"I will now allure her, and bring her into the wilderness, and speak tenderly to her." --Hosea 2:14





Thursday, August 21, 2014

An Invitation to Solitude...

Painting 'Quiet Moments' by Albert Chavallier Tayler

"Allowing the  Gospel message into our life means letting our life become, in the broad and real sense of the word, a religious life, a life referred to, bound back to, God.

The basic revelation of the Gospel is the overwhelming, penetrating presence of God.  It is a call to encounter God, and God allows Himself to be encountered only in solitude.

It would seem that this solitude is something that those who live among the people of the world have to forego.

But, this would be to believe that we precede God in solitude, while, on the contrary, it is He who waits there for us; to find God is to find solitude, because true solitude is spirit, and all of our human solitudes are merely relative approaches toward the perfect solitude that is faith.

True solitude is not the absence of people, but the presence of God.

To place our lives before the face of God, to surrender our lives to the movements of God, is to roam free in a space in which we have been given solitude...

If the eruption of God's presence in us occurs in silence and solitude, it allows us to remain thrown among, mixed up with, radically joined to all of the people who are made of the same clay as we are."
(Servant of God Madeleine Delbrel)


Lord, I am slowly learning that I can encounter solitude and still be among people and duties. Oddly enough,  one of my most favorite times with You, is when I am ironing my husband's shirts!  I am quiet and I feel Your gaze upon me...so intensely.  Smiling, You invite me to just BE with You!  You are there to help me 'iron out' all the wrinkles in my life and before I know it, everything is smooth and crisp!  This time with You, both stands still AND goes quickly.  Before I even know it...all the shirts are finished and something I once dreaded doing...has now become an intimate time with the One I love!   You are teaching me that You are always waiting for me...if only I take the time to quiet myself enough to notice Your beautiful gaze!  

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