Hello and welcome to Methods,
An online experiment and guided prayer and meditation brought to you by The Restoration Project.
Each episode will focus on a different prayer practice or method,
But we hope to provide you with opportunities to praise,
To wonder,
To give thanks and confess,
And to contemplate the depths of God's goodness and mercy and mystery.
To aid in this process,
We invite you to silence your notifications and to find a comfortable place to sit and reflect on God's presence.
Episode 6 Thomas A.
Kempis instructs us,
Anyone who aims to live the inner and spiritual life must go apart with Jesus from the crowd.
In one sense,
Being where you are right now,
Perhaps sitting in your room or car or even in a crowded coffee shop with your headphones on and notifications off,
Is beginning to engage the practice of solitude and silence.
In an attempt to pray,
We are disconnected from the world.
We are focused on God and interceding for others.
We are away from the crowd,
At least spiritually and with Jesus.
But in all likelihood,
This episode will be the most difficult yet.
Our method is silence.
There is a natural fear that accompanies silence,
Especially when silence is being practiced as a spiritual discipline.
It is not simply that we must refrain from talking for a few minutes.
We do this quite often each day.
No,
Our fear is due to the fact that the inner silence we hope to achieve demands listening.
And what if we find that,
In our listening,
God remains silent?
What if we cannot hear?
What if,
In our solemn attempt to receive something from God,
We find that our thoughts are dominated by doubt and insecurity?
Silence sounds easy,
But listening?
That's much more difficult.
Over the course of this episode,
We invite you to begin practicing silence and solitude,
To begin listening for God's voice,
To begin wrestling with our inability to be at peace with ourselves,
With our thoughts,
To intentionally remove the noise of our world,
To listen.
When silence refers more to an inner quiet,
We will provide a soundtrack,
But over time it will fade.
We invite you to be open,
To engage in the hard work of listening,
And if you are able to hear,
To respond.
Cl amb мас.
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