Proverbs 3: 5-6 Trust in the Lord with all your heart and lean not on your own understanding; in all your ways submit to him, and he will make your paths straight. 1 John 4:7-8 Let us love one another, for love comes from God. Everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love. |
Personal discipline outside my school work, as evidenced by my failure to update this blog regularly, is not my forte. My dream is to write weekly in this devotional section and perhaps being in divinity school will inspire me. Or it might do the opposite: I might not have a spare theological word to offer after the grueling workload. I'm certainly hoping this is not the case, as I want to work on my public theological writing through this blog.
Today was a day of musing on spiritual discipline, as I sat in a lecture on The Rule of St. Benedict and was asked by my professor to quickly jot down a rule of my own. Here is what I came up with in the five minutes allotted for the task:
Seek to put Christ in the center of your musings, desires, and actions, letting his renewal nourish the soil of your life and his light energize your work, so that you may live a life that is harmonious with his created beings. Seek to avoid things that destroy and deaden, from the material distractions of this world to the seduction of pride. Retreat to the wild places for regeneration, but do not flee from serving and loving your fellow human beings.
I thought it was an inspired assignment, as I had to write with a stream of consciousness style, not agonizing over the implications of what I am typing, but letting it flow (hopefully guided by the Spirit).
My follow-up is to try to apply this in my life. For those of you reading this, I would encourage you to try this, to see what spills out of you. What guides you in the dark? What inspires you to put one foot in front of another? What do think need to be your principles and your boundaries in this life? And most importantly, what do you feel God's calling is for your time on this earth?
Today was a day of musing on spiritual discipline, as I sat in a lecture on The Rule of St. Benedict and was asked by my professor to quickly jot down a rule of my own. Here is what I came up with in the five minutes allotted for the task:
Seek to put Christ in the center of your musings, desires, and actions, letting his renewal nourish the soil of your life and his light energize your work, so that you may live a life that is harmonious with his created beings. Seek to avoid things that destroy and deaden, from the material distractions of this world to the seduction of pride. Retreat to the wild places for regeneration, but do not flee from serving and loving your fellow human beings.
I thought it was an inspired assignment, as I had to write with a stream of consciousness style, not agonizing over the implications of what I am typing, but letting it flow (hopefully guided by the Spirit).
My follow-up is to try to apply this in my life. For those of you reading this, I would encourage you to try this, to see what spills out of you. What guides you in the dark? What inspires you to put one foot in front of another? What do think need to be your principles and your boundaries in this life? And most importantly, what do you feel God's calling is for your time on this earth?