Category: Lectio Divina

Lectio Divina–A Reflecting Spirit

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My soul thirsts for God, for the living God.

When can I go and meet with God? (Psalm 42:2)

The four-step sequence of the lectio divina spiritual exercise commences with a reading of the Scriptures and a listening spirit. With an ear attuned to the voice of God, we read slowly, listening for those words or phrases that the Spirit draws to our attention. Once identified, our hearts turn not to our heads for translation, but to a period of reflection in which we immerse ourselves in the word or phrase in order to discover the message that God is delivering through it.

Meditatio is the next step that we ease into as our word or phrase has been heard. We are going to meditate on this small segment of God’s Word in order to discern what it means to us. Reflection enables us to delve much deeper in the words and asks the Spirit’s participation to direct our heart-thinking to communicate the nuances of the message. For example, we all read the beginning words of John 3:16 the same: “For God so loved the world…”. If I say that I love my wife and that I also love lasagna, it is easy for all of us to distinguish the difference in meaning between the two uses of the word love.

If the Spirit has raised the word love to our attention as we listened to the passage, as we meditate on the word He will communicate the specific application that it has for each of us. If I am struggling with a brother or sister in my faith community, God may communicate to me the need to surrender my position for the good of the other. Meditation on that word may reveal to you that God is pleased with your sacrificial love for others. There are innumerable messages that can invested in that simple word, all unique and most easily overlooked when we read simply to read the book. Meditating on the word moves it deeper, into our heart where the Spirit can cause it to reverberate and reveal its meaning. We do not seek definition, we seek revelation.

Deep calls to deep in the roar of your waterfalls; all your waves and breakers have swept over me. Psalm 42:7

Our reflection centers itself on the single question, how are your revealing yourself to me Lord? Whether a single word, a verse or even a broader passage. Our immersion into the Scriptures is not seeking information, rather, we seek identification. The voice of the Lord speaks the passage directly to us and we are to receive it, perhaps differently than others who may be hearing the same exact passage. He may want us to take Peter’s place in the shadows as the cock crows, or to substitute for Mary in early morning chill as Jesus makes His first resurrected appearance. There may be warning or encouragement in “Be holy, because I am holy”. The single word “finished”, uttered from the cross may be the single reflection that alters your theological understanding of all that comes before and after.

Grace and peace to you.

Lectio Divina–A Listening Spirit

imageThe spiritual practice of lectio divina is our primary mode of reading the Bible when our purpose is spiritual transformation. Our reading in this manner is directed toward depth rather than breadth. We are not studying, we are allowing our hearts to be drawn to the incalculable depths of God’s love. Our goal is to be immersed in that love, to be washed and shaped by it as stone is by the waves or the rushing of the river.

Once the passage or section is chosen, a quiet environment free from distractions is the ideal place in which to pore over the scriptures. Before the first word is read, allow the quiet of your environment to still your soul. This is not a practice for the coffee shop. God does not normally speak to us through thunder or fire from the sky. It is a quiet voice, a whisper to which we must be attuned in order to hear it. To listen for that hushed voice, we must be expectant and prepared to welcome it into our soul.

When we read with a listening spirit our objective differs from our other reading practices. The words are not as much in focus as is the speaker of those words. We read in such a way that the words of Scripture transcend the page, the ink and even the particular person who is in view in the text, and we hear our Father telling us His story. Read the text without stopping, hearing the voice form the story. Hear His inflections and emphases as our expectant heart directed by the Spirit clues us into the particular message that He wants to communicate to you and me through these words. Repeat the reading a second and third time, repeating until the emphasis becomes crystal clear.

The Lord is near to all who call on him, to all who call on him in truth. Psalm 145:18

When you have extracted the personalized word that the Spirit has guided you to, you are ready to move to the next phase of lectio divina, reflection. We will pick this up in the next post. Until then, grace and peace to you.