WHAT: I am taking a class in Seminary called “Spiritual Formation”. One assignment is to write about a page worth of thoughts that interact with content of each lecture and readings or somehow connect with my own spiritual formation. It’s meant to be more introspective than scholastic.
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One of my assigned readings is from a book called, SACRED TRAVELS by Christian George. The section that I read had to do with the use of Pilgrimage and Rest as a tool for Spiritual Formation. If I’m honest, I got restless, irritable and mildly jealous as I read. Apparently I have Spiritual forming to do! The author said all kinds of wonderful things about the benefits of Pilgrimage. About how a soul can benefit from time away from a normal, hectic, draining existence to rediscover faith, love, and to be in a better frame of mind to respond to what God wants to do deep in a soul. He described his journey to Skellig Michael and the wonderful things that God did for him there. Call me Pathetic Joe, because although I appreciated his story, I was fixated on how impossible a Pilgrimage would be for me now or in the near future. I kept wondering about the practical aspects of time, kids, and finances; how to poor people do a Pilgrimage? Are they reserved for the wealthy?
I was slightly encouraged as the author talked of some thoughts he had as he was ascending the 1,230 feet to Wartburg Castle. I related very well as he wrote,
"I questioned my Christianity... What if I woke up one morning and everything I'd placed my hope in had been proved false? Was I on track with God? Could I feel confident in my salvation?"
Martin Luther once had a “friend” who kidnapped him and brought him, blindfolded, to this Castle. It was here that Martin Luther may have done the most significant work of his life as finished his translation of the Bible so that every German could read it for themselves. But it was also here that Martin Luther fought the Devil. It was here that he dealt with very deep and dark depression. Although, I am no Martin Luther, I am in a pretty dark, depressing place in my life. So, maybe, hopefully, this is part of my Pilgrimage; a free Pilgrimage, because I can’t pay for elaborate trips to Monasteries in Ireland or famous Castles in Germany. This is where I’m at right now, in Fresno. Woot. Woot.
Have you ever heard of “The Dark Night of the Soul”? My assigned readings took me to an excerpt from some great writing by John of the Cross. If you can’t tell from my writings, I am currently in a pretty dark place. I have a bunch of “why?” kind of questions. My Hope is still firmly in Christ, but if I’m honest, He seems really far away right now. The monk known as John of the Cross says that people who follow God will often be taken, by Him, to a deeper, “more advanced” stage in his/her spiritual life. He calls this stage, “The Dark Night”. He suggests that a person will, “lose all the pleasure that they once experienced in their devotional life”. He talks about 7 sins that God will address during this difficult period. One that stuck out to me was Pride: He speaks of it in the sense of “spiritual pride”. The part that stuck out to me was when John talks of how this person should learn humility; they will learn to think very little of themselves or their religious works. Well, that’s me; I just have a hard time spinning it as positively as John. I currently have a pretty small opinion of myself or my abilities as a pastor or a Christian. To summarize the results of this “Dark Night”, he says this,
“…pride becomes humility, greed becomes simplicity, wrath becomes contentment, luxury becomes peace, gluttony becomes moderation, envy becomes joy, and sloth becomes strength.”
Each one of those pairs has become incredibly significant to me. I relate.
In my estimation, my current spiritual formation has me in something very similar to this “Dark Night”. And in my estimation, it will probably get darker before it’s over. But somehow that doesn’t depress me.
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