Archives by: Gary Hoag

Rejoice always, pray continually, give thanks in all circumstances; for this is God’s will for you in Christ Jesus. 1 Thessalonians 5:16-18

“Paul not only encourages unceasing prayer, but also practices it. “We continually thank God for you” (1 Thessalonians 2:13), he says to his community in Greece. “We also pray continually that our God will make you worthy of his call” (2 Thessalonians 1:11). To the Romans, he writes: “I continually mention you in my prayers” (Romans 1:9), and he comforts his friend Timothy with the words: “I remember you in my prayers constantly, night and day” (2 Timothy 1:3).

The two Greek terms that appear repeatedly in Paul’s letters are pantote and adialeiptos, which mean “always” and “without interruption.” These words make it clear that for Paul, prayer is not a part of living, but all of life, not a part of his thought, but all of his thought, not a part of his emotions and feelings, but all of them. Paul’s fervor allows no place for partial commitments, piecemeal giving, or hesitant generosity. He gives all and asks all.

This radicalism obviously raises some difficult questions. What does it mean to pray without ceasing? How can we live life, with its many demands and obligations, as an uninterrupted prayer? What about the endless row of distractions that intrude day after day? Moreover, how can sleep, needed moments of diversion, and the few hours in which we try to escape from the tensions and conflicts of life be lifted up into unceasing prayer? These questions are real and have puzzled many Christians who want to take seriously Paul’s exhortation to pray without ceasing.

One of the best-known examples of the desire for unceasing prayer is the nineteenth-century Russian peasant who wanted so much to be obedient to Paul’s call for uninterrupted prayer that he went from staretz to staretz (hermit to hermit) looking for an answer until he finally found a holy man who taught him the Jesus Prayer. He told the peasant to say thousands of times each day, “Lord Jesus Christ, have mercy on me.” In this way, the Jesus Prayer slowly became united with his breathing and heartbeat so that he could travel through Russia carrying his knapsack with the Bible, the Philokalia (an anthology of Eastern Christian mystical writings), and some bread and salt, living a life of unceasing prayer.

Although we are not nineteenth-century Russian peasants or pilgrims, we share the quest of the simple pilgrim: “How to pray without ceasing?” I want to answer this question not in the context of the wide, silent Russian prairies of a century ago but in the context of the restlessness of our contemporary Western society. I suggest that the practice of unceasing prayer is a threefold process: we first cry out to God with all our needs and requests. Then we turn our unceasing thoughts into continual conversation with God. Finally, we learn to listen to God in our hearts through a daily discipline of meditation and contemplative practice.

Henri Nouwen in Spiritual Direction: Wisdom for the Long Walk of Faith (New York: Harper One, 2006) excerpt from chapter 5.

My GTP work is going well with the delegation from Chile.

In my early morning reading in my room at the retreat I read a chapter, and this sentence in particular struck me: “Paul’s fervor allows no place for partial commitments, piecemeal giving, or hesitant generosity. He gives all and asks all.”

So, how do we come to a place of giving all and asking all?

We practice unceasing prayer. It starts with crying out, it leads us to conversation with God, and concludes with contemplation, reflecting on what God is teaching us. In plain terms, we acknowledge our weakness, He meets us there, and we go away transformed.

God desires that we abandon partial commitments, piecemeal giving, and hesitant generosity.

But the only way for us to do that is to acknowledge our weakness, to meet with Him to discover His all sufficiency, and then to consider what steps we must take to live and act on what is true. It’s a journey.

We only figure it out as we live it out that the path leads to life, freedom, and rich generosity.

My dear brothers and sisters, take note of this: Everyone should be quick to listen, slow to speak and slow to become angry, because human anger does not produce the righteousness that God desires. James 1:19-20

“Community as discipline is the effort to create a free and empty space among people where together we can practice true obedience. Through the discipline of community we prevent ourselves from clinging to each other in fear and loneliness, and clear free space to listen to the liberating voice of God… Community has little to do with mutual compatibility. Similarities in educational background, psychological make-up, or social status can bring us together but they can never be the basis for community. Community is grounded in God, who calls us together, and not in the attractiveness of people to each other… I would like to describe one concrete form of this discipline of community. It is in the practice of listening together. In our wordy world, we usually spend our time together talking. We feel most comfortable in sharing experiences, discussing interesting subjects, or arguing about current issues. It is through a very active verbal exchange that we try to discover each other. But often we find that words function more as walls than as gates, more as ways to keep distance than to come close.”

Henri Nouwen in Making All Things New: An Invitation to the Spiritual Life (New York: HarperOne, 1981) 80-84.

As I serve brothers and sisters from Chile with the assistance of a translator from Guatemala this week, I am trying to create community by encouraging listening to one another to hear how God might teach us through one another.

Some may perceive me as having all the answers, and whilst I might share some content this week as a teacher, my focus is listening so that words don’t function as walls instead of gates.

Our generous service, whether paid or as volunteers, must create community through listening and loving. I may be attuned to this because I’ve failed so much with it in the past.

