Month: July 2010 (Page 2 of 4)

Devotions from Henri Nouwen’s book, The Inner Voice of Love

Today’s devotion is on following our deepest calling. When we discover in ourselves something that is a gift from God, we have to claim it and not let it be taken from us. Sometimes people who don’t know our heart may miss the importance of something that is part of our deepest self.  They might not know us well enough to respond to our genuine needs. It is then that we have to speak our heart and follow our own deepest calling. Many of us may give in too easily to other’s influence and may start questioning and doubting ourselves.  We may end up agreeing with the other before we have consulted our own heart. But instead we need to be attentive to our inner self. Let us act and speak from our solid inner base without apologies-humbly but convincingly.

Devotions from Henri Nouwen’s book, The Inner Voice of Love

Today’s devotion is on following our deepest calling. When we discover in ourselves something that is a gift from God, we have to claim it and not let it be taken from us. Sometimes people who don’t know our heart may miss the importance of something that is part of our deepest self.  They might not know us well enough to respond to our genuine needs. It is then that we have to speak our heart and follow our own deepest calling. Many of us may give in too easily to other’s influence and may start questioning and doubting ourselves.  We may end up agreeing with the other before we have consulted our own heart. But instead we need to be attentive to our inner self. Let us act and speak from our solid inner base without apologies-humbly but convincingly.

P.S. I got in some more berry picking tonight as I can hardly stand to let them go to waste. When I was picking I stayed within my boundaries near the road as it was tempting to venture further over towards my cousin’s house. But that is her plot to pick. Each of us is given a place where we are planted by the Lord and that is the place where we are to bear fruit. But if we look at others and go where they are planted we will miss out on what the Lord has for us.  I saw some luscious berries further in, but resisted the temptation to go there. What I had in my pail was sufficient and I was grateful. I did get scapes and some poison ivey but doesn’t deter me from picking. Let us not give up with minor irritations and inconveniences but carry on His work in the vineyard ( berry patch)!

Devotions from Henri Nouwen’s book, The Inner Voice of Love

Today’s devotion is on befriending our emotions. It can be discouraging to discover how quickly we can lose our inner peace. Maybe someone enters our lives who creates anxiety within us. Or maybe we thought we were centered and could stay with God, but then someone we hardly know makes us feel insecure. Then we start asking ourselves if we are loved or not, and that person becomes the criterion. We don’t need to be hard on ourselves or make it more difficult to come home again to love. But we don’t have to repress our emotions either. We can acknowledge them and let them pass by. In a way, we have to befriend them so that we don’t become their victim. The way to victory is not to try to overcome those emotions but in building a deeper sense of safety and at-homeness and a more incarnate knowledge that we are deeply loved. Then little by little, we will stop giving so much power to a stranger.
We can be sure that God will truly fulfill all our needs. If we hold on to that, we will not expect that fulfillment from people who we already know are incapable of giving it.

Devotions from Henri Nouwen’s book, The Inner Voice of Love

 Jesus became flesh for us so we could encounter Him in the flesh and receive His love in the flesh.

But sometimes our shame and our guilt prevent and block His presence in our lives. We may not feel fully at home in our bodies and wish we were good enough, looked more beautiful, or were more pure. Our lives may be filled with fears and we may feel we need permission to be ourselves. But Jesus was totally free before the authorities of His time. He told the people not to be guided by the behavior of the scribes and Pharisees.
Jesus came to free us from our doubts and fears and bonds. He wants to create in us a space where we can be with Him and live in the freedom of His children. We need not be discouraged that we cannot change ourselves but rather enter in to the presence of Jesus as we are and ask Him to give us a fearless heart where He can be with us.   We can’t make ourselves different. But He can give us a new heart, a new spirit, a new mind, and a new body. May we let Him transform us by His love and so enable us to receive His affection in our whole being.

Devotions from Henri Nouwen’s book The Inner Voice of Love

Today’s devotions is about the road to freedom and the importance of staying on that road. Sometimes we seem to think we are losing ground and going backwards and our healing is sporadic. But when we experience a set back or regress, all is not lost. We don’t start all over again. Instead what we have gained we have gained. 
Sometimes things build up and we feel like we are right back where we started. But instead, it is like we are pulled off the road, and return to the place where we left it, not to where we started.  It is not important to dwell on the moments we feel pulled away from our progress, but we must try to return home, to the solid place within us immediately. Otherwise we connect with similar moments and together they become powerful enough to pull us far away from the road. We must remain alert to the distractions and return to the road when we are on the shoulder rather than when we are pulled all the way into a nearby swamp.  IN everything, let us keep trusting that God is with us and has given us companions on the journey. Let us return to the road of freedom each time we get pulled off.

Devotions from Henri Houwen’s book, The Inner Voice of Love

Today’s devotion is on loneliness and the importance of trying to find the source of this feeling. I think Henri dealt with this a lot in his life.  We are all inclined to either run away from our loneliness or to dwell in it. If we run away it doesn’t diminish; we simply force if out of our minds temporarily.  When we start dwelling on it, our feelings only become stronger and we can slip into depression. Our spiritual task is to find the source which is not always easy to do as we can’t do it with our minds. It is a work of the heart and with our heart we can search for that place without fear.  As we discover where these feelings emerge from, it will lose some of its power over us. The pain of our loneliness might be rooted in our deepest vocation or our call to live completely for God.  When we experience in our innermost being the truth of our loneliness, we can find that this loneliness is not just tolerable but may be even fruitful. It can lead us to an even deeper knowledge of God’s love.

Devotions from Henri Nouwen’s book, The Inner voice of Love

Today’s devotion is about telling our story and it is important that we look at the pains of our past realizing that it has led us to our new life now. But if the new life is not fully ours, then our memories will continue to cause us pain. For when  we keep reliving painful events of the past, we can feel victimized by them.   But we can instead tell our story from the place where it no longer dominates us and causes us pain.  We can speak about it with a certain distance and see it as the way to our present freedom. We will then find that the pain has left and we don’t have to go back and relive it or depend on our past to identify ourselves.  We don’t need to tell our stories compulsively and urgently to keep returning to our past hurts. But instead they can lose their weight and be remembered as God’s way of making us more compassionate and understanding towards others