The Spiritual Life

Last updated on: March 27, 2017 at 5:36 am by Henry Karlson

The Spiritual Life 2017-03-27T05:36:15-05:00 Henry Karlson

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Since the expectation is not of a quantity, the time in which the silence occurs does not depend upon extreme lengths of time to be seen as a success. Knowing this, I find I have less anxiety holding me up with expectations on my part, expectations which will keep me thinking and focused on myself than on the prayer and silence itself. Likewise, knowing it is all about openness to the revelation which is to be given to us in and through the grace of God, the lack of demand placed upon God allows the differences in each of the experiences of prayer not to disturb me or hinder me from pursuing further meditation. For it is only with presumption that we find ourselves overcome with one form of spiritual delusion or another, either getting prideful of what we feel we have achieved or despondent and mournful of not sharing in the experiences others relate to us. If we realize it is not about us, then we can cut through all the presumption and let it all be as it is, and let the grace of God shape us and perfect us, even if we do not immediately see our experience how that grace is at work in our spirit.

St. Seraphim of Sarov and a Bear. Lithograph in the Public Domain via WikimediaCommons

Because of this practice, I am also able to enter such silence, not just when I am in praying at my home at night, but at other places and times as well. When walking in a forest, it is wonderful to try to silence my mind, and to experience the grandeur of creation without imposing upon it any of my own thoughts. God reveals himself, speaks of himself, in all things, and only in the silence can the logoi of the Logos be truly ascertained. We can label them as forms, and intellectually know of their existence, and conventionally label them as essences or natures, but it is in an encounter with them beyond all thought, when we let the logoi speak without interruption, that we truly find in them the Logos and truly recognize wherever we go, God is able to be seen and heard.

Finally, at, as I go to sleep, I like to offer one last Jesus Prayer, so that the day begins and ends couched in the grace of Christ. Sometimes, to be sure, I might have petitions to give to God, and so I empty myself of my hopes and dreams by imparting them on Christ, but in the end, after that, I like to end with the Jesus Prayer, and I feel, if I do not say or give any such petitions, they are included in the spirit of the prayer already.

To be sure, I am not great in the path of spirituality. I struggle, and find my struggles against all kinds of sinful temptation hinder my advance. My practice, though normally as presented above, certainly varies from day to day, and on some days, the prayer will be more done out of routine and force of will than any spiritual prompting. Those days, my prayer and meditation tend to be less focused, indeed, without silence, but even then, I do not worry. I make sure in those days I recite prayers, give myself to God, and let God do the rest, knowing that on such days, God is helping keep me humble and not self-assured of my own spiritual progress. In this manner, on some days I might have less than five minutes prayer, and on other days, find myself enchanted by God and stumbling around in his beauty for hours without end.

While my spiritual practice is, in part, attune to my own needs and particular disposition, hopefully it can help suggest ways those seeking to find a practice for themselves can go about doing so. The most important thing of all the practice is grace. It is the what makes the rest possible, but we must not therefore assume we have nothing to do ourselves, rather, we must find out how it is best to be taken into our lives and do that, so that we find ourselves spiritually nourished and ready to live life as Christ expects of us. For this is what Christianity is about—the acquisition of the grace of God, the acquisition of the blessings of the Holy Spirit through the accomplishments of Christ; without it, all we have is a dead letter which is of no avail.

[1] Now, there are other practices I do, at specific times, which are not always done every day, and are not for everyone; these I am not outlining here, although some of the things I do suggest here serve as the foundation for such greater spiritual engagement.

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