Category Archives: Death Daily

Daily Riches: Desolation’s Gift (Ruth Barrows and Kathleen Norris) *

Posted on by under Death Daily, Desolation's Gift, Embracing Losses and Limits, Faith and Doubt, Suffering and Grace

“‘God is trying to get us to accept a state where we have no assurance within that all is well … where no clear path lies before us, where there is no way; a state of spiritual inadequacy experienced in it’s raw, humiliating bitterness.’ Only when we admit that we have “no way” do we have any hope of finding one. Out of what seems desolate a newly vigorous faith can arise, a certainty that is not subject to changes in moods or feelings, or the vicissitudes of life.” Kathleen Norris, quoting Carmelite Ruth Burrows

“Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way,
consider it an opportunity for great joy.
… for when your endurance is fully developed,
you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.”
James 1:2,4

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Our first response is not usually to look at “desolation” and “troubles” as gifts or an “opportunity for great joy.” Burrows, Norris and James team up to convince us otherwise.
  • Being “complete” (James) sounds a lot like Norris’s “vigorous faith” … not subject to changes in moods or feelings, or the vicissitudes of life.” Have you experienced the kind of faith that transcends feelings and circumstances? If so, did you learn it in times of ease, or in times of trouble?
  • Have you ever thought of desolation as God’s gift to you as his child – “giving” trouble into your life so you enter a state where “there is no way?”  where you experience “spiritual inadequacy” and “humiliating bitterness?” I imagine for many who follow Jesus, that would be a new, and perhaps disturbing thought. It sounds pretty brutal. Might it be true?
  • Can you embrace desolation in your life in order to receive its gift? Perhaps if we can remember the ministry of desolation in our lives, we won’t refuse it. Is there desolation at work right now in your life? Will you embrace it?

Abba, thank you for working in me to make me whole. Help me to embrace your sometimes painful love.

__________

For More: Acedia & Me by Kathleen Norris

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“There grows in me an immense dissatisfaction with all that is merely passively accepted as truth, without struggle and without examination. Faith, surely, is not passive, and not an evasion. And today, more than ever, the things we believe, I mean especially the things we accept on human faith—reported matters of ‘fact,’ questions of history, of policy, of interpretation, of wants—they should be very few.” Thomas Merton   These Daily Riches are designed to encourage examination of convictions, of faith, so that we increasingly trust in the God who is really there, and less in our ideas of Him. Thanks for reading and sharing my daily blog. –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Contemplation (John Eudes Bamberger) *

Posted on by under Contemplation, Death Daily, Hurry Sickness, Learning Your Proper Place, Meditation, Silence

“When you are faithful in [silent meditation] … you will slowly experience yourself in a deeper way.  Because in this useless hour in which you do nothing ‘important’ or urgent you have to come to terms with your basic powerlessness, you have to feel your fundamental inability to solve your or other people’s problems or to change the world. When you do not avoid that experience but live through it, you will find out that your many projects, plans, and obligations become less urgent, crucial, and important and lose their power over you.” John Eudes Bamberger

“Surely I have composed and quieted my soul;
Like a weaned child rests against his mother,
My soul is like a weaned child within me.”
Psalm 131:2

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Are you able to go to the place the Psalmist writes about, where your soul is quieted and you experience great love, peace, protection, and acceptance from your heavenly parent?
  • Do you have a deep sense of your own “basic powerlessness … to solve your or other people’s problems?” Do you attempt to “avoid that feeling” or try to “live through it?” What is the result?
  • In the press of a busy day, time spent sitting quietly before the Lord can seem “useless” or like “doing nothing.” Have you established a daily practice to keep from skipping such time so that you can more powerfully sense his love for you and your own limitations and needs?

Abba, I pray that the false urgency of my world would lose it’s grip on me as I linger in your presence. I pray that, more and more, I would sense your great love towards me. Help me to breathe in that love, and then exhale it out as my gift, and your gift, to my world.

__________

For More: The Way of the Heart by Henri Nouwen

_________________________________________________

The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to provide you with something of uncommon value each day in 400 words or less. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Asceticism (Kathleen Norris) *

Posted on by under Asceticism, Death Daily, Learning Your Proper Place

“Asceticism … is a way of surrendering to reduced circumstances
in a manner that enhances the whole person.

It is a radical way of knowing exactly who, what, and where you are,
in defiance of those powerful forces in society –
alcohol, drugs, television, shopping malls, motels –
that aim to make us forget.”
Kathleen Norris

“Then Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan River. He was led by the Spirit in the wilderness where he was tempted by the devil for forty days. Jesus ate nothing all that time and became very hungry.”   Luke 4:1,2

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • At the start of his ministry, Jesus was “led by the Spirit” into an extreme ascetic experience. What was the reason for this? Think about it in light of what Kathleen Norris says.
  • What forces do you notice in your life that make you “forget exactly who, what, and where you are?”
  • How can you voluntarily “reduce your circumstances” (or accept reduced circumstances) in order to “enhance” your whole self and be better grounded?

