A Concord Pastor Comments: Day 5 on retreat: Friday

As I've mentioned, these retreat posts are roughly following my own retreat here at Eastern Point in Gloucester. As it happens, I find the Spirit guiding me back a few days to those powerful words from Edwina Gately. Perhaps you, too, have more to learn, to reap from the seeds her words plant in our hearts and minds...

I'm learning on this retreat how much I need to find my freedom and peace in the presence of God in my life, in the grace of God, in the love God has for me. So, spend some time again with Edwina's words, this time with my annotations.

Be silent.
Find, make the time every day to be in a quiet place,
no interruptions, no phone, no screen
- even if only for five minutes or so...
Be still.
Sit in a comfortable place, take a few deep breaths,
Close your eyes if that helps...
Wait before your God.
Resist the urge to "get things going"
and simply wait for God, wait 'til you feel God's presence,
wait 'til you know that God is with you...
Say nothing.
This is not a prayer of words, it's a prayer of the heart.
Don't seek or try to think of what to say: say nothing at all...
Ask nothing.
Regardless of your needs at the moment: ask nothing of God.
This isn't ask-and-receive time,
this is time simply to be with God and know the Lord's love...
Be still.
Be still in your body, be still in your thoughts,
be still in your mind, be still in your heart...
Let your God look upon you.
God wants to look upon you
as a mother looks upon her child's face with love,
as a father looks upon his child's face with joy...
That is all.
This prayer IS this simple:
simply to be in God's presence and to know,
to bask in the Lord's gaze...
God knows. God understands.
No need to speak, no need to ask for anything:
God knows everything you need before you speak
and God understands every difficulty and problem you have
in ways that you will never understand.
God loves you with an enormous love.
God knows you and God understands you
and still God loves you tremendously,
fully, freely and with forgiveness...
God only wants to look upon you with love.
In this time of prayer, this is all God wants:
to look upon you with love
and to know that you know and receive that love...
Quiet...
Still...
Be...
Let your God love you...
In this simplest of prayers you have very little work to do
- God does all the work!
You have only to find or make a quiet time,
to be still in God's presence,
maybe light a candle
and wait to know God's gaze, God's loving gace
upon you...