the breath of God, saturday

Saturday, June 14

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

Opening Prayer: O Loving God, who breathed me into being, breathe your Divine Breath in me again this day—that I might be filled with your life and guided by the winds of your Spirit.  For the sake of your Son.  Amen.

Scripture Reading for the Day: Genesis 2:4-7

Reading for Reflection:

 

At this point you may be wondering, “What about God’s role in spiritual growth?”  After all, the Bible speaks of transformation as the work of God.  It’s always a miracle when it happens.  To speak of spiritual growth only as a product of training could make it sound like something we can engineer.  Anytime a frog is turned into a prince—or even just a gentler, kinder frog—there is always something mysterious and awesome at work.  In spiritual growth that “something mysterious” is the work of the Spirit.  So another analogy from scripture is helpful.  “The wind blows where it chooses,” Jesus said, “and you hear the sound of it, but you do not know where it comes from or where it goes.  So it is with everyone who is born of the Spirit.”

     Consider the difference between piloting a motorboat or a sailboat.  We can run a motorboat all by ourselves.  We can fill the tank and start the engine.  We are in control.  But a sailboat is a different story.  We can hoist the sails and steer the rudder, but we are utterly dependent upon the wind.  The wind does the work.  If the wind doesn’t blow—and sometimes it doesn’t—we sit still in the water no matter how frantic we act.  Our task is to do whatever enables us to catch the wind.

     Spiritual transformation is that way.  We may be aggressively pursuing it, but we cannot turn it on and off.  We can open ourselves to transformation through certain practices, but we cannot engineer it.  We can take no credit for it. (The Life You’ve Always Wanted by John Ortberg)

Reflection and Listening: silent and written

Prayer: for the church, for others, for myself

             
Closing Prayer: O God, giver of life, you formed us from the dust of the ground, breathed the breath of life into our nostrils, and made us living creatures.  Come to us, by your Spirit this day, and breathe that very breath into us once again, that we may become all that you created us to be.  Amen.