MONDAY MARCH 11, 2024
DAILY SCRIPTURE:
PSALM 145
JOHN 16:1-7
This past Sunday, Pastor Clark preached from John 16. This week we will have a daily Psalm to pray and a passage from John 16 along with a daily discipline, reflection, meditation, poem, or prayer.
DAILY DISCIPLNE: MEDITATION ON SCRIPTURE
Monday’s we will provide a Meditation and Reflection during the Lenten Journey.
LET’S BEGIN.
SIT IN YOUR QUIET SPACE:
READ SCRIPTURE:
Read slowly and allow the words to penetrate.
JOHN 16:1-7
SILENCE:
If you would like to set a timer for 5 or 10 min. If you haven’t practiced mediation or it has been a while maybe start with 5 minutes.
Find a posture as you sit with a straight back; I like to think a tall back. Pretend a string is coming down from ceiling and is attached to the top of your head.
Not rigid and not too relaxed.
CENTERING PRAYER:
“Jesus, let me feel your love.”
Repeat 3-4 times.
SILENT MEDITATION:
Once you feel centered begin:
Sit in silence. If your mind begins to wonder don’t stress. Come back to the breath and the centering prayer 2 or 3 times.
If images or words come to mind. Don’t focus to hard on them just make a note of it and get back to the breath and centering prayer.
Once the timer has gone off you may open your eyes.
READ SCRIPTURE A SECOND TIME:
John 16:1-7
CENTERING PRAYER:
Eyes open or closed.
Begin Centering Prayer
Breathe in … “Lord have mercy,”
Breathe out… “Christ have mercy.”
Or whichever prayer you choose.
SOLITUDE AND SILENCE:
Sit in silence before the Lord another 5- 10 minutes.
CLOSING:
Pray the Lord’s Prayer
Amen.
TUESDAY MARH 12, 2024
DAILY SCRIPTURE:
PSALM 146
JOHN 16:12-15
DAILY DISCIPLINE: FASTING
Tonight at 6pm we will meet in the Sanctuary from 6-8pm to pray as a community. We are asking the community to make this a fast day and then join us for prayer.
DAILY EXERCISE: LECTIO DEVINA
Today’s practice will be Lectio Divina, the literally meaning “divine reading,” but better translated as “spiritual reading.”
Lectio Divina is broken up into 5 separate sections:
- SILENCO – Silence (we can use our Centering Prayer to help prepare.) Take 60 seconds (or more) in silent preparation for sacred reading.
- LECTIO – Listen to the text by reading out loud slowly and repeat 3 times.
- MEDITATO – Meditation – Reflect on what word, words, phrase or sentence that speaks to you from the text, then write it down.
- ORATIO – Pray – Pray as responding to the words, phrases, sentence that God has stirred in you.
- CONTEMPLATIO – Rest in the presence of God, allowing the words revealed to take root.[1]
LET’S BEGIN:
- SILENCIO – 60 seconds or more of silence
- LECTIO – Scripture read out loud slowly and repeated 3 times.
- John 16:12-15
- MEDITATIO – Reflection on a word, words, phrase, or sentence that speaks to you from the text. Hold onto it or write it down.
- ORATIO – Pray as responding to the words, phrase sentences that God has stirred in you.
- CONTEMPLATIO – Rest in the presence of God allowing the words revealed to take root: 3 to 5 minutes.
- AMEN
WEDNESDAY MARCH 13, 2024
DAILY SCRIPTURE:
PSALM 147
JOHN 16:16-20
DAILY PRACTICE: POETRY
The haiku is a Japanese poetic form that consists of three lines, with five syllables in the first line, seven in the second, and five in the third.
This haiku is Holy Spirit inspired from John 16:
By Maria Monetta
Words of truth spoken,
Your Spirit lives within us,
Joy in the trials.
Take some time and read through our scripture in John or the Psalm and write your own Haiku, or a poem on something that stood out to you, or just write freely what the Holy Spirit brings to you.
