Reflection
Our task is not to search for the God beyond but to become aware of the God who is within, who sustains us, who is the unconditional gift of life and of love. God’s presence is the source of all being, of our being. That will not change no matter what we do. In our prayer, we seek to encounter the Presence of God. In scripture we read that God is with us always. “Don’t you realize that you are God’s temple and the Spirit of God is within you?” (1 Cor. 3:16). What can change is our awareness of that and the effect that will have on our living and our peace of heart.
Prayer
Speak Lord, your servant is listening.
1 Samuel 3. 9
Action
Explore your image of God? What does it mean to you when you think of God as within, of God as the vivifying spirit?
Suggested Reading
God is love and if you live in love, you live in God and God lives in you.
John 4:16
For in God we live, and move, and have our being.
Acts 17:28
Jesus answered and said, “ If anyone love me, they will keep my words: and my God will love them, and we will come make our abode with them.
John 14:23
The first duty of love is to listen.
Paul Tillich
Though we are incomplete, God loves us completely. Though we are imperfect, God loves us perfectly. Though we may feel lost and without compass, God’s love encompasses us completely. … God loves every one of us, even those who are flawed, rejected, awkward, sorrowful, or broken.
Dieter F. Uchtdorf
We should be astonished at the goodness of God, stunned that God should bother to call us by name, our mouths wide open at God’s love, bewildered that at this very moment we are standing on holy ground.
Brennan Manning
The feeling remains that God is on the journey, too.
Teresa of Avila
People see God every day, they just don’t recognize him.
Pearl Bailey
God is an unutterable sigh, planted in the depths of the soul.
Jean Paul Richter