This post may seem a little strange after my last one – but here it is anyway 😉

Yesterday I stepped into a new part of my life journey. It’s something I have tried before out of a feeling of obligation and the sense that it’s what I am supposed to do – this time it is driven by a sense of longing. The other times it has always been short lived. My hope is that this time it turns into a part of my life.

My ‘faith’ is one that is largely intellectual (for want of a better term as that makes it sound smart when it’s not) and action oriented. It has largely been driven by what I think and do… there, that makes it sound less self-important. For the most part I am put off by the ‘spirituality’ I have experienced as I have grown up as encapsulated by what most often is called ‘Pentecostalism’. I see what I think and do as ‘spiritual’ because I have grown to believe that ‘everything is spiritual’.

Some of what has turned me off Pentecostalism are the stereotypical pitfalls that seem to go hand in hand with it. It is often loud, showy, personality driven and because it focuses towards crowds it feels impersonal and it often seems to go hand in hand with some poor theological ideas. I know this isn’t true of all forms and expressions of Pentecostalism, but it has largely been my experience of it so I have never really engaged such a spirituality. I’m coming to realize that this aversion to Pentecostal expressions of spirituality may partly come down to the fact that at the core, I’m strongly introverted and the expression of Pentecostalism is largely extroverted.

That said, I’m at a point in life where there’s a plank in my life that I feel is missing and I have a longing to fill it. I can’t describe it as anything other than the need for a grounded core that is deeply personal – that is simply about God and I; something that everything else (the thinking and doing) flows from.

I don’t want to call it an experience of the ‘spiritual’ as I believe that creates a false dualism, because as I said, I believe everything is spiritual. I can accept the use of the word ‘mystical’. I like that word because, for me, it denotes something closer and quieter and therefore appeals to the strong introvert in me and it comes with a  pedigree and history that dates right back throughout Christian history and practice. There is a lot I admire about the Catholic Mystics and practitioners of the faith who have drawn on what they offer.

On the weekend I read some of Henri Nouwen’s thoughts on solitude and creating space to hear from God in the quiet place – to allow one’s life to be shaped by that solitude. It strongly resonated with me and where I am at right now.

To that end I have ordered a book that takes the spiritual exercises of St Ignatius and guides the reader through them in such a way that makes them accessible for the lay person in their daily life. Originally the exercises were written for a 30 day retreat where the person undertaking the retreat would be guided through the exercises by a spiritual director. I believe this is how the Jesuits still practice the exercises – along with many other people.

I want to draw on the exercises of Ignatius, so to have them presented in such a way as to make them workable in my daily life will be helpful.

Yesterday and today, inspired by Nouwen’s thoughts on solitude, I also made space for 15 minutes to be on my own meditating on a Psalm. Now I read the Bible a lot and have since I was 5 – but the motivation behind this reading has been different from my norm. This was much more devotional. I have never connected with the Psalms on a deeply personal level and never quite got the devotion to them that some people seem to have – that changed yesterday.

Yesterday in my space of solitude I read Psalm 139. I read it not caring about context, what more I could learn, what I might struggle with, how it relates to my work or the world at large in the way that I would normally read the Bible. I consciously pushed aside distractions, including the desire to read more than is there. I read it simply wanting to draw closer to God and so as I read it, I allowed it to form the words of prayer that followed my reading – a simple, whispered and quiet prayer. After quietly reading it through a couple of times I felt drawn to the words of verse 23 and these became my prayer “Search me, O God, and know my heart; test me and know my thoughts.”

I didn’t have a mind blowing experience and to start with it felt tough to not slip into my normal patterns of reading the Bible – solitude and quiet time clearly involve discipline (Thomas Merton says as much), but it felt right, it felt personal, it felt close and for the first time I felt a connection to a Psalm that I can only describe as ‘mystical’ – it was small and intimate.

Today I did the same with Psalm 33 and the words of verse 22 became my prayer “Let your steadfast love, O Lord, be upon me [us], even as I [we] hope in you.”

Both times the prayer has felt led. I have uttered it in a whisper as it feels appropriate and then have stayed silent and relaxed.

I am looking forward to the exercises of St Ignatius as my understanding is that they involve a journey. I have no doubt that this desire to enter into something more ‘mystical’ and to create space for that ‘still, small voice’ won’t be easy and will involve discipline, but it’s something I feel I am lacking and need, so I’m willing to go on the journey.

For some, this may read like a confession. There is this assumption that Christians who operate in the public realm have it all together in every area of their faith – to admit that I feel immature in my devotional life may surprise some. This does not mean that I don’t pray, I do, regularly. I also read the Bible regularly, alongside that, many will be aware of what I do in public, but each of those things and everything else I do feels like they need something else underpinning them and it’s that something that I am seeking to create room for.