Spring of Souls

Tis the spring of souls today: Christ hath burst His prison;
And from three days’ sleep in death as a Sun hath risen.
All the winter of our sins, long and dark, is flying
From His light, to whom we give laud and praise undying.
Now the queen of seasons, bright with the day of splendor,
With the royal feast of feasts comes its joy to render!”

~ St John of Damascus

𝓗𝓪𝓹𝓹𝔂, Happy, Happy 𝓔𝓪𝓼𝓽𝓮𝓻!

Lent 40 ~ In This Silence

God will speak in this Holy Silence.

But He will whisper just loud enough for you to hear.

~ paraphrased from www.coraevans.com

Lent 39 ~ Freed

Into Your hands, I commend My Spirit.

Lent 38 ~ Keep Watch with Me

My soul is sorrowful even to death. Remain here and keep watch with me.

~ Matthew 26: 38

Lent 37 ~ I am Going to Jerusalem

 

When the days drew near for Him to be taken up, He set His face to go to Jerusalem.

~ Luke 9: 51

Lent 36 ~ Fear of God

      It’s not easy to reconcile the words, the fear of God, with the image of God as a loving Father. Why fear, I used to wonder.

       Today, hearing of some world events, a phrase began to drum within me,

They had no fear of God

They had no fear of God

They had no fear of God

I turned the words over in my heart and began to think about them and the light they brought to me. The fear of God helps me to remember that as gentle and as loving and as generous as God is, He is fair too. Not just to me, but also to those whom I hurt. If I am negatively secure in my convictions that because God loves me, God will always be in my corner and that anything I do will be alright with Him, I can be in for a surprise. Or shock.

       I believe there is a rope that binds us to God. The harder we pull on that rope through unfairness and injustice, the faster we will come before the seat of Justice – especially those whom God has blessed with so much more than others. Because He loves us, even as He meets our falls with mercy, He does also with justice. For God will not, in His immense love, allow sin to taint us.

       Today, an unlikely singular joy weaves its myriad hymns through the trees, coming to rest upon my heart. Despite a lack of sleep, agitation over happenings in my country and in the world, and concern over my studies, my heart sings and sings. It is so, so odd that I have to pause and run my gaze over the terrain of my heart. Then, a memory comes of my night’s intention – to pray big, “recklessly” even. Suddenly, watching the winds sing, a knowing comes into me. Heaven does indeed want me to pray the big, reckless prayers! The time for it has come for me.

       And so I do, on this final Saturday before Holy Week.

       Individual by individual.

       My family and I.

       The countries on my heart.

       I place them all into the Wound of the Heart of Jesus.

       May His Precious Blood wash over each one. And may the Light of the fear of God burn through the cold.

Lent 35 ~ Beyond the Tomorrows

Expect to have hope rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again.

~ Sarah Ban Breathnach, author

          A Friday is always lovely because it marks the end of the work week for me – except when I get called in for additional work on Saturdays, and I have to go in, heart all filled with little thorns. But none of that this week. The car windscreen has not been repaired yet because my husband only got home on Wednesday after his outstation meeting. We’re booked to have it all seen to next Tuesday of Holy Week. In the meantime, my husband has to pick me up after work each day, and that has been so nice, both the picking up and the extra time we get to spend together.

          Today, being Friday, I prayed once more for all of our family to be sheltered within the 5th Wound of Jesus, and for His Precious Blood to cleanse us, for God knows just how much we need this. In my mind, I was expecting cleansing to be signified through a sense of remorse, a sorrow for my sins the way I’ve read that saints often feel.

          Instead, like many days this Lent, it has been such a gentle day. At work, the mindless chatter has reduced by about 80% due to the repositioning of our workstations. I sit in a quieter segment of the room now, and the peace is deep and abiding. Thanksgiving spills over for this miracle, something so small in terms of change, but which has yielded so much. I then came home from work, my mind turning over ideas for the writing for my studies. There was so much more of my studies to get done, but the house put out its arms and welcomed us all home. This beautiful old home that has seen births and a death, joys and sorrow, it welcomed me like a mother, and within it I found again, peace and rest and quiet merriment.

