Hello Prayer Bench friends,
Here is an Easter practice, a scripture musing, information about the popular spring program, Stroll for Your Soul, and an ancient prayer. I like the connection I feel when engaging in prayers that have wafted over centuries.
New Moon
From Barbara Brown Taylor, Learning to Walk in the Dark, I learned that it takes three days of darkness before the sliver of new moon to appear in the sky.
“Jonah spent three days in the belly of the whale, Jesus spent three days in the tomb, Paul spent three days blind in Damascus … From earliest times, people learned that was how long they had to wait in the dark before the sliver of the new moon appeared in the sky. For three days every month they practiced resurrection.”
We are in the days of the new moon. Make time to look up (or is it down?) into the night sky and accept an invitation to practice resurrection and see where it leads. You can ever share your experience in the comments.
Saul’s Spiritually Defining Moment
Read: Acts 9:1-20
For three days Saul was without sight - three days - just in case we need reminding this is an event with a Living Christ.
For three days Saul was without sight. He can’t see his hand in front of himself.
For three days he was without sight. He can’t see even one step ahead.
And this is a scary place to find ourselves. Not being able to see the way ahead.
Sometimes it is an inner spiritual experience. We call it “the dark night of the soul.”
We are like a caterpillar wrapped tightly in her dark cocoon. Something is happening inside us but we don’t know what. Who could possibly imagine a butterfly when our spiritual senses have the consistency of mush? We simple exist in the dark awaiting our spiritual transformation. Perhaps you know something about that in your life?
Sometimes this “not seeing” is an outer experience of being in liminal space and the way that was familiar has passed from sight and the new way hasn’t yet opened to us. Perhaps you know something about this too?
For three days Saul was without sight and yet a sliver of new light always comes (though often taking longer than three days.)
Reflect on a time when this was true for you. Reflect on what you need if you are abiding in days of darkness. Consider the ways this dark night is a gift.
Stroll for Your Soul
It takes 21 days to make a habit, they say. In the Stroll for Your Soul program, you receive daily emails for 21 days and you can use their simple structure to inspire you to go out for a stroll, or practice engaging your senses in a new way, or deepening your attention to nature, or to start an earth journal, or to take one photo a day of something that encourages you.
Our 2022 theme is "Weathering Our Days." We can’t avoid weather. It dictates our behaviours and determines what we can and can’t do. It influences our moods; it sometimes disrupts our lives. Every day has weather. Weather is a great metaphor for considering our relationship with God. As we pause to consider the weather, we gain spiritual lessons for our journey.
Stroll for Your Soul is a collaborative program between Prayer Bench and Caroline Bindon of Kereru Publishing in New Zealand. Caroline offers Stroll in September. Together, we explore the unique spirituality of our weather from very different parts of the world by sharing everyday experiences with reflections, videos, scripture and photographs and experiential prayer.
You can sign up for Stroll as an Individual ($20) or form a group with unlimited numbers for $50. Learn more about each one in the Prayer Bench.
An Ancient Prayer
“God, thou hast given us thy Word for a light to shine upon our path;
grant us so to meditate on that Word, and to follow its teaching,
that we may find in it the light that shines more and more until the perfect day; through Jesus Christ our Lord.” (St. Jerome, c 342 – 420)