questions, day 7

Come to Stillness: Take a few minutes to allow your mind and heart to be still before God.

Opening Prayer:
O God, our Father, Creator of all that is, give us the courage to wrestle with the questions you ask us rather than jumping to some immediate answer—thereby cutting off any possibility of real growth or struggle. Help us stay in the question long enough to hear what it is you have for us there. In the name of Jesus. Amen. (JLB)

Psalm for the Week: Psalm 13

Scripture for the Day: Mark 10:46-52

Reading for Reflection:

As a culture, we have to be taught the language of descent.  That is the great language of religion.  It teaches us to enter willingly, trustingly into the dark periods of life.  These dark periods are good teachers.  Religious energy is in the dark questions, seldom in the answers.  Answers are the way out, but not what we are here for.  But when we look at the questions, we look for the opening to transformation.  Fixing something doesn’t usually transform us.  We try to change events in order to avoid changing ourselves.  We must learn to stay with the pain of life, without answers, without conclusions, and some days without meaning.  This is the path, the perilous dark path of true prayer. (Everything Belongs by Richard Rohr)


The real question is “What does this have to say to me?”  Those who are totally converted come to every experience and ask not whether or not they liked it, but what does it have to teach them.  “What’s the message in this for me?  What’s the gift in this for me?  How is God in this event?  Where is God in this suffering?” (Everything Belongs by Richard Rohr)

Sometimes…we have to do a thing in order to find out the reason for it. Sometimes our actions are questions, not answers.                                                                                          

                                                                                ~John Le Carre

Reflection and Listening: silent and written

Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself

Song for the Week: How Firm a Foundation

How firm a foundation, ye saints of the Lord,
Is laid for your faith in His excellent word!
What more can He say than to you He hath said—
To you who for refuge to Jesus have fled?

Fear not, I am with thee, oh, be not dismayed,
For I am thy God, and will still give thee aid;
I’ll strengthen thee, help thee, and cause thee to stand,
Upheld by My gracious, omnipotent hand.

When through the deep waters I call thee to go,
The rivers of sorrow shall not overflow;
For I will be with thee thy trouble to bless,
And sanctify to thee thy deepest distress.

When through fiery trials thy pathway shall lie,
My grace, all-sufficient, shall be thy supply;
The flame shall not harm thee; I only design
Thy dross to consume and thy gold to refine.

The soul that on Jesus doth lean for repose,
I will not, I will not, desert to his foes;
That soul, though all hell should endeavor to shake,
I’ll never, no never, no never forsake.

Closing Prayer:
It seems to me Lord
that we search
much too desperately
for answers
when a good question
holds as much grace
as an answer.

(Seasons of the Heart by Macrina Wiederkehr)