Finding Your Purpose - Lessons Learned In January on Tending the Holy Thursdays, we have been exploring finding your purpose. I encourage you to reread the first three blog posts about this topic and if you haven’t already, download the Spiritual Autobiography Resource Guide to complete to help you in your search. (See button at end of this post) This week the focus is on the lessons learned and I invite you in the comments to reflect on what you learned. Have you received any insights into your purpose or what new ideas appeals to you as you continue to distill this longing within your heart? Lessons Learned – Finding your Purpose God first – I will never have all the answers and can’t even find the next step without focusing on God first. The whole process of finding meaning in my life begins with him. He planted this hunger within me and I truly believe he sows the seeds of desire in my heart. As I dig and listen and seek for answers, prayer soaks the whole experience. … [Read more...]
Prayer – Why Do We Pray? How To Freshen Your Prayer Life
Prayer - Why Do We Pray? How To Freshen Your Prayer Life Prayer - I have really needed and thought about and lean upon prayer this past week. Prayer is a foundational practice for many of us and for me I know prayer strengthens and guides me. Have you ever thought about why we pray? Why Pray? We pray for many reasons. God invites us into relationship and discussion with him in prayer. Doesn't it just blow your mind that the almighty, ever powerful God, creator of all things, desires to be with little old you and me in an intimate conversation? Wow! How could we turn down this gift of being with God? Prayer gives us the opportunity to praise and glorify God. To stand among others throughout history, those present now, and those yet to come into human form in awe and wonder of something so much greater than ourselves. Prayer changes us - turns our every cells, thoughts, and behaviors around to look, seek, and reach for God. Prayer makes us pliable in the hands of the … [Read more...]
Finding Your Purpose – Quotes to Ponder – Tending the Holy Thursdays
Finding Your Purpose – Quotes to Ponder In January on Tending the Holy Thursdays, we have been exploring finding your purpose. I encourage you to reread the first two blog posts about this topic and if you haven’t already and download the Spiritual Autobiography Resource Guide to complete to help you in your search. (See button at end of this post) Next week I will summarize this topic and add some of my lessons learned and will invite you in the comments to reflect on what you learned. Today I am going to simply list thoughts/quotes what others have written about finding your purpose. It is my hope these words guide you to clarity, stimulate your imagination of what could be and motivate you to keep searching. “Let yourself be silently drawn by the stronger pull of what you really love.” Rumi ******** “Decide upon your major definite purpose in life and then organize all your activities around it.” Brian Tracy ******** “Uncovering purpose helps to refine passion, … [Read more...]
Luther and Katharina – Book Review
I love a book with a strong female lead. And when the story is partially based on history, the reading becomes more intriguing. A great read for the upcoming 500th anniversary of the Reformation. Luther and Katharina – a Novel of Love and Rebellion by Jody Hedlund tells the story of Martin Luther and Katharina von Bora’s relationship and then marriage. This fast read swept me quickly into the 1500s dark history of war, reformation, courage, and turmoil. This is a love story more than a history book. I kept wondering as I read it what was true and what was the author’s imagination. Hedlund clarified that in the author’s notes in the back of the book which as I reader I appreciated knowing. To be honest, I am a non-fiction reader and rarely read or enjoy fiction books. So it is quite an accomplishment to have a novel keep my attention from the start and draw me into the story with great dialog and description like this book did. The story captivated me and made me curious about … [Read more...]
Ten Tips for Finding your Purpose – A Spiritual Practice – Tending the Holy Thursdays
Ten Tips for Finding Your Purpose – A Spiritual Practice Who am I? Why am I here? What is my spiritual contribution to this world? Three very deep questions that if we are honest, every human at one time or another faces. Finding your purpose is an ongoing, ever-evolving spiritual practice and one we will be exploring together on Tending the Holy Thursdays in January. Today let’s look at tips to consider when finding your purpose and ways you might explore to identify your deepest desire. Next week I will share some quotes to ponder then finish the month with some lessons learned as we grow with this practice in our spiritual journey. The Spiritual Practice of Finding Your Purpose – Ten Tips to Test Story: What is your story? If you were to write your life so far, what would you title each chapter? Who are the characters, the settings, the plot, tensions, transitions, turning points, and resolutions? How do you want your story to end? Disney would have the story visualize … [Read more...]
The Church Calendar – What is the Liturgical Year?
The Church Calendar The church I attend follows the church year calendar or the liturgical year. This way of looking at the seasons is a bit different from the January through December block we normally use. What is the Liturgical Year? The church year calendar forms around the events in Jesus’ life. Then we too can center our lives, our worship, our spiritual formation around the lessons learned from walking and talking with Him. I love seeing the colors in worship change with each season of the liturgical year. Purple, white, green, black, red, pink, gold and others decorate the pulpit and altar creating a reflective atmosphere and setting the stage for pondering our God. Happy New Year begins not on January 1st, but on the first Sunday of Advent – the four Sundays before Christmas. Seeing the flow of time through the readings and observances from the Bible creates a powerful environment for worship. The seasons moved from Advent, through Christmas, Epiphany, Lent, … [Read more...]
Tending the Holy Thursdays – The Spiritual Practice of Finding your Purpose
Finding your Purpose “Do you know your purpose?” The clinical psychologist who asked me that question didn’t wait for me to answer. “I think deep down you do.” When I felt the call from God to become an Associate in Ministry (AiM) in our church, one of the many requirements in the early first steps was to participate in a three-day psychological evaluation. My family joked that I would go to Columbus for the test and never return. They laughed that I would be locked up in a mental hospital for the rest of my life. Some days as a mother of three teens and a workaholic hubby, I already felt like my home was the asylum. Love my crazy family, but I digress… In the very helpful discussions with psychologist, I recognized that the work I was doing then at the local health department no longer aligned with what I deeply felt God was inviting me into. What used to match up with my purpose in a previous season, no longer fit. I passed the church’s mental evaluation but left … [Read more...]
Exploring the Human Need to Seek Validation
Seeking Validation Am I ok? How did I do? Have I earned your stamp of approval? A common hunger for most humans is acceptance, validation, approval. I read everywhere “we need to let go of this urge for pleasing others or the requirement for their endorsement for the way we live, act, believe." Let’s discuss and explore this human need to seek validation and what it means to us spiritually. I hear what the experts say: that too much people pleasing leads to not being our true selves or we end up doing things that contradict our values and beliefs or produces overwhelming, life sucking worry. At times, we do focus too much on approval and not what is important or live for someone else at the expense of our own identity. We live in an unhealthy world of approval addiction. I get it. Yet we do all seek validation at times. How good it feels to be affirmed, loved, and accepted for ourselves. If I am completely honest, I deeply desire this validation. I am learning to accept … [Read more...]