Abba, whether I choose less (things, activity, talk) or less is chosen for me (opportunity, health, affirmation), I pray that you would work in that empty space to teach me “who, what and where” I am.

__________

For More: Dakota: A Spiritual Geography by Kathleen Norris

_________________________________________________

These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to provide you with something of uncommon value each day in 400 words or less. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Hitting the Ultimate Bottom (Richard Rohr)

Posted on by under Death Daily, Desolation's Gift, Embracing Losses and Limits, Suffering and Grace

“Death is not just physical dying, but going to full depth, hitting the bottom, going the distance, beyond where I am in control, fully beyond where I am now. We all die eventually; we have no choice in the matter. But there are degrees of death before the final physical one. If we are honest, we acknowledge that we are dying throughout our life, and this is what we learn if we are attentive: grace is found at the depths and in the death of everything. After these smaller deaths, we know that the only ‘deadly sin’ is to swim on the surface of things, where we never see, find, or desire God and love. This includes even the surface of religion, which might be the worst danger of all. Thus, we must not be afraid of falling, failing, going ‘down.’ It is at the bottom where we find grace; for like water, grace seeks the lowest place and there it pools up.”   Richard Rohr

“Our of the depths I cry to you Yahweh,
Lord, hear my voice.
Let your ears be attentive
to my cry for mercy. …
I wait for Yahweh
my whole being waits,
and in his word I put my hope.”
Psalm 130:1,2,5

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  •  None of us want to “hit the bottom” where we lose all control and “have no choice” in what is happening to us. And there are certainly many lesser “deaths” along the way to that ultimate one. And yet, much of what needs to happen in us will occur no other way. When life takes you into these painful places, can you remember to allow God to do in you what he probably couldn’t do any other way?
  • Knowing this about “falling” and about “grace pooling up at the bottom”, can you remember not to be afraid?

Abba, your love definitely takes me places I never wanted to go. I’ve found life there though, and pooled up grace, so I will trust you as the two of us go on together.

__________

For More: Immortal Diamond by Richard Rohr

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These “Daily Riches” are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to give you something of uncommon value each day in less than 400 words. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Death and the Great Physician (John Donne and Philip Yancey)

Posted on by under Death Daily, Embracing Losses and Limits

“Our last day is our first day; our Saturday is our Sunday; our eve is our holy day; our sunsetting is our morning; the day of our death is the first day of our eternal life. The next day after that … comes that day that shall show me to myself. Here I never saw myself but in disguises; there, then, I shall see myself, but I shall see God too…. Here I have one faculty enlightened, and another left in darkness; mine understanding sometimes cleared, my will at the same time perverted. There I shall be all light, no shadow upon me; my soul invested in the light of joy, and my body in the light of glory. … That voice, that I must die now, is not the voice of a judge that speaks by the way of condemnation, but of a physician that presents health.” John Donne

“A turning point came for Donne as he began to view death not as the disease that permanently spoils life, rather as the only cure to the disease of life, the final stage in the journey that brings us to God. Evil infects all of life on this fallen planet, and only through death–Christ’s death and our own–can we realize a cured state.”  Philip Yancey

“Lord, remind me how brief my time on earth will be.
Remind me that my days are numbered—
how fleeting my life is.
You have made my life no longer than the width of my hand.
My entire lifetime is just a moment to you;
at best, each of us is but a breath.”
Psalm 39:4,5

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • St. Benedict says to “keep death daily before your eyes.” How often do you consider your approaching death? How could doing that benefit you?
  • John Donne suggests we shall only really know God, ourselves – and true health, on the day that we die – that death is “… the final stage in the journey that brings us to God.”  Can you think about your death that way? If so, how does that make you feel?
  • If your life is “a moment … a breath”, what does that mean for how you want to live?

 __________

For More: Soul Survivor: How My Faith Survived the Church by Philip Yancey

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These “Daily Riches are for your encouragement as you seek after God. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Death Daily (Dietrich Bonhoeffer)

Posted on by under Death Daily

“In life with Jesus Christ, death as a general fate approaching us from without is confronted by death from within, one’s own death, the free death of daily dying with Jesus Christ. Those who live with Christ die daily to their own will. Christ in us gives us over to death so that he can live within us. Thus our inner dying grows to meet that death from without. Christians receive their own death in this way and in this way our physical death very truly becomes not the end but rather the fulfillment of our life with Jesus Christ. Here we enter into community with the One who at his own death was able to say, ‘It is finished.’” Dietrich Bonhoeffer

“We always carry around in our body the death of Jesus,
so that the life of Jesus may also be revealed in our body.”
2 Corinthians 2:10

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • “Christ in us gives us over to death (crucifixion) so that he can live (resurrection) within us.” What has this meant in your life?
  • These mini-deaths are “free” in that we choose them or submit to them. Have you been able choose to receive these kinds of difficult losses and trials as Christ’s “gift?”
  • “Our inner dying grows to meet that death from without.” When you consider this, how does it affect your feelings about your own death?
  • Take a few moments to think about your physical death becoming “not the end but rather the fulfillment of [your] life with Jesus Christ.” Sit with that in quietness. What emotions arise from that?