THURSDAY MARCH 14, 2024
DAILY SCRIPTURE:
PSALM 148
JOHN 16:23-27
DAILY PONDERING FROM THE COMMUNITY:
JUST ASK
Lonetta Key, FPCH COMMUNITY
John 16:23-27
There are many considerations to be derived from this text. But our concentration today centers around verses 23 and 24. Here the Lord emphasizes the promise of confidence in the positive effect of prayer. “Very truly I tell you, my Father will give you whatever you ask in my name. Ask and you will receive.”
The general goal of this passage was to educate the twelve regarding how their prayer life would proceed once Jesus left them. The temporary “leaving” was the crucifixion and the time spent in the tomb. But the day would soon come thereafter for the permanent “leaving”. Christ wanted to make certain they clearly understood they would no longer need to depend upon Him to be the intermediary between them and the Heavenly Father, for their prayers to be heard and answered. They could contact God directly. Because they had loved Jesus, God also loved them. The Lord also assured them twice that their prayers would not fall on deaf ears—that the result of asking would be receiving..
This was an urgent concept for Jesus to imbue in the minds of the disciples as His crucifixion would take place very shortly after this conversation. Jesus had told them He would send the Comforter to be with them in His absence Who would provide continuity. Just as critical was their understanding that His ascension into Heaven did not terminate their access to His Father.
As with the disciples so it is with us today. We ask in the name of Jesus, but we do not have to depend upon Him to relay our request to the Father. Our prayers go directly to God’s throne of grace. What a humbling and extraordinary privilege.
A passage that coincides with this topic is at the beginning of Luke 11. In response to the disciples request Jesus teaches them how to pray. He then amplifies on this by telling them a story— “Suppose you have a friend,…” Most of us are familiar with the rest of the scenario. A man needing bread in the middle of the night for an unexpected out of town guest, shamelessly persists in disturbing his neighbor until the man finally acquiesces, gets up, and responds to his friend’s need. (Luke 11:5-8)
The Lord then continues in verse 9 by making personal application as He says that prayer requires us to, “Ask and keep on asking and it shall be given you; seek and keep on seeking and you shall find; knock and keep on knocking and the door shall be opened to you.” And He reiterates that in verse 10.
It is imperative that with every fiber of our being we recognize the absolute essentiality of knowing without doubt that asking equals receiving. That prayer changes things. That prayer works. This is the life blood of each Christian. Without this vital spiritual umbilical cord our souls will wither. As James says, “The prayer of a righteous person is powerful and effective.” Without exception, when we drop to our knees and come before the Heavenly Father’s throne beseeching Him, we must do so in faith believing.
“Ask and you will receive, and your joy will be complete.” (John 16:24)
FRIDAY MARCH 15, 2024
DAILY SCRIPTURE:
PSALM 149
JOHN 16:28-31
DAILY PRACTICE: ARTICLE ON LENT
LENTEN DEMOLITION OF SIN
by Matt Paolelli
In my Chicago office, my coworkers and I have been driven to distraction lately. If you spent a few minutes in the office, you would see people leaving their cubicles to get up and stare out the window. You would see people pointing and hear the outburst of excited shouts. Once in a while, you might even feel the entire building slightly shaking.
No, this is not the beginning of a Godzilla movie, and we are not in any danger.
We have all been openly gaping at the ongoing demolition of the two adjacent buildings in our office park. We have a front-row seat to the meticulous destruction of these 2000s-era, structurally sound, multilevel office buildings that will soon make way for new one-story buildings to house data processing centers. And what a process it is!
As the demolition has unfolded over the past several weeks, I have been struck by how slowly and particularly the wrecking crew is going about its work. My uninformed compulsion would be to sprinkle a few sticks of dynamite throughout the two buildings, pop some popcorn, start the countdown, and watch them fall. Instead, the first week of action saw just one segment of one building taken down. They even took the time to individually break each one of the windows in the building before the wrecking ball began swinging.
And the wrecking ball, while powerful, is not having the easiest time breaking through the concrete and metal walls of these relatively new buildings. Once it does, the demolition is put on hold again, as construction trucks move in to clean up the colossal mess on the ground in the wrecking ball’s wake.