Expect to have hope rekindled. Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways. The dry seasons in life do not last. The spring rains will come again.

          On a day when I’ve decided to pray big for my country, to pray recklessly even, without caring for the disappointment that may come when prayers are answered differently, Sarah Ban Breathnach’s words bring a quiet sort of hope. Not giddy. Not exuberant. But a gentle yet strong certainty that even if tough days come, something beautiful does lie in wait beyond the mountains of tomorrows. Hidden for now, bidding its time.

The dry seasons in life do not last,

The spring rains will come again,

Expect to have hope rekindled,

Expect your prayers to be answered in wondrous ways.

Lent 34 – Fear No Evil

Even though I walk in the dark valley
I fear no evil; for You are at my side
With Your rod and Your staff
that give me courage.   ~  Psalm 23: 4

          Many years ago, someone dreamt that I would go down a dark path off a highway, by myself. The person told me that in the dream, she tried to stop me from leaving, but that I continued to make my way into the deepening darkness. In her words, she said,

But you went. And you went bravely.

          That dream actually foretold a coming sorrow in my life, one I could not have foreseen, and a descent into seeming interminable darkness. What it did not show the person who dreamt of me, was that the dark would one day give way to light, and I would be freed.

          In the wee hours of this morning, on this precious day of the 18th of March, I prayed for the healing of the bloodline of this person who dreamt of me so many years ago. It was just a simple prayer: I placed the bloodline into the 5th wound of Jesus, the Wound of the Sacred Side of Jesus as well as of the Heart of Christ.

          Later, as I read the Responsorial Psalm for today, something within me lingered over the 4th verse,

Even though I walk in the dark valley
I fear no evil; for You are at my side
With Your rod and Your staff
that give me courage

I recalled the dream from many years back but soon tucked it away. Then, I went to what was a fulfilling workday.

          But returning to my car late in the day after work, I discovered that the rear windscreen had completely shattered. My car was parked close the security checkpoint so it was a safe location. Colleagues from work checked everything and everywhere and it did not seem to be the result of any mischief. The windscreen could have sustained a small crack at some point which we did not notice, which might have led to its complete failure today.

          Very strangely, except for a slight sense of dread at having to drive very carefully to make it home without having the windscreen explode on me and the fact that my husband was working outstation for two days, I was completely calm and even cheerily resigned to what had happened.

          Until now, as I type out this post, my heart remains untroubled. My husband did ask earlier in the evening once I informed him about the incident, if I would go ahead and continue to pray about the bloodlines of any more people. I didn’t have an answer then, but in the silence of the night and alone at home, I do now. Whether this incident is related to my prayer or not, what must be prayed about must be prayed. Satan must never be allowed to win. Am I certain that this is his doing? I guess I am because inexplicable, violent smashing seems to be his call sign. He smashes when he has lost to Jesus. Years before, again on a night when my husband was working outstation, satan had wrenched a Crucifix in my home, attached securely to its hook and smashed it to the floor a distance away because I had, for the first time that night, prayed to love my crosses. Satan adamantly thwarts any prayer, but I have come to understand that there are some to which the reaction will be particularly violent. In my case, the prayer to suffer for Christ was one. And now, the prayer to purify bloodlines of generations of sin.

          Protected by the Blood of Christ, I prayed again for bloodlines to cleansed, because

I fear no evil, for Jesus is at my side;

With His rod and His staff, He gives me courage.

Lent 33 ~ In Everything, Give Thanks

First posted on The Breadbox Letters by Nancy Shuman.

May she rest in peace.

Lent 32 ~ Do Nothing Until…

See if you have your soul ‘in your hands’ or if some passion or fit of anxiety has robbed you of it…if it has gone astray, look for it before doing anything else and bring it quietly back into God’s presence, subjecting all your affections and desires to the obedience and direction of His divine will… Resolve to do nothing that your desire insists on until your mind has regained peace, unless it is something that cannot be put off.

~ St Francis de Sales