you lead. We lose and you find. We wander and you return us home. Grant us the grace to be a manifestation of your presence.
Closing Song: Manisfestation - Ark Praise Dancers Enrique Holmes
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I7OYKBK_7Xs&list=RDI7OYKBK_7Xs&start_radio=1
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