And so we’ve all been riveted to this slow and steady process, hoping to be looking out the window at the right time to watch in awe as the wrecking ball satisfyingly hits its mark and a particularly large chunk of the building hits the ground in a cloud of dust—making our own building literally shudder at the thought of such a fate.
Since I work for Word on Fire Ministries and we are now in the heart of Lent, I can’t help but turn this demolition project into a spiritual metaphor.
As we engage in the Lenten practices of fasting, prayer, and almsgiving, we are hopefully examining the blueprints of our lives and finding those structurally unsound areas that would best be visited by the wrecking ball of spiritual mortification.
Rooting out sin is a difficult and arduous process that often has to be as staged and slow as the demolition of these buildings. Unfortunately, there is no dynamite solution for our sinful tendencies. The best we can do is more frequently avail ourselves of God’s unending mercy in the Sacrament of Reconciliation, but if you’re anything like me, you’re quickly traipsing back to the confessional, getting déjà vu as you confess a frustratingly similar list of transgressions.
So what can we do to make our Lenten demolition more destructive (in a good way) so that it clears space for the new construction of positive habits and Christ-centered living? Here are a few ideas.
Check your foundation
Everyone from the Big Bad Wolf to the wise man who built his house upon a rock knows the importance of a strong foundation for solid construction. So, too, goes your spiritual life.
What is at the heart of your faith? Do you go to worship every Sunday? Do you have a personal prayer life? These are two basic building blocks upon which so much more can come to rest. If there is a crack in your personal foundation of faith, Lent is the perfect time to challenge yourself to set things right.
Once you have the basics covered, can you extend yourself. If you need to fight the ever-present excuses of being busy and having no time, make yourself a Lenten commitment to take on a new spiritual practice, and perhaps it will evolve into a habit.
Break all the windows
What are the windows in your life that need breaking? Which windows are you looking through to view the people around you with envy, disdain, mistrust, lust, or hatred? Which windows are showing you your own distorted reflection and leading you to arrogance, self-loathing, loneliness, insecurity, or despair? Break ’em all.
So much of our unhappiness and sin comes from viewing the world and ourselves through our broken, human eyes. While we will never see perfectly through the eyes of God, we can still take steps to eliminate distractions and cut through the evil one’s lies that lead us to unhealthy comparisons, destructive judgments, and straight-up sinful behavior.
Lenten fasting can help us trim this “fat” from our minds and our souls. For me, this means logging off of social media and literally putting the phone in another room when I get home from work. I’ve been on Facebook for almost twenty years, and while I like to reassure myself with the benefits of keeping in touch and sharing baby pictures, social media has been diabolically designed and scientifically proven to alter your brain chemistry. The consequences of low self-esteem, fear of missing out, and the desire to share only your perfect, curated life far outweigh the positives.
Matt Paolelli is the Development Marketing Director for Word on Fire Catholic Ministries. His work also appears in U.S. Catholic magazine, the Grotto Network, and Aleteia.
SATURDAY MARCH 16, 2024
DAILY SCRIPTURE:
PSALM 150
JOHN 16:32-33
DAILY DISCIPLINE: STAURDAY EXAMEN
PRAYER OF EXAMEN
The following practice is called The Examen where one simply pauses to prayerfully reflect on your week with the guidance of the Holy Spirit.
What has brought new life and joy this week?
Where have you seen Jesus revealed in a new or fresh way?
What has surprised or disturbed you this week?
Share with God an encounter that changed, challenged, or comforted you.
Ponder times when you may have resisted God’s guidance. What has stopped you from being wholehearted? Speak with the Lord about this.
Pray for the week to come, for God’s guiding hand in your life and your interactions with others.
Are there any Spiritual Disciplines you have committed to practice throughout Lent? Ask the Lord for grace to remain faithful in those disciplines.
Closing Prayer:
You have given all to me.
To you, Lord, I return it.
Everything is yours; do with it what you will.
Give me only your love and your grace,
That is enough for me.
[1] My.lectiodivinajouranl.com