I've always thought that the most difficult aspect of the Christian life was discernment.
How do I know? How do I know what's right for me to do, of all the great goods presented to me, which do I choose? How does a person choose a spouse, a career, where to live, how to spend time?
But how do I know what God wants of me, as a person?
I can discern, pretty well, the general will of God. The Ten Commandments are pretty clear...how to love God...how to love others. But as an individual with all of the options ahead of me that embrace love of God and others - there's a lotta options.
I've recently finished reading Fr. Jacques Philippe's tiny and powerful book Interior Freedom. It took me a year. So pithy, simple and thought provoking was his book, barely a quarter inch thick - that I had to mull each paragraph. It was crammed with ah ha moments.
I've started a second book as spiritual reading by the same author In the School of the Holy Spirit.
The focus of this book is schooling the reader on the promptings of the Holy Spirit. How do we know what God wants of us as individuals, how to foster those promptings in our life, how to be certain something comes from God.
I'm only a chapter in, but this book (again, only a quarter inch think!) promises to be every bit as rich as the first one I read. From chapter one:
Holiness is not a program for life, but something obtained from God. There are even infallible means for obtaining it, and the important thing is to know what they are. We all have the power to become holy, simply because God lets himself be won over by the trust we put in him.
It's not because of the work we do, the plans we make, how excellently we follow our "program." But holiness is a result of our receptivity, our willingness, our softness toward God and the movement and direction of the Holy Spirit.
Fr. Phillipe's books here.
And, for recreation, I'm reading aloud to the kids To Kill a Mockingbird in preparation for Harper Lee's long awaited second book (like fifty five years awaited)...
Go Set a Watchman...due to be published in about three weeks. Ya.
How do I know? How do I know what's right for me to do, of all the great goods presented to me, which do I choose? How does a person choose a spouse, a career, where to live, how to spend time?
But how do I know what God wants of me, as a person?
I can discern, pretty well, the general will of God. The Ten Commandments are pretty clear...how to love God...how to love others. But as an individual with all of the options ahead of me that embrace love of God and others - there's a lotta options.
I've recently finished reading Fr. Jacques Philippe's tiny and powerful book Interior Freedom. It took me a year. So pithy, simple and thought provoking was his book, barely a quarter inch thick - that I had to mull each paragraph. It was crammed with ah ha moments.
I've started a second book as spiritual reading by the same author In the School of the Holy Spirit.
The focus of this book is schooling the reader on the promptings of the Holy Spirit. How do we know what God wants of us as individuals, how to foster those promptings in our life, how to be certain something comes from God.
I'm only a chapter in, but this book (again, only a quarter inch think!) promises to be every bit as rich as the first one I read. From chapter one:
Holiness is not a program for life, but something obtained from God. There are even infallible means for obtaining it, and the important thing is to know what they are. We all have the power to become holy, simply because God lets himself be won over by the trust we put in him.
It's not because of the work we do, the plans we make, how excellently we follow our "program." But holiness is a result of our receptivity, our willingness, our softness toward God and the movement and direction of the Holy Spirit.
Fr. Phillipe's books here.
And, for recreation, I'm reading aloud to the kids To Kill a Mockingbird in preparation for Harper Lee's long awaited second book (like fifty five years awaited)...
Go Set a Watchman...due to be published in about three weeks. Ya.
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