Friday, April 27, 2007

Friday, April 27, 2007

Today’s text

1 John 4:7-8

“Beloved, let us love on another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.”

Prayer

It sounds so simple, Holy Simplicity. And it is, for you. Or so I think. For your heart is simple, pure, given to the one reality, the one truth, the one thing whom you are. You are pure of heart, simple to the core. You do not spin off in a million directions but are eternally the One Love abiding simultaneously in every time and every space, a living unity of love in which nothing else is mixed or confused.

You are love. In you is no complexity, only impenetrable simplicity of heart and desire.

No wonder I can’t understand you, for I am not simple or pure at heart. My heart is drawn and driven by forces from within and without. My mind is tossed by conflicting winds of desire, some holy, many self-serving and most beyond conscious awareness.

But there are times of sublime simplicity when, if only for a moment, all other desire falls away, and I want only one thing. Rapt in your simplicity, only one thing matters, only one can be expressed, only one is possible. One desire fills the empty spaces of my soul, evaporating all confliction of heart. And I know the love you are, the love you would have me be.

This alone matters. All else is so much noise. So let it be. Amen.

Pr. David L. Miller

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Wednesday, April 25, 2007

Today’s text

1 John 4:7-8

“Beloved, let us love on another, because love is of God; everyone who loves is born of God and knows God. Whoever does not love does not know God, for God is love.”

Prayer

Grant me the most sublime of blessings, Loving Mystery. Grant me love’s knowledge of you who are Love itself. For love is knowledge; anything less is mere mental grasping, feeling about in the dark. Only love knows.

Only when I love does my heart open to see and know you. For how can a heart that does not love know you who are Love itself? And how can a heart love unless Love itself dwells in its depths? In loving we know you; in knowing you we love. The circle of loving begins and ends in you.

We see what we are, and we are what we see. I would see you, for you are love and only love allows me to savor your wonder and grace in the midst of a cynical and brutal age. Only love opens my soul to see you and to see as you see.

When I know you my soul opens up to embrace all you have made, like a spring flower awakened, drinking in the warmth of life and the grace of air to become beauty simply by basking in the gifts you give. Creation rushes into my senses to be embraced by a holy affection larger and more resonant than any I can produce. You love your world in me, and I know you in the loving.

I have no words that capture the truth of this ecstatic loving awareness. I only know that in such moments I know truth. I know you. So let me love. Amen.

Pr. David L. Miller

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Tuesday, April 24, 2007

Today’s text

1 John 4:3-6

“Little children, you are from God and have conquered them; for the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us, and whoever is not from God does not listen to us. From this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error."

Prayer

Give me ears to hear the resonance of your speaking in all speaking, Holy Silence. I would listen to you amid the sound and fury of my little moment in time that I may know what is real and true. Otherwise, I lose myself … and you.

There is a silent spot in my soul with which I so often lose touch. Many voices distract me from the deep silence where you abide. The worst distraction is my own anxious voice, filling the empty spaces where I can truly listen and hear.

Close my mouth, and open my heart. Let me retreat to that silent space of soul to rest and listen for the cry of your Spirit enfleshed in these many lives I daily meet. You are there. I hear you often in cries of joy or sorrow, yearning or consolation. And I would listen to you more. Only so, hearing your voice in the voices, do I know you. And that is life.

So let me listen. Amen.

Pr. David L. Miller

Monday, April 23, 2007

Monday, April 23, 2007

Today’s text

1 John 4:3-6

“Little children, you are from God and have conquered them; for the one who is in you is greater than the one who is in the world. They are from the world; therefore what they say is from the world, and the world listens to them. We are from God. Whoever knows God listens to us, and whoever is not from God does not listen to us. From this we know the spirit of truth and the spirit of error.”

Prayer

Greater are you, Holy One. Greater are you than the powers of death that stalk the Earth, greater than the fears of human souls, greater than the coarse judgments others make on us or that we heap upon ourselves, greater than the grief that grips our hearts over losses we must bear, greater than the sins and failures that haunts us, greater than the voices that deny your nearness, greater than the nihilism and cynicism that forsake love for power.

You are greater. And you are mine. That you are greater does not surprise me. What startles is the awareness that I bear you within as holy gift and possession from which my heart may fully live. Only in this awareness do I live fully; all else is half-life, grainy shadow in which the contours of beauty and joy are lost to soul.

But when I am aware that I bear a life that is Life, every moment becomes sacrament, and all life speaks with your voice, resonating with an uncreated love that is greater, always greater. Deus semper major. You are always more than mind or imagination, more than sorrow or struggle. May it be so today. Amen.

Pr. David L. Miller