[Faith-talk] Daily Thought for Monday, April 28, 2014

[Paul]

Hello and good day to you all.  I hope that, by God's matchless grace and His providential care, that you all are doing well today.

This date on the calendar, April 28, holds a special event for me, as it was on this date in 1990, a Saturday, when my late pastor, Robert T. Woodworth of Christ and Country Church and the undersigned journeyed down to Washington DC to take part in a pro-life rally on the grounds of the Washington Monument.  As I recall, it was a fairly hot day with maybe 100,000 people from all over the country standing around and listening to uplifting and inspiring stories from a pro-life perspective.  The thing I remember was that, toward the end of the rally when Pastor Woodworth and the undersigned were leaving to go back home, that Sandy Patty was singing a version of our national anthem in a way that I've never heard previously.  One thing about these pro-life get-togethers was the fact that strangers meet strangers and, even though we didn't know one another, it was as if we had known each other for a long time.  That's the way it is with some Christians.  One thing I distinctly remember is that we met a group of people from Ohio who offered my pastor and me a cup of ice tea, which we gladly accepted.  All in all, it was a very pleasant time.

And now we continue with our look at the next little spiritual discourse by Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection.  This one has the title of "On the Presence of God," rendered as follows:

1.  The presence of God is an applying of our spirit to Him, or a realization of His presence which can be brought about either by the imagination or the understanding.

2.  I know one who, for forty years, has practised the presence of God intellectually, and he gives it several other names.  Sometimes he calls it a simple act, or a clear and distinct knowledge of God:  sometimes an impression or a loving gaze or a sense of God; yet other times he calls it a waiting on God, a silent conversation with Him, a divine repose, the life and peace of the soul.  He says, however, that all these expressions for the presence of God are synonymous, they express the same thing, the presence which has come to be natural to him, in this way:

3.  By repeated acts and by frequently recalling his mind to God he has developed such a habit that, as soon as he is free from external occupations, and even often while he is still busy, his very soul, without any forethought on his part, is lifted above all earthly things, maintained and as it were upheld in God, as in its consummation and place of rest.  At such times faith is nearly always with him, and his spirit is satisfied.  It is this which he calls the actual presence of God, which includes all other kinds and much more besides, so that he lives now as if there were only God and himself in the world:  conversing always with Him, entreating Him at need, and rejoicing with Him in a thousand ways.

4.  Now it should be observed that this communion with God is held in the depth of the soul, at its very centre:  it is there that the soul speaks heart to heart with God amid a wonderful peace wherein the spirit experiences the keenest joy.  All that goes on outside is no more to the soul than as a fire of straw which, the more it flares, the sooner it is burnt out, and rarely and little do external concerns disturb the interior peace.

5.  But to return to our own consideration of the subject, I tell you that the lovingness of God insensibly kindles so burning a flame of love in the soul that embraces Him, that one has to moderate its outward expression.

6.  We should be surprised if we knew what converse the soul sometimes holds with God, who seems so much to delight in such communion that He allows anything to the soul which desires to rest in Him and in His heart.  And, as if He feared lest she should return to the things of earth, He is careful to provide for her all she could possibly desire, so that she finds within herself a feast of heavenly delights, though she herself has done nothing towards it, and brings to it only her happiness.

7.  The presence of God is then the life and nourishment of the soul, which by God's grace, may attain it by the following means.

And we shall learn what they are in tomorrow's Daily Thought.  The majority of you probably haven't read such deeply spiritual writings, but I hope that Brother Lawrence, his English translator Donald Attwater and the undersigned have brought you something to feed on during these past several days.

And now may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, in these last days in which we live.  Lord willing, tomorrow we will continue our discussion on this topic.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul