Prayer for an attentive ear

 “An attentive ear is the desire of the wise.” (Sirach 3:29)

O deep, listening wisdom,

who am I to desire the desire of the wise?

I ask that you listen to a fool like me,

for I’ve listened enough to know that an attentive ear is not only the desire of the wise,

but also the source of their wisdom.

Give me ears to hear the laments of the broken-hearted.

Give me ears to hear the cries of the displaced.

Give me ears to hear the voices too scared to speak up.

Give me ears to hear the breath of persistent life.

Give me ears to hear the hidden rhythms of the earth.

Give me ears to hear the chorus of the universe.

Give me ears to hear the melody of truth.

Give me ears to hear the resounding echo of your love.

Listening one,

I desire that the ear of my heart be always inclined toward you,

and in the silent space of our mutual listening

wisdom will sing herself into being.

Amen

"Invitation to Retreat" by Ruth Haley Barton

Invitation to Retreat: The Gift and Necessity of Time Away with God by Ruth Haley Barton. IVP Books, 2018

Ruth Haley Barton and her work with Transforming Center has built a strong collection of resources aimed at tending to the spiritual lives of pastors and Christian leaders. Her volume “Strengthening the Soul of Your Leadership” published in 2008 with a second edition published in 2018 laid the foundation of much of her following work. Through workshops, retreats, podcasts, and further books Barton has shown that the work of Christian leadership is soul work. Her work follows a similar path to that of Richard Foster in teaching a largely evangelical audience the wisdom ancient spiritual practices have for modern busy leaders.

Her latest book explores the spiritual practice of retreat.

As every Christian book about retreat should do, she grounds her invitation to retreat in the example of Jesus and his own practice of retreating to a quiet place to pray, as well as his calling his disciples come away to a deserted place and rest a while. (Mk 6:30-31) Since that time, people in the church have recognized the importance of balancing their active life of work, with a time of retreat to give deeper attention to their relationship with God. “Retreat in the context of the spiritual life is an extended time apart for the purpose of being with God and giving God our full and undivided attention.” (P. 4)

Retreat often has two phases. The first phase is a retreat away from something. Barton uses the military phrase of strategic withdrawal from those places where we might be in danger. These dangers include distractions, trying too hard, exhaustion, poor boundaries, and feeling as if everything depends on you.

At The Hermitage, a retreat center in southwest Michigan where I am on staff, we will encourage retreatants to begin their time of retreat simply with relaxing and not doing anything. People need time to let go. Sometimes, that is all that can be, or needs to be accomplished on a retreat; simply letting go.

Once you have retreated away from something, the next phase is to retreat into something – and Barton describes that something as the rhythm of your retreat. She takes a few chapters to discuss moving into a different rhythm, one based largely on fixed-hour prayer. She sees fixed hour prayer as an important way to reset one’s mode of being. In an appendix she provides an order of prayer for praying four times a day during one’s retreat.

At the Hermitage we often talk about the rhythms of the Hermitage with daily morning prayer, including Eucharist on Wednesdays and centering prayer on Saturdays. Communal meals eaten in silence also help to live into the rhythm of daily life. These rhythms provide a structure, or a framework upon which the retreatants, and the staff, can shape and guide their day and give space to their intentions.

After the initial getting away to a retreat, Barton acknowledges that the retreatant can move into an experience of a deeper letting go and relinquishing. Letting go of control – you may have planned to read a few books, or write a paper, but on retreat you realize the Spirit is calling you to something completely different. Barton relates that retreatants may also experience a relinquishing of false-selves, and a letting go of identity.

In the next chapters Barton discusses the creative possibilities that can happen on retreat. Retreats can become productive times of discernment, recalibration, and finding spiritual freedom. It is important not to rush to these more productive experiences of retreat too quickly without giving enough time to let go and enter into the rhythm of the retreat.

Her final two chapters discuss the very important topic of returning from retreat. The retreat is not an end in itself. “The purpose of retreat is twofold: to become more deeply grounded in God as the ultimate orienting reality of our lives, and to return to the life God has given us with renewed strength, vitality, and clarity about how we are called to be in God for the world.” (p. 115) It is not uncommon for people to want to remain in the heightened experience they had on retreat – I have felt that way too – but returning from retreat is important.

On the driveway exiting the Hermitage departing retreatants see the sign “Return slowly.” This is not an indication that we don’t want to see them again, but it is a reminder that a retreat should serve the purpose of return. People returning to a time of retreat too quickly and too often may actually be escaping rather than retreating.

Barton has an easy going and approachable writing style. This short book is built on a strong foundation which Barton translates into practical suggestions and guidance. The format is especially geared to novice for whom retreat might only conjure up sleepless nights on rowdy church youth retreats or extended boring corporate meetings filled with activities nobody wants to do.

With all that Barton and Transforming Center accomplishes, it is hard to imagine when she finds the time to heed the invitation to retreat, but her book demonstrates she speaks with the wisdom of thoughtful experience.

In my work at The Hermitage, I feel fortunate that I get to extend the invitation to retreat, and provide the rhythms and structures which foster attentiveness to God.

