Monday, June 03, 2019

Lightworks Two/1:2 (Rm 8:35-39) FREEWRITE

I think these Jesuits are some of the wisest people I have ever met. Just a reminder: I am going through the 18th Annotation of the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola. The 18th Annotation is a portion of the larger Spiritual Exercises that can be done in a 20th Annotation (30+ days at a retreat center away from any distractions) or the 19th (8-9 month prayer journey of about 34 weeks through the entire Exercises). I did the 19th two years in a row, and I ate it up!

This version is called Lightworks which is "simple exercises" of the 18th. You can do some or all and is broken up into One (4 weeks) Two (7 weeks) and Three (3 weeks) or done for 14 weeks through from start to finish). I am doing One-Three May - September when I will lead some people through the 19th Annotation. 

I say Jesuits are wise because I am reading the things that Joseph A. Tetlow has written in Lightworks. I just love the philosophy of being a "Contemplative in Action" which is something I have lived since my God awakening when I had a nervous breakdown in 1983, but I have never been able to articulate it as "Contemplative in Action." This captures it so well!  My heart is so warmed right now as I write that. I could have been a Jesuit (hahahahaha - not Catholic and not a man)! 

Anywho, here are some things that I wrote in my journal from Tetlow:

"The amount of time given to prayer is a very rough measure of how open the retreatant (person taking the Exercises) is to God and how generous" (p. 274).

"Your own intimacy with Jesus Christ, if you should freely choose to let it be known, will give the Holy Spirit a fine occasion to fire the retreatant's heart with love" (p. 274).

This manual is written for spiritual directors who accompany people through the Exercises, and that is something I have been commissioned to do (my director through the Exercises, Mike, gave me that commission and is there to help me at every turn - yay). But I am always hesitant to share my own intimacy with Jesus Christ. How do you articulate that? I also do not want to brag. I don't know why prayer has never been difficult for me, and I can only say it is a gift from him! This was something to pray through. 

"Remember that you never make a generous gesture to God the Lord … that will exceed God's generosity to  you. God always pours out gifts with regal largess when we offer to our Creator any of our own little gifts" (p. 133 - "The Way Some People Pray") 

This is SO TRUE! It was like the PUMP Party this weekend. We pray once a year for a Saturday with a group (this year over the 12 hours was about 34 people), and I always walk out of there saying, "I am so blessed. This was SO GOOD! No sacrifice. God gives us so much more than we give to him." 

We can never out give God in his abundant generosity to us.

And Romans 8:35-39 spoke so powerfully to me. Nothing can separate us from Christ's love. Not war or anything. This was on the heals of waking up to a buzz on my phone from "O" in a country I cannot say. Video of the after effects of a bomb going off in the streets of his city. Nothing can separate him from your love. Protect him Lord. 

That is all I have for today. I need to process a bunch from the PUMP. I really loved it. It was a lot of pre work, but I am going to take the lead on recruiting people for next year (mainly because we will pray for a part of the world that no one has expertise on so I am recruiting people from out of the area). 

The partner I worked with this year was maxed out, and I was waiting on the partner for doing things, and I ended up having to take about 90% of it on when if I had taken full leadership, I would have delegated sooner. So, I had an epiphany that it was something I started 4 years ago, and even though I had given it to someone else last year because of what I was doing (Renovare Institute and our Kingdom Community) it was OK to take it back. And I think the partner is too maxed out and does not know it. I feel nothing but compassion for this person. So here we go again! 

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