A (Near) Month of Thanks: Work

It’s Monday, and for many of us that means a return to the working world. 

Work isn’t the most shiny, glittery part of life to give thanks for. If you’re unemployed and looking for work during these hard economic times, it’s hard to give thanks for something you don’t have. If you’re employed and don’t love your job, it’s easy to let unhappiness and cynicism have its sway.

Perhaps because work is so difficult for so many, that’s just why we ought to stop and notice the bright spots in it.

When it comes to work …

• I’m thankful for work that utilizes my skills and talents, as well as my mind.
• I’m thankful for the relationships I’ve built through the work I do.
• I’m thankful for the chance to work on the editorial staff of a magazine I’ve been reading for the better part of a decade and is fun and current and smart and thoughtful. 
• I’m thankful for professional relationships built in the last 10+ years that keep my editorial freelance career moving forward and provide a variety of interesting projects and books to edit.
• I’m thankful for my life’s work, which allows me to write regularly and connect with people all over the world in the journeys of their lives with God. 
• I’m thankful for a schedule that’s flexible to allow for all the different kinds of work I do.
• I’m thankful for work that pays the bills. 
• I’m thankful for work that doesn’t pay at all. 
• I’m thankful for the chance to feel alive with contribution and meaning through the work I do.

When it comes to work, how do you give thanks?

A (Near) Month of Thanks: Evening

Yesterday we reflected on the morning hours. Today, let’s reflect on the evening. 

When it comes to the evening hours, I am thankful for: 

• A home that feels safe
• The routine of turning on the lamps in our main rooms, since it’s growing dark outside
• The ritual of preparing dinner with all of its colors and smells — chopping cilantro, slicing red bell peppers, browning onion, pressing garlic
• How the ritual of preparing dinner connects me to my love for Kirk and a sense of contribution in our home
• The way Diva and Solomon show up, expectantly, when we walk in the front door
• The way we go hunting for them when they aren’t waiting for us at the front door, and then we find them lounging on the couch or snuggled together on the bed
• The hug Kirk and I give each other once we’re both home from work
• Conversations on the couch or over dinner about the events of our days
• A chance to decompress from the day with a bit of “introvert time,” which we both need and freely give each other
• The times when the kitties pile on the bed with us at the very end of the day and we play and make each other laugh
• The calming effect that scrolling through my Instagram feed has on me before going to sleep
• The routine of listening to the Pray as You Go podcast with Kirk at the end of each day

What about the evening hours makes you thankful?

A (Near) Month of Thanks: Morning

I am most certainly not a morning person, but there are aspects of the morning hours that I love. 

When it comes to each day’s morning, I am thankful for:

• Our faithful routine of making coffee for each other
• The quiet sounds of the neighborhood waking up (when I’m awake early enough to notice)
• Time at my desk to read, pray, think, and write
• Diva’s company, whether she’s prowling at my feet for affection, jumping onto the desk to sit sentry, or maneuvering onto my lap for warmth and cuddles
• A home I enjoy waking up in
• The light streaming through our stained-glass windows in the bedroom
• Kirk’s routine of getting ready and how he always kisses me goodbye
• The warmth of blankets
• A peaceful, beautiful view outside my window
• The chance to reconnect with the world through Facebook, Twitter, and email

What about the morning hours makes you thankful?

A (Near) Month of Thanks: Democracy

In the campaign season of the 2008 election, I remember being struck at a soul-deep level for the very first time at the wonder of democracy. 

I realized that it gave me the dignity of my own opinion. I could choose to support a candidate, and my neighbor could choose to support a different one. Neither of our voting preferences negated the value of the other’s.

I could vote for a candidate, and I could retain my preference for them even if they lost. Their loss didn’t mean I was wrong for choosing to support their agenda. It didn’t mean I had to change my view. It meant I got to have an opinion, and I got to participate in civil society by voting my voice, even if the majority decided on a different preference than the one I held.

As someone who is a peacemaker at heart, I am thankful for the way democratic societies give each person the dignity of their personal perspective and the voice of their own vote. I struggle with American patriotism a lot (that’s a different story for a different day), but the accordance of dignity to each person for their voice and perspective and experience is an ideal I will always uphold.

How are you thankful for democracy today?

A (Near) Month of Thanks: Freedom

It’s voting day in the U.S. today. (It’s surely been a long time coming!)

