Life Lived in Lectio

Lectio Divina...divine reading...reading in a way that pays attention to divine presence...listening to what radiates in one's heart and soul...imagine living your every day life in such a way.  Being aware.  Being awake.  Knowing God is present.

For me, that's why there are certain spiritual practices I love.  I love praying the daily offices; I love reading scripture (and lots of other texts) in lectio; I crave prayer time; I love to pause and listen.  I get filled with joy when I realize that I've most likely heard something "right."  I get filled with Spirit's happiness when I go and be and do what God has asked of me.

Discernment is a daily exercise because we are never done. Our journeys are one day of discernment followed by another.  Each day, we be and do the best we can in response to our experience of God's guidance.  Today I heard a sermon on the feeling of the "next thing."  I left that service all aglow...I had had a lectio moment.  Actually, I had experienced several lectio moments.  Several phrases had radiated for me -- "Here I am Lord,"  "restore the joy," "the next thing," "Amazing Grace," "clean slate," "broken and poured out for me" -- WOW!

This morning as I was preparing myself for worshipping with a new and different community of faith, I had drawn three prayer words from my stash.  They were "patience," "joy," and "mercy."  As I have been reflecting on my worship experience, those words have come back to me.  Patience with whom or what?  My children?  The "process"?  Joy...yeah...JOY!  Mercy.  Mercy is another hard one.  Mercy with others in my life who will have a difficult transition as we find a new faith community--including those we leave behind as well as those we join?  Mercy.  That's a word that's packed with meaning, one that I will be praying on and living with over the next few days. 

I have faith that the coming days will be filled with moments of insight and clarity and understanding; I also accept that the coming days will most likely have moments of doubt, fear, regret...and...perhaps, Mercy.

A life lived in lectio is a life filled with grace and gratitude, tears and joy, doubt and wonder.  A life lived in lectio is a life lived listening.