Abba, the experience of death from within is both painful and frightening. Even so, I want to embrace the “deaths” you send into my life so that Jesus will live more fully in me. Please help me “die to my own will” as I submit to your will for me when it comes to this “daily dying with Jesus Christ.”

__________

For More: Bonhoeffer: Pastor, Martyr, Prophet, Spy by Eric Metaxas

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The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to give you something of uncommon value each day in less than 400 words. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: The School of Spiritual Formation (J. I. Packer)

Posted on by under Death Daily, Desolation's Gift, Patience with Yourself, Spiritual Formation

“Cross-bearing is the long lesson of our mortal life. It is a part of God’s salvation, called sanctification. It is a lesson set before us every moment of every day. It concerns this strange and daunting business of how strain and pain–passion, in the sense of conscious suffering voluntarily accepted–may be transmuted into glory. If life were an art lesson, we could describe it as a process of finding how to turn this mud into that porcelain, this discord into that sonata, this ugly stone block into that statue, this tangle of threads into that tapestry. In fact, however, the stakes are higher than in any art lesson. It is in the school of sainthood that we find ourselves enrolled and the artifact that is being made is ourselves.” J. I. Packer

“Surely it was for my benefit
  that I suffered such anguish.”
  Isaiah 38:17
(King Hezekiah, after recovering from a near fatal illness)

From the Head to the Heart

  • What could you do on a daily basis to be more aware of God’s work in you, “transmuting” you, in “every moment of every day?”
  • What kinds of things keep you from this awareness?
  • Packer reminds us that this is “the long lesson of our mortal life.” Can you be patient with yourself and God during this long, gradual process of “strain and pain” and “anguish?”

Abba, help me to be mindful each day of the ways you’re working to change me through my circumstances – especially when it comes to “conscious suffering voluntarily accepted.” Help me in this school of sainthood.

__________

For More: Christianity: The True Humanism by J. I Packer and Thomas Howard

_________________________________________________

The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to give you something of uncommon value each day in less than 400 words. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Desolation’s Gift (Ruth Barrows and Kathleen Norris)

Posted on by under Death Daily, Desolation's Gift, Suffering and Grace

“God is trying to get us to accept a state where we have no assurance within that all is well … where no clear path lies before us, where there is no way; a state of spiritual inadequacy experienced in it’s raw, humiliating bitterness.” Only when we admit that we have “no way” do we have any hope of finding one. Out of what seems desolate a newly vigorous faith can arise, a certainty that is not subject to changes in moods or feelings, or the vicissitudes of life.” Kathleen Norris, quoting Carmelite Ruth Burrows

“Dear brothers and sisters, when troubles come your way,
consider it an opportunity for great joy.
… for when your endurance is fully developed,
you will be perfect and complete, needing nothing.”
James 1:2,4

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Our first response is not usually to look at “desolation” and “troubles” as gifts or an “opportunity for great joy.” Burrows, Norris and James team up to convince us otherwise.
  • Being “complete” (James) sounds a lot like Norris’s “vigorous faith” … not subject to changes in moods or feelings, or the vicissitudes of life.” Have you experienced the kind of faith that transcends feelings and circumstances? If so, did you learn it in times of ease, or in times of trouble?
  • Have you ever thought of desolation as God’s gift to you as his child – “giving” trouble into your life so you enter a state where “there is no way?”  where you experience “spiritual inadequacy” and “humiliating bitterness?” I imagine for many who follow Jesus, that would be a new, and perhaps disturbing thought. It sounds pretty brutal. Might it be true?
  • Can you embrace desolation in your life in order to receive its gift? Perhaps if we can remember the ministry of desolation in our lives, we won’t refuse it. Is there desolation at work right now in your life? Will you embrace it?

Abba, thank you for working in me to make me whole. Help me to embrace your sometimes painful love.