Kirk and I voted early on Sunday, and as we walked toward our polling place to stand in line, I thought about the gift that it is to have the voice of a vote. I thought about the places in the world where elections are fixed or votes are suppressed — or where there’s no citizen voice involved in governance at all. 

So, for today’s gratitude theme, it seemed only fitting to consider freedom. 

• I’m thankful for the freedom to vote.
• I’m thankful for the freedom to vote differently than my neighbor.
• I’m thankful for the freedom to think and ask questions.
• I’m thankful for the freedom to formulate ideals.
• I’m thankful for the freedom to live a lifestyle based upon my convictions.
• I’m thankful for the freedom to worship.
• I’m thankful for the freedom to love.
• I’m thankful for the freedom from anxiety, fear, and judgment I find in Jesus.

What about freedom makes you thankful?

A (Near) Month of Thanks: Let's Begin with Home

I’ve noticed on Instagram, Twitter, and Facebook this last week, since the calendar changed to November, a lot of people are taking this month as an occasion to give thanks for something new each day.

This got me thinking about the two occasions we talked about gratitude last week in the prayer series and how helpful I’ve experienced gratitude to be for engendering an overall feeling of health and well-being in life. 

This new series here will invite us to practice gratitude throughout the rest of this month. 

Each day, I’ll post a gratitude theme, and we’ll have a chance to reflect on what aspects of that theme we are thankful to experience in our lives. I’ve turned the comments back on for this series so we can collectively experience each person’s unique thanksgivings, should you desire to share.

So, for example, home.

• I’m thankful my home is a place of peace. 
• I’m thankful so many elements in our home carry stories.
• I’m thankful Solomon and Diva have found their home with us.
• I’m thankful our home is a simple but beautiful space.
• I’m thankful people find rest and peace and welcome in our home.

What about home makes you thankful?

Closing Thoughts on Prayer

Hi, friends. 

I’ve so enjoyed writing this series on prayer for you.

I’ve loved receiving emails from many of you over the last 5 weeks who said you’ve been encouraged to learn all the various forms that prayer can take. Some of you shared your faith has felt validated by this series. Some of you have shared surprise at some of the entries, asking, “Can it really be?” Others of you have shared that you felt relieved, also asking, “Can it really be?” 

This series could continue on indefinitely, if we really wanted it to. I have a list in my planner that includes even more forms that prayer can be, including:

• Dance
• Study
• Lectio divina
• Cleaning the house
• … and more.

I think what’s important to notice here is that prayer is life. 

When the apostle Paul wrote his first letter to the Thessalonian church and encouraged them to “pray without ceasing” (1 Thess. 5:17), I don’t believe he had in mind for them to kneel at their bedsides, brows furrowed, talking in concentrated verbal prayer every moment of the day to God.

I believe he intended them to learn to experience all of life as prayer.

To find connection with God in all we do. To discover the truth of our hearts in our activities. To offer those revelations to God. To consider the ways God might be speaking and inviting us to notice our hearts and his voice throughout our days. 

I’ll see you here on Monday with a new series to share. 

Much love,

Christianne 

Prayer Can Be ... Images

If you’ve been reading here a while, you know that images show up in my life with God quite a lot.

I’ve written about a 9-month season of walking on a beach shoreline with Jesus. I’ve written about that season coming to an end and how I was ushered toward a grassy area with a huge tree overlooking a cliff. I’ve written about being that tree. In other seasons of my life, I’ve walked through woods with Jesus, overlooked a city with Jesus, and then entered into that city with him. I’ve held the image of a village. I’ve held the image of a communion cup.

I’ve learned that images can be such a gift to our prayer lives because they can teach us so much.

They can put words to our inner experiences. They can serve as a mirror of our internal state. They can serve as invitations. They carry layers. They hold multiple dimensions that invite us to notice and go deeper and even ask questions. They teach us about ourselves and God. 

Do images play a part in your prayer life? Are you holding any particular image right now?

Prayer Can Be ... Under the Surface

I met with my spiritual director, Elaine, on Monday, and the first thing I said when I sat down was that I hadn’t spent any formal time in prayer since our last meeting three weeks ago. 

It was a strange admission for me, since prayer is a primary part of my life. I have a rhythm to my days that includes intentional time spent in quiet and prayer with God each day. 

But I’d not been spending that time each day.

I’d been avoiding it.

And yet, as our conversation proceeded, we came to see that prayer had been abundant in those three weeks.

It was under the surface. 

