Just do it are the famous three words that made Nike a household name. It implied whatever the activity just do whatever it takes to get it done. A significant hindrance to practicing Mindful Christianity or any meditation is I don’t want to practice it right now. There are a thousand reasons not to spend…
To be successful at contemplative prayer and Mindful Christianity, you must be able to center your mind and focus your heart on the risen Christ and God’s presence. One critical way of being able to concentrate your mind on God is the idea of non-doing. The art of non-doing is cultivating time alone with God. It’s important…
Our walk with God is fulfilling and freeing when we calm the thoughts that bounce around in our minds. We desire to focus our hearts on living in communion with the living Christ. Concentration on the living Christ connects us to the essence and presence of God on a moment-by-moment basis. (The Eternal Now – Embracing…
There are several misconceptions about the practice of solitude and contemplative silence. Solitude is more than being alone and quiet during prayer time and bible study. It is more than walking alone in the woods, savoring a favorite hideaway, and seeking isolation to escape the cares of the world. It is more than the relaxation…
Contemplative prayer focuses our minds on Christ and lifts our hearts and souls above our daily way of living life with its worries about self-preservation and survival. It frees us from the bondage of being consumed with what will happen to us and opens our heart to experience peace with God. It carries us above…
One day I placed a chair in the middle of my study and sat down….whether we recognize it or not, we all need a quiet place one on one with God. I felt like a nomad, thirsty and dying with no visible water in sight. I didn’t know precisely how to quench my spiritual thirst, but…
The last stanza of Psalms one hundred and fifty in the Old Testament concludes with these words. “Let everything that has breath praise the Lord.” It is the sixth verse that is the final description of man’s worship carried out in the sanctuary and His mighty heavens. Praise is responding to God’s power and surpassing…
It is time in your life to move on and no longer be held hostage by those who are unwilling to apologize or reconcile with you. We want family or friends who have wronged or violated us to admit their actions. We want an apology for what they have done to us, but often there…
The good news is we never need to feel alone, isolated, or estranged from God. God created us to live in fellowship, and prayer is an intrinsic part of that relationship. Our life journey allows us to walk hand in hand with God, and whether we realize it or not, God is with us through every…
Henri Nouwen wrote prayer has for too long only been associated with piety, talking to God, thinking about God, morning and evening prayers, Sunday services, grace before meals, sentences from the Bible, and many other things. However, for Nouwen, “Prayer is the center of the Christian life. It is the only necessary thing. It is…
In my quiet time, I use a phrase that calms the thoughts in my mind through repeated repetition. For example, the desert fathers and mothers in the early days of Christianity recited and used the Jesus Prayer, “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me a sinner,” to calm their restless thoughts and…
Everyone struggles with feelings of loneliness and the despair of being alone. There is the cosmic loneliness of being on a sphere spinning through space at six hundred miles per second. We have troubling thoughts about our significance when we compare ourselves to the indescribable vastness of the universe. There is an adage spoken…