REFLECTIONS, POEMS & PRAYERS

Dale Gish 2/23/19 Dale Gish 2/23/19

Celebrate

When God overwhelms you with His love, heals you, frees you from a burden, forgives you, takes away your fear or shame, go and celebrate. You can’t celebrate too much.

In the story of the woman and the lost coin, God celebrates when the one who was lost is found. Jesus the Good Shepherd rejoices over the lost sheep who is rescued. The Father throws a party when the prodigal returns.

As a spiritual director I am privileged to be able to see the amazing work that God does in people’s lives. And when I see God’s miraculous work, I often sense that God wants to celebrate, throw a party.

And so, when God overwhelms you with His love, heals you, frees you from a burden, forgives you, takes away your fear or shame, go and celebrate. You can’t celebrate too much.

Dale Gish 2/22/19 Dale Gish 2/22/19

Dutiful Faith Versus Joyful Faith

While we all have times where we have to make ourselves pray, ultimately God wants us to want to spend time with Him and enjoy spending time with Him. Do you like spending time with people who are making themselves spend time with you? I don’t, and I think it isn’t God’s favorite either.

I’ve been a very dutiful person. I have wanted to know what is right and true and to live it out. And there’s a real value in this kind of serious discipleship and faithfulness. But I think there is a downside. Have I and have we become dutiful Christians versus joyful Christians?

Let’s explore this in the context of prayer. What kind of prayer does God really want from us? Well, God, of course, wants us to spend time with Him, but it also matters the spirit in which we spend that time. I think that God longs for us to have our hearts in it.

The Ignatian Exercises rocked my world in this. I as I prayed and encountered Jesus I discovered that I wanted to be with Jesus. I loved Him and loved being loved by Him. I wanted to care about the things he cares about, and love the people he loves. I found my experience of God transformed from a demanding taskmaster to a God that I wanted to be with and who met me daily with comfort, challenge, encouragement and joy. I would hear Jesus asking me “What do you want?” and I found myself answering that what I most wanted was Him and to give myself to Him.

I am blessed to be surrounded by Christians and be a spiritual director to Christians who take discipleship seriously and have attempted to make their lives about following Jesus and give their lives to the body of Christ. I am truly grateful for that. However, sometimes I see much more duty and obligation than I see joy in the Lord.

One of the biggest things I do in spiritual direction is to walk with dutiful Christians as they grow in having desire and joy become more their motivation. I don’t want them to throw out serious discipleship, but instead want to help them find a new motivation for their serious discipleship, desire and joy. The Ignatian Exercises are designed to do this and Jesus Himself always seems to call people to deep desire and joy as they pray through his life. Maybe that is why I love the exercises so much.

I have a long way to go in having desire and joy be my motivation. But it is a journey I am glad to be on with the Lord. It is easy to fall back into duty, but Jesus loves it when I step into desire and joy.

“Dale what do you want?” “I want you, Jesus.”

“Give me only your love and your grace. That’s enough for me.” -Ignatius of Loyola

This reflection was inspired by the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola. If you are interested in praying the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius with me starting in September, please contact me.

Dale Gish 2/10/19 Dale Gish 2/10/19

Poem: A Journey of Soul Restoration

Lord, my hands are your hands
I give them to you

But your Kingdom does not stand or fall on my work
You have your own power and your own ways
You can raise up hands to serve you from these stones

Lord, my hands are your hands
I give them to you

But your Kingdom does not stand or fall on my work
You have your own power and your own ways
You can raise up hands to serve you from these stones

Save me from the sin of self-importance
I can only receive what is given
I can only give when you invite

So I desire to trust you
And let you lead me amid the brokenness
On a journey of soul restoration
Knowing that you are far better than what I can imagine
And more with me than I could dare to hope

Dale Gish 1/15/19 Dale Gish 1/15/19

Deeply Beloved

We are met by God with compassion and tenderness as beloved daughters and sons. We are Deeply Beloved.

Who are the Deeply Beloved? We Are!

From the beginning God has loved us. In Eden, God delighted to walk with us in the cool of the evening. Then God formed a people, revealing himself to them, leading them out of slavery, dwelling with them. Though God’s people often turned away, God sought them out and called them back into right relationship.

In Jesus, God is Emmanuel, deeply with us. Jesus accompanied His people, healing them, teaching them, loving them. Jesus showed us the greatest love by dying on a cross to save us, breaking the power of sin and death. And He rose from the dead, alive, to comfort His disciples, calling them to welcome people from all nations into the church.

When Jesus ascended, He sent the Holy Spirit to dwell with us, lead us, comfort us. The Holy Spirit continues to dwell in us today, and Jesus befriends us and continues to call us as disciples, while the Father continues to pour out great love upon us. We long for the day in the new creation when God will dwell with us, wiping away the tears from our eyes, and sorrow and suffering will be no more.

Though our lives are full of failure, though struggle surrounds us, though we constantly need grace and forgiveness, God seeks us and invites us to abide in the vine, entering deeply into the love relationship of the Trinity. We are met by God with compassion and tenderness as beloved daughters and sons. We are Deeply Beloved.