For those who are interested in exploring spaces for retreat, some resources include Retreat Finder and Find the Divine. Your are also always welcome to pay me a visit at The Hermitage.

Me and the Prairies: an Expansive and Intimate God

(My “faith statement” shared on Sept. 16, 2018 as I join Florence Church of the Brethren Mennonite.)

I was born and raised in a Russian Mennonite community on the Canadian prairies.

As often happens, it wasn’t until I moved away that I discovered how deeply this environment had shaped me.

In my mid-twenties I spent two years living and working as a Mennonite Voluntary Services worker in San Francisco. San Francisco may just well be the complete opposite of Winkler, Manitoba – culturally, environmentally, and geographically. While it was an exciting place to live for two years in my mid-twenties, I was also very glad to leave. I could fully exhale again.

I left there and went to Elkhart, Indiana to attend seminary. It was around this time that I read Kathleen Norris’ wonderful book “Dakota”. While Norris’ western south Dakota is geographically a little different than my prairies, her language about her land and her faith opened my eyes, mind, and heart to the geography of the place where I was raised, and how deeply it had shaped me, and my faith.

The prairies are a land of expansive spaciousness, and deep vulnerability. The prairies teach you that God truly does rain on the just and the unjust, and that rain can be a long-awaited relief after too many days without, and it can come with such ferocity that your electric rain gauge measure an inch every 10 minutes.

The overwhelming expansiveness of the blue prairie sky can’t but impress upon you something of the character of God, and your place in God’s universe. And if the sky doesn’t disrupt you, the endless miles of flat, nearly barren landscape will remind you just how small you are.

That huge sky can also bring forth a western wall of clouds so black and ominous that any conceit about subduing and controlling the earth blows away with the first foreboding breeze.

Waking up to 12 foot snow drifts across the roads makes a mockery of any wishful plans you made for that day.

So, what do the prairies and their weather have to do with my faith? They have taught me that any sense of defining, limiting, or controlling God is just a vain exercise of hubris.

In my Russian Mennonite community, humility was the highest virtue and pride the cardinal sin. Now, that can lead some of its own disfunctions, but these lessons were reinforced by the expansiveness of the prairies and the unknowability of the elements. The prairies offer a good lesson in humility.

My people placed high moral value on working hard, but there was also the recognition that a bountiful harvest was ultimately God’s to provide, or not.

Despite this, and while not exactly in these words, in Sunday School and at home I was taught that God was orderly and composed and so we should be too. But, at a deeper level, I feel like I was taught both by the people and the place that God was wild and we were vulnerable. I don’t mean God was capricious and we were servile, but God was God, and we were not.

I continue to be deeply grateful for how this space has shaped me and continues to shape me today, but in the last 10 or so years I’ve recognized that my experience of God, and of myself has expanded. The intimacy of God has become much more evident. And with that intimacy is an awareness of a depth of love. I’ve come to a growing awareness of God’s presence in me and my presence in God.

While it was the prairies that taught me about God’s power and wildness, I am not as certain what prepared me for this understanding of God as intimate love. Although the image that came to mind as I was pondering this is of me sitting and waiting. And in that waiting I was discovering my own inner spaciousness; my own inner prairie. And on this prairie, the overpowering cloud from the west is simply love.

God is intimate, and God is expansive. God is uncontrollable, and God is self-giving love.

Now, I feel that as a good Mennonite, as a good Anabaptist, I should be talking about Jesus, and discipleship, and service, and ethics. Even if you look at our two scripture texts, June chose the Matthew one and I chose the Psalm. If these things weren’t important to me I wouldn’t be standing here in front of you desiring to join this Anabaptist congregation. I am increasingly recognizing these good Mennonite principles as being born out of an understanding of and an encounter with God, who is expansive and intimate, and we, who are humble and loved.

The Gift of Silence

Last week my wife and I began working at a retreat center. The Hermitage has offered guests and groups a place away for more than 30 years. One of the key services, or offerings we provide is the gift of silence. We do not practice a fierce silence, but encourage a spirit of silence by eating our meals in silence, incorporating silence in our practice of morning prayer, and setting aside a single meeting room as the place for conversations. We as staff are intentional about considering silence as a gift that we offer our guests, and we invite the guests to extend this gift to other retreatants. Retreatants come to give attention to their relationship with the divine, and we don’t want to interrupt that work with small talk. Offering the gift of silence is an act of hospitality.

Silence has been an important part of my spiritual life for many years, but I also look forward to what new depths of silence I might encounter as I further open myself to its gifts.

Not achieving

I feel like I'm being given the opportunity to live into the life I desire - to be a man of prayer in all I do; to be creative as an expression of the Spirit moving through me; to speak less and listen more.

But I also seriously fear giving myself to this because I may discover that I don't have the resources to be that person. And the truth is, I probably don't have those resources. It probably isn't something for me to achieve, but to accept, to receive, to participate with.

What I want is for the Divine to live boldly through me, and that is not something I can achieve.

This not achieving, however, is not not doing anything. Not achieving does not happen without discipline. (I think.) Not achieving does not happen without my consent, my desire, my openness.

Freely given. Freely received. That is all.

Amen