Devotions thoughts taken from Michael Molinos book, The Spiritual Guide

Are we caught up in our prayer life by making requests, meditation, reasoning, and straining to find God without?  God is within us!  St. Augustine summed it up by saying, “Lord I went wandering like a stray sheep, seeking you with anxious reasoning weighted within me. I wearied myself much in looking for you without. Yet you had your habitation within me…I went around the streets and squares of the cities of this world and found you not, because in vain I sought without for you who were within.”  We will not find God without by means of reasoning and logic. Each of us has Him present within us for we are His living Temple. Let us enjoy Him who lives within us and rest in his care for us.

Devotions based on Michael Molinos’ book, The Spiritual Guide

As we go along on our spiritual journey sometimes if feels like we are making no progress and actually going backwards. We may feel like we are walking in darkness and dryness. But God may be calling us to walk by faith and not dependent on our feelings and reasoning and efforts. Instead He wants our humble submission to His will, dying to our own natural efforts to know Him. At such times we need to trust Him even though it feels like we are blindfolded. We come to Him silent, believing, suffering, and with patience. As we place our life in His hands and resolve to do nothing except what His will is, then we can rest in Him for our relationship is most secure!

Devotions based on Michael Molinos’ book, The Spiritual Guide

Our spirit is the very center, our inward temple of God. He reigns upon His thrown in that place so we may keep our hearts at peace. Troubles may come to us in the form of temptations, trials, subtle suggestions etc. but we can still be at peace in that innermost place.  We might think of it as a divine fortress that defends and protects us. Even when surrounded by enemies we only need to retreat into that place. For there all is quiet, peaceful, secure and calm.  We have this strong castle that will make us triumphant over our enemies!  That place is a deeper place of prayer and love for Him alone. When we are attacked, we need to retreat to that place of peace. When we are discouraged or stressed or afraid we need to seek His face.  “Seek silence in the midst of the tumult, seek solitude in the masses, light in the midst of darkness; find forgetfulness in injury, victory in the midst of despondence, and courage in the midst of alarm, resistance in the midst of temptation, peace in the midst of war.”  Let us remember our inward invincible fortress!

Devotions based on Michael Molinos’ book, The Spiritual Guide  ( 1675)

“The deep things of God are not invented things, nor are the teachings to be proven, but rather only to be received.” The deep things don’t come through hearing or reading books, but by the Holy Spirit who wants to communicate to those that are “humble in their mind and lowly in the use of their reasoning.” The author talks about the inward way, how to go beyond mental rational prayer to a deep resting in Him. That means laying aside everything and going to that deep inward place where we find quiet and peace. As we go to this center we find He gives us strength and power to love Him more, even in hard circumstances. When we are on a journey toward a deeper relationship with the Lord, we may come to the place where reading books is tedious if they don’t deal with inward matters, or we may want to lay aside outward prayers, or we may have a growing knowledge of our own self nature. These are signs the Lord is wooing us to a deeper relationship with Him. As we conform to His leading we will know peace like never before.

11-22 On Saturday we had 8 “Wildmen” at Canaan for retreat and I think of them as passionate for God. It reminded me of an article I read by Chila Soychik who describes a passionate woman but I think it applies to both sexes.  Persons that are passionate for God have a thirst for Him that is the driving force of their lives. They care little for fame or fortune, recognition or reward but have experienced a personal relationship with Him.  They hunger for truth in this mixed up world where wrong often seems right. They go to the Word every day as their necessary daily food.  They love others with a godly passion and model unconditional love. They don’t portray themselves as having arrived but as someone who knows where they are going. They encourage others to join them too. A passionate person lives today with tomorrow in mind, knowing their life is a drop in the bucket of time and eternity.  They live each day to the fullest and are vibrant and  committed. They avoid sin so they can gain intimacy with God. None of us have boundless energy, super-human strength, or superior spirituality.  In fact, we are ordinary ones who fail, fall, and are tired at the end of the day.  But have we seen God work,  heard Him through His Word,  experienced peace and answered prayers, and enjoyed the comfort of the Holy Spirit? If so, we can call ourselves “Wildmen” or “Wildwomen” who are passionate for Him.

