I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills, from whence cometh my help
This week's work is on the Ignatian Examen.
These are the five steps of the Examen:
- Pray for God’s help.
- Give thanks for the gifts of this day.
- Pray over significant feelings.
- Rejoice and seek forgiveness.
- Look to tomorrow.
The Grace I Seek
I pray for the following graces: wonder at God’s ongoing creation; gratitude for the gift of God creating me and creating the world.
Read Psalm 121.
Pray the psalm slowly. Open your heart to God. Consider: What is God like? How can God help me?
God is soaring. God is like the mountains. God is unchanging. The words of the psalm resound for me in so many ways...the first lines, from a poster I had on my wall as a teenager; the sixth verse, from the King James: "The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor the moon by night" gives the title to one of Madeleine L'Engle's best books (The Moon by Night).
I think the thing that grasps me most here is vs 7-8: "The Lord shall preserve thee from all evil: he shall preserve thy soul/The LORD shall preserve thy going out and thy coming in from this time forth, and even forevermore."
HE SHALL PRESERVE THY SOUL. God doesn't promise that we won't be hurt, or broken hearted, or even killed. But God will preserve our souls.
That is a big promise, and yet not exactly what I want. I would prefer that 'preserving me from all evil' mean ... that! I don't want it to include cancer, or worries over aging parents, or the world in a hell of a mess. But God is not magic, and God does not promise all roses.
My family's dealings with cancer treatment over the past year have been our hardest thing, so far.
My friend Robin wrote a few days ago about how having treatment for breast cancer recently has been difficult for her, not so much because of that situation and the things that surround it, but because most in the breast cancer community are, with their diagnosis, facing the hardest battle in their lives. And Robin is and was not, because Robin's precious son Josh died by suicide in 2008. And breast cancer cannot approach that.
I pray for God's help for Robin and others who are facing their hardest thing ever, that they will know that their souls will be preserved.
And for all of us, walking in our paths singing songs of ascent...that we may take comfort in the knowledge that, no matter what, happens, we will never be left alone. No matter how alone we may feel. "The LORD is thy keeper; the LORD is thy shade upon thy right hand."
