Devotions based on David Benner’s book, Soulful Spirituality

We need to listen to our life and recognize the many parts of our story over which we had no control…like the family we were born into, skin color, body type, temperament etc. We all have an ideal of what we want our life to be like but it isn’t always the actual. We must embrace the tensions between this gap of our ideal and actual self and our inconsistencies. If we are truly alive, there will always be parts of our self that do not fit easily with other parts of our self or with our values. We are all a mixed bag of contradictions and mystery. We have a shadow side that needs to be acknowledged or we will not know our true self. We need to accept all that we are, all that we have done, and all that has been our history and experience so we can live life fully. God is in the midst of the realities of our lives. Prayer is the place we can honestly share our true self with the true God. Too often we bring to God in prayer our false self of who we wish we were or would like to seen by others. But prayer is grounded in reality and we have to meet God in those realities. Prayer then becomes a help to living our lives with authenticity and being truly alive.