I told her about the chance moments, like driving my car down the street or talking with someone who was struggling, where I became aware of an undercurrent of prayer at work in my spirit. Some people call it a prayer language. Others refer to Romans 8, which says the Holy Spirit “helps us in our weakness, for we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words” (v. 26).

That’s what it was: groanings too deep for words.

Underneath the surface often.

It happens when I don’t know how to pray. It happens when I wake in the middle of the night with someone on my mind and I don’t know why. 

And, as I learned in my session with Elaine on Monday, it happens all the time. Underneath the surface. As I go about my day. 

Do you ever experience prayer underneath the surface?

Prayer Can Be ... Gratitude

One of the components of my life for which I feel great gratitude.

—

On Sunday, I was in two gatherings at church where the concept of gratitude entered in.

The first was a gathering to learn about the healing work of God, led by an older Australian gentleman who has given his life to the ministry of healing in the church. He shared that gratitude is important to healing in the sense that if we don’t recognize what God has already done in our life (gratitude), it makes it harder to be open to what he can do (healing). 

Later in the day, our assistant rector spoke along similar lines at the contemplative eucharist service. He said that gratitude creates an opening in us for God. It helps us see, and then we have a greater capacity to see more. 

I know some people who keep a daily gratitude journal, just looking out upon their lives and writing in that journal each day the things for which they have to give thanks.

For myself, I find that practicing the review of the day increases gratitude in my life in a very natural way and in significant measure. When I begin to see on a regular basis that God is present and working in my life in so many ways that I might not have seen in the moment they happened, that increases my posture of gratitude toward God and toward life. 

How might gratitude become a form of prayer for you?

Prayer Can Be ... A Review of the Day

I’ve written on two different occasions about something called the prayer of examen. It’s a simple, daily practice of taking 10-15 minutes at the end of each day to review the events of the day and look for evidences of God.

Sometimes we’re aware of God’s presence with us in the day, and sometimes we’re not. The prayer of examen, or review of the day, gives us a chance to acknowledge God and to find God in places previously unseen. 

When I practice a review of the day, a wide variety of moments can be called to mind:

• Being saved from a potential car crash
• The chance to participate in the eucharist at church
• A text from a friend or loved one
• An email that deeply touched me
• That moment at the end of the day when all four of us — Kirk, me, Solomon, and Diva — pile on the bed to snuggle and make each other laugh
• Remembering to pay a bill coming due
• The chance to sit in quiet on my couch for a half hour, just reading and praying
• Beautiful weather

These are evidences of God’s goodness toward me. Ways God provided for soul and body. Ways I was opened to love and grace. 

It is a chance to notice and give thanks.

Could a review of the day be helpful to you?

Prayer Can Be ... "Please"

The last few days, into the wee hours of the night and morning, I’ve been transcribing interviews with individuals living deep inside the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

Christians. Jews. Muslims. 

Scholars. Farmers. Refugees. 

Government officials. Bedouin natives.  

They tell a story that will absolutely break your heart.

There is so much of this conflict I’m not sure many of us really know. We hear the news headlines and sound bytes, but we rarely hear the stories. We rarely hear of day-to-day life for everyday people living there. We rarely hear the narrative arc, as both sides tell it, of this small but always simmering and often explosive corner of our delicate world. 

When I hear the stories of land lost, houses demolished, families separated, roads blocked, curfews instated, IDs revoked, and barbed wire and walls put up, my heart cries out with one plea: 

“Please.”

When I hear of displacement, dispossession, and oppression, my heart cries out: 

“Please.” 

When I hear of the despair, the suicide attempts, the lost grip on the value of one’s own life, my heart cries:

“Please.”

When I hear of nonviolent resistance, of peace petitions, of generous concessions met with violence or silence, my heart cries out: 

“Please.” 

When I see the international response of apathy or ignorance or pigeon-holing or blind-eyeing, I cry out in sadness: 

“Please.” 

These are cries of prayer for peace. For resolution. For mercy. For wisdom to know my part. For pain at the hardness of hearts. For pain at this whole wide world’s suffering soul. 

What makes your heart cry, “Please”?

Prayer Can Be ... Writing

Writing is prayer for me. 

When I write here each day for you, it’s an act of prayer to discern what ought to be shared and the best way in which to share it. 

But also, when I write privately, the entries I compose on my typewriter are prayer. I feed sheets of paper through the roller and pound away at the vintage keys. Sometimes I speaking directly to God. Sometimes I’m just getting my thoughts and feelings on paper.

The whole time, I’m seeking to get at what’s really true.