__________

For More: Acedia & Me by Kathleen Norris

_________________________________________________

The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to give you something of uncommon value each day in less than 400 words. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Embracing Our Limits (Pete Scazzero)

Posted on by under Death Daily, Embracing Losses and Limits, Humility, Learning Your Proper Place

“Getting off our thrones and joining the rest of humanity

is a must for spiritual maturity.
We are not the center of the universe.
The universe does not revolve around us.
Yet a part of us hates limits. We won’t accept them.
This is one of the primary reasons grieving our losses Biblically
is such an indispensable part of spiritual maturity.
Embracing our limits humbles us like little else.”
Peter Scazzero

“So John’s disciples came to him and said, ‘Rabbi, the man you met on the other side of the Jordan River, the one you identified as the Messiah, is also baptizing people. And everybody is going to him instead of coming to us.’ John replied, ‘No one can receive anything unless God gives it from heaven.  …It is the bridegroom who marries the bride, and the best man is simply glad to stand with him and hear his vows. Therefore, I am filled with joy at his success. He must become greater and greater,
and I must become less and less.’” John 3:26-30

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Of one pastor it was said, “He wanted to be the bride at every wedding, and the corpse at every funeral.” It’s both funny and sad. Do you ever struggle to “get off your throne and join the rest of humanity?”
  • Think about some of the limits in your life. Do you hate them? Are you refusing to accept them, or are you “embracing” them?
  • What would it mean for you to “grieve your losses Biblically?” Can you see that there would be benefit in doing that? How so?

Abba, forgive me for constantly trying to do more than you intend with my life. Forgive me for my exalted sense of my own importance – for my constant chafing at the limits you give. Help me to submit to the work of “limits” in my life.

__________

For More: Emotionally Healthy Spirituality by Peter Scazzero

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The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to provide you with something of uncommon value each day in about 300 words. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Contemplation (John Eudes Bamberger)

Posted on by under Contemplation, Death Daily, Hurry Sickness, Learning Your Proper Place

“When you are faithful in [silent meditation] … you will slowly experience yourself in a deeper way.  Because in this useless hour in which you do nothing ‘important’ or urgent you have to come to terms with your basic powerlessness, you have to feel your fundamental inability to solve your or other people’s problems or to change the world. When you do not avoid that experience but live through it, you will find out that your many projects, plans, and obligations become less urgent, crucial, and important and lose their power over you.” John Eudes Bamberger

“Surely I have composed and quieted my soul;
Like a weaned child rests against his mother,
My soul is like a weaned child within me.”
Psalm 131:2

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • Are you able to go to the place the Psalmist writes about, where your soul is quieted and you experience great love, peace, protection, and acceptance from your heavenly parent?
  • Do you have a deep sense of your own “basic powerlessness … to solve your or other people’s problems?” Do you attempt to “avoid that feeling” or try to “live through it?” What is the result?
  • In the press of a busy day, time spent sitting quietly before the Lord can seem “useless” or like “doing nothing.” Have you established a daily practice to keep from skipping such time so that you can more powerfully sense his love for you and your own limitations and needs?

Abba, I pray that the false urgency of my world would lose it’s grip on me as I linger in your presence. I pray that, more and more, I would sense your great love towards me. Help me to breathe in that love, and then exhale it out as my gift, and your gift, to my world.

__________

For More: The Way of the Heart by Henri Nouwen

_________________________________________________

The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to provide you with something of uncommon value each day in 400 words or less. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)

Daily Riches: Asceticism (Kathleen Norris)

Posted on by under Death Daily, Learning Your Proper Place

“Asceticism … is a way of surrendering to reduced circumstances
in a manner that enhances the whole person.

It is a radical way of knowing exactly who, what, and where you are,
in defiance of those powerful forces in society –
alcohol, drugs, television, shopping malls, motels –
that aim to make us forget.”
Kathleen Norris

“Then Jesus, full of the Holy Spirit, returned from the Jordan River. He was led by the Spirit in the wilderness where he was tempted by the devil for forty days. Jesus ate nothing all that time and became very hungry.”   Luke 4:1,2

Moving From the Head to the Heart

  • At the start of his ministry, Jesus was “led by the Spirit” into an extreme ascetic experience. What was the reason for this? Think about it in light of what Kathleen Norris says.
  • What forces do you notice in your life that make you “forget exactly who, what, and where you are?”
  • How can you voluntarily “reduce your circumstances” (or accept reduced circumstances) in order to “enhance” your whole self and be better grounded?

Abba, whether I choose less (things, activity, talk) or less is chosen for me (opportunity, health, affirmation), I pray that you would work in that empty space to teach me “who, what and where” I am.

__________

For More: Dakota: A Spiritual Geography by Kathleen Norris

_________________________________________________

The “Daily Riches” from RicherByFar are for your encouragement as you seek after God, and as he seeks after you. My goal is to provide you with something of uncommon value each day in less than 200-300 words. I hope you’ll follow my blog, and share it with others. I appreciate your interest!  –  Bill (Psalm 90:14)