Devotions based on Stephen Smith’s book, Soul Custody

We are told in Phil 2:12 to cultivate and complete our salvation with reverence and awe. ( AB) Action steps are ways to work out our salvation if we are serious about our soul care. Our culture says to work more do more etc but let us not be hijacked by people and messages of the world at the expense of our souls.  Caring for our souls is a need in every season, every culture, and every soul. We should be careful to recognize warning signals that our soul gives us such as stress, depression, lack of joy strife, dryness, anxiety, preoccupation with daydreams, more time spent using technology etc.  We may need to admit to God all the areas of our life that are out of control and ask Him to help. .  We should also note the positive aspects of our soul which includes peace, contentment with life, spiritual aliveness, and exuberance about life. We can be inspired by preachers or our spouse can help us but no one can care for our soul like we can.

We must choose to be true to ourselves. Being true to our soul will look different than what that would be for another. What works for us may not work for someone else. But let us be intentional and explore the ways that are life-giving for us and stay with that.  Then every so often we should evaluate our experiences, go on retreats, ask ourselves if we are making choices that bring us closer to Him. “We flourish and thrive when we give the soul what the soul requires to live.”

Devotions based on Stephen Smith’s book, Soul Custody

Love is the acid test of Christian spirituality. It is the proof that we love God.  Either we are growing to be more loving or we are not growing at all in our souls.  Soul friendships are the place where love is fostered, nurtured, and given. It is also the primary place where love is received. It is the place where our soul connects in love, to love, and to be loved.   In everyone’s life there is a great need for a soul friend. In this love, we are understood as we are without mask or pretension. May we learn about this love from I Cor 13 “ Love never gives up. Love cares more for others than for self. Love doesn’t want what it doesn’t have. Love doesn’t strut, doesn’t’ have a swelled head, doesn’t force itself on others, isn’t always “me first”, doesn’t fly off the handle, doesn’t keep score of the sins of others, doesn’t revel when others grovel, takes pleasure in the flowering of truth, puts up with anything, trusts God always, looks for the best, never looks back, but keeps going to the end.” (MSG) Let us think of ways we can be a soul friend to another!

Devotions based on Stephen Smith’s book, Soul Custody

  “A soul friendship is an open place for another soul to emerge, a safe place for the action of friendship making, which is no easy task.” Sometimes we mistakenly assume that one broken person plus another broken person equals a whole. But our math is wrong. One broken person plus another broken person just equals more broken people.  What we really offer another is our wounds, our fears of being rejected, our history etc.  But when we experience God in our midst soul friendships happen. We offer ourselves to one another and feast in the fellowship that can transform us.  Friendship is really a movement from me to we.  To be present to you means that I must be prepared to be temporarily absent from me. My selfish desires to be heard and understood must be put aside for the sake of the other. It’s not about just me. It’s about us!  We move from the journey alone to the journey together.  “When we love one another deeply from the heart we move out of our own hearts into the sacred space of our friends- where peace and fear coexist, where trust and doubt find an equal dwelling place, where secrets are so embedded and darkness so great that we long for someone to bring us light.” In soul friendships we move out of the darkness and into the light of not only each other’s presence but His presence-the true light.

Devotions from Stephen Smith’s book , Soul Custody

When we live only for ourselves we become alienated from others and also alienated from ourselves. Our deepest and truest self is not an isolated self but finds its meaning and fulfillment in community. In a soul friendship we die to our false self and learn the joy and grace of being accepted as we truly are. The author mentions levels of friendship that correspond to the chamber of the heart. Chamber One is the surface level of connecting to another person. Here we just share basic information about each other. Chamber Two conversations go a bit deeper. Here we share common interests and affinity. Chamber Three is where we share some of our story-good along with the bad.  We try to be reciprocal in what we give each other and also receive.  Chamber Four is the place that holds secrets that no one knows; our hurts, our wounds etc.  Soul friendship is the journey of sharing all the chambers of our heart with all the chambers of another’s heart and discovering God in the midst of it all. Chamber 4 is the place that good friends, tested and proven friends explore together. It is the chamber that yields great rewards of personal transformation.  It is challenging and requires trust, safety, and an invitation to go there. Even Jesus selected only a few good friends to share his most intimate secrets and for most of us we are able to share with only a very few too.