What’s happening now? What do I think and feel about those things? Where is God in here? What am I learning? What’s difficult? How can my previous experience shed light on this? How will I respond?

These questions, for me, are prayer. They’re an act of opening my heart to the truth and of inviting God to tell me the truth, too.

They’re moments of clarity. Of repentance. Of contrition. Of discernment. Of holy truth-telling.

How is writing prayer for you?

Prayer Can Be ... Preparing a Meal

Sometimes when I’m in the kitchen preparing dinner at the end of a work day, anticipating Kirk to walk in the door at any moment, I’m aware that the dinner preparations have become like prayer. 

I’m slicing tomatoes or pressing garlic or sauteeing onions or browning meat. I’m stirring soup or measuring broth or chopping cilantro or pouring spices. I’m squeezing lime wedges or mashing avocadoes or dicing bell peppers or shredding rotisserie chicken. 

And all along, I’m holding Kirk and our home in my heart. 

I heard a description of prayer once as “holding someone up to the light.” Not using any words or making specific petitions. Just holding them up to the light. 

Preparing a meal in our home often becomes that kind of prayer for me.

I’m holding Kirk and our home close to me, then holding them up to God. Just presenting them. Us. Our life. My heart toward him. My heart for peace reigning here. My love for the provision of sustenance in our home. My love for sharing that meal with him.

What is it like for meals to be viewed as prayer for you?

Prayer Can Be ... Nature

For some of us, prayer happens best when we’re outside. 

• Taking a walk in the quiet outdoors
• Hearing the back-and-forth call of birds
• Feeling the wind or sunshine
• Tromping through thick snow
• Spotting a bald eagle
• Glimpsing the sparkle of sun on lake waters
• Wandering through thousand-year-old forests
• Following a butterfly’s journey
• Feeding a horse an apple
• Laying on a blanket in the park, looking up at the sky
• Finding a rainbow
• Listening to the rhythmic pattern of pounding waves 

There are unending ways the natural world invites us toward God.

It teaches us God’s peace, as it continues on without worry of all that worries us. It teaches us God’s beauty, as the intricacies and creativity abound. It teaches us God’s care, as the ecosystems and cycles of life exist in perfect balance. And on and on and on.

The natural world becomes a doorway into the heart of God. 

How have you experienced nature as prayer?

Prayer Can Be ... Exercise

When I was six years old, my mom took my younger sister and me to join a soccer team. I remember walking toward the group of kids on the field that first day of practice and being truly petrified. I was shy, so meeting a group of strangers filled me with great anxiety. And besides that, I didn’t know the first thing about soccer. 

The soccer attempt was short-lived. (I don’t recall that I ever went back after that first day’s experience.)

But my sister and I joined a girls’ city softball league shortly after that. And the extent of my native athletic talent should be made plain to you with this fun fact: 

I played girls’ softball for three years and only hit the ball once. 

My freshman year in high school, I tried out for the volleyball team and was surprised to discover I liked it. I was also surprised to discover I made first cuts at tryouts. The coach thought I was quick and disciplined at the conditioning drills. Also, I hit a pretty mean serve, and I could bump the ball with the best of them.

Spiking and setting? Not so much. I was cut from the team in the second round.

I did, however, excel at swimming. My older brother and I went out for the team my sophomore year and were both moved to varsity within a few swim meets. But as much as I loved the conditioning experience of swimming laps and following drills, I hit a plateau and never grew beyond a certain point. Plus, anxiety crippled me at the swim meets. I swam for one year and then quit. 

All this to say, exercise has never really been my friend.

And yet I’m experiencing the way exercise can be a form of prayer these days. 

Earlier this year, due to a couple of events, I began to explore the importance of the body in our lives — especially our spiritual lives — and have been experimenting in different small ways with what I’m learning. I have such a long way to go in truly understanding all this, and especially in integrating it into my daily life and behavior, but there is one thing I’ve noticed.

When I think of my body as part of the whole of who I am, exercise becomes a form of prayer.

I push and pull against resistance with the weights. I expand and contract my muscles with stretches and reps. 

And all along, as it’s hard, I’m thinking, This body is yours, God. You gave it to me to steward. It houses my heart, mind, and soul. I’m doing this for you.

Do you ever experience exercise as prayer? 

Prayer Can Be ... Serving Another Person

Earlier this year, I volunteered for an event in downtown Orlando called iDignity, which provides free services once a month to help people get their paperwork so they can apply for ID cards, birth certificates, and social security cards.

You probably already know that without proper identification, it’s impossible to do certain things in society, like get hired for a job, cash a check, rent an apartment, or vote. Identification plays such a critical role in helping people become participating members of society. 

I was privileged to interact with a broad spectrum of humanity that day.

So many stories. 

A number of the people I met had just gotten out of jail, some for the second or third time. They didn’t have places to live. Some had been previously arrested in other states, and their only form of physical identification was a mug shot on file at the out-of-state jail. They were hungry and trying to scrounge money for their next meal.

I remember, still today, some of the individuals I met. A tall, quiet young man with a record. An older black woman with dark eyes and a meek smile. A young pregnant girl so thin her legs looked like they could so easily snap like twigs.

It felt like such a privilege to look into their eyes and smile. 

To accord them dignity. 

To acknowledge their common humanity with me. 

I felt like I was looking into the eyes of Christ each time someone approached me to put their name on the list for a birth certificate application.

In them was the image of God. Just like the image of God is in me. 

And so each smile, each moment of eye contact, each small conversation was an instance of prayer. As I loved them, I was loving Jesus. 

Have you ever experienced prayer as serving another person?

Prayer Can Be ... Spiritual Direction

I’ve shared on different occasions how meaningful it is for me to meet with my spiritual director, Elaine, once a month.

We sit together in her home, and there’s open space for me to talk about what’s going on in my relationship with God. Or simply what’s going on in my life in general, and we look together for God’s presence and activity in those things. 

I always leave her home feeling refreshed.

I know God is in that place, present between the two of us. 

A lot of that has to do with my knowing Elaine is attuned to God as she listens to me. She’s listening to me, but she’s also listening to the Holy Spirit. And in her responses to me, she reflects that prayerful posture — sometimes through asking just the right question, sometimes through pointing out something I hadn’t noticed, sometimes by remembering the landscape she knows of my story and how it might speak to what’s currently going on.

As a spiritual director myself, I know that the full hour of time that I hold with someone in a session — or even the full length of an email dialogue we might carry concerning their journey of the heart — is prayer. Whether their sharing is spoken to me or to God, all of it is prayer.

That space is sacred. We are listening and looking together for God. 

Have you ever experienced spiritual direction? Would you like to?

Prayer Can Be ... Tears

Sometimes you’re in a place where all you can do is cry. 

Those tears are prayer. 

I love the way Psalm 56 describes our tears in the sight of God: 

“You keep track of all my sorrows. You have collected all my tears in your bottle. You have recorded each one in your book.”

—Psalm 56:8, NLT

I have all these images in mind of what those bottles of tears look like in God’s storehouse. Maybe one is a vial. Maybe another a mason jar full. Maybe another the size of an old glass milk bottle. Maybe another a bottle of wine. 

I suspect that no matter the volume of our tears, God finds bottles of suitable size to hold every single one of them. How could he not?

Have tears ever been prayer for you? Is it helpful to know that they are?

Prayer Can Be ... Being Present to Another

One of my favorite things in the world to do is be present to another person as they’re sharing their heart.

Whether we’re sitting together on the couch, connecting across the miles by phone, or sharing an email exchange, I love the experience of receiving another person’s heart and giving them the experience of being truly heard and seen.

God seems to have given me an uncommon ability to do this:

• Asking questions that help a person probe deeper into their heart, feelings, beliefs, and experiences; 
• Reflecting back what I hear so they find themselves saying, “Yes! That’s exactly it!” and feel that amazing, uncommon rush of having been actually known;
• Providing space for the “real deal” to be said without a flinch or agenda offered in response;
• Getting out of the way so my stuff and my story don’t interrupt or detract from their sharing.

I love being made this way. I can’t tell you how grateful I am that God made this attentive listening the focus of my life’s work now. (And if you need someone to be present to you in this way, consider this an open invitation from me.)

But sometimes, when being present to another person, the way forward becomes unseen. I find myself, with them, stuck in the brambles. There isn’t a clear way through. 

Usually, at this point, I discover the end of myself. And the next step forward is truly a Hail Mary pass: 

“God, help. I don’t know what to say. Please show up.”

Pretty much every time, he does.

In fact, I don’t know that I’ve ever experienced God not showing up after I prayed that panicked plea. The conversation takes a turn I never could have foreseen or orchestrated, and I know that God has been there. He showed up in ways beyond me.

Have you ever experienced prayer when being present to another?