God help all of us create space where people can practice true obedience together and learn from each other what that looks like. Do this by your Holy Spirit we ask in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Be devoted to one another in love. Honor one another above yourselves. Romans 12:10

“Friendship is one of the greatest gifts a human being can receive. It is a bond beyond common goals, common interests, or common histories. It is a bond stronger than sexual union can create, deeper than a shared fate can solidify, and it can be even more intimate than the bonds of marriage or community. Friendship is being with the other in joy and sorrow, even when we cannot increase the joy or decrease the sorrow. It is a unity of souls that gives nobility and sincerity to love. Friendship makes all of life shine brightly. Blessed are those who lay down their lives for their friends.”

Henri Nouwen in Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith (New York: HarperCollins, 1997) reading for 7 January.

Today I will meet up with a friend, Peter Fiorello, executive director of Black Rock Retreat. We’ve collaborated in the Kingdom for more than a decade. We enjoy the mutually beneficial gift of friendship. We are devoted to each other.

We have talked for a couple years about traveling to Chile to serve Christian workers crying out for help like the Macedonian man in the vision Paul saw in Acts 16:9. They want assistance in biblical governance, ministry administration, and Christian fundraising.

Recently Peter had an idea. He reached out to me and shared it. “The camp has some resources. What if we fly these influential workers from Chile to USA and GTP helps train them in governance, administration, and partnership work?”

We prayed. They loved the idea. The rest is history. This is a beautiful picture of collaborative giving. We are combining the facilities, knowledge, and resources that we have to multiply stewards who will impact thousands through their service.

That’s the work of GTP. It’s going to be a long, complex, and rewarding week. Pray for me and my translator, Carla Archila of Guatemala, to help them understand and use a series of templates to build organizational capacity for fruitful ministry.

What about you? Do you have a friend with whom you share common interests? What if you teamed up to serve others generously so that your giving did not create dependency but built them up as disciples?

Ask the Spirit to guide you and call the person that comes to mind like Peter called me.

As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love. John 15:9

“We are called to pray not because we feel like praying or because it gives us great insights, but simply because we want to be obedient, to listen to the voice that calls us beloved. The word listen in Latin is audire. If we listen with full attention in which we are totally geared to listen, it’s called ob-audire, and that’s where the word obedience comes from.

Jesus is the obedient one. That means He is total ear, totally open to the love of God. And if we are closed, we are surdus. That is the Latin word for deaf. The more “deaf” we get, the more absurdus we become, and an absurd life is precisely a life in which we no longer listen and are constantly distracted by all sorts of voices and lose touch with the truth that we are the beloved.

And as soon as we start to become spiritually deaf to the voice that calls us the beloved, we are going to look someplace else to make us the beloved. And that’s when we get into trouble. We are going to look for love, affirmation, or praise where we cannot find them and get hooked in all sorts of ways, whether it is alcohol, drugs, relationships, success in work, how people talk about us, or desire to have control over things. Prayer brings love alive among us.”

Henri Nouwen in A Spirituality of Living (Henri Nouwen Legacy Trust, 2011) 27-28.

For those who desire to serve as conduits of God’s generosity to a lost and hurting world, Nouwen reminds us today, echoing the prayer of Jesus, that we remain in the Father’s love.

We do this by prayer and listening. This propels us to obedience. Obedience causes us to participate in what God wants to happen. Failure to do so results in an absurd life that expends time and money on stuff that won’t satisfy.

In this light, Nouwen blesses us today with the reminder to pray and soak in the reality that we are the beloved. Listen and obey to abandon absurdity and position yourself for a life of generosity.

Early tomorrow I fly to Washington, D.C. to do a weeklong workshop on Governance, Administration, and Partnership for a Chilean delegation of Christian workers at Black Rock Retreat. I’d appreciate your prayers for a fruitful week.

In everything I did, I showed you that by this kind of hard work we must help the weak, remembering the words the Lord Jesus himself said: ‘It is more blessed to give than to receive.’ Acts 20:35

“What a wonderful mystery this is! Our greatest fulfillment lies in giving ourselves to others. Although it often seems that people only give to receive, I believe that beyond all our desires to be appreciated, rewarded, and acknowledged, there lies a simple and pure desire to give… Our humanity comes to its fullest bloom in giving. We become beautiful people when we give whatever we can give: a smile, a handshake, a kiss, an embrace, a word of love, a present, a part of our life…all of our life.”

Henri Nouwen in Life of the Beloved: Spiritual Living in a Secular World (New York: Crossroad, 1992) 85

Why is giving better than receiving? I think, with Nouwen, that it is what God made us to do. We become beautiful people when we give. We find fulfillment when we give. We accomplish our purpose on the planet when we give.

At this time in USA, flowers are blooming. But they only bloom for a season. Think about the connection. The purpose of a flower is to bloom for a short time. This is just like our lives. We are only here a short time.

Father in heaven, empower us by your Spirit to give smiles, handshakes, kisses, embraces, words of love, gifts, and parts of our lives, so that we bloom like beautiful flowers for you. Hear our prayer in the name of Jesus. Amen.

Yet I am always with you; you hold me by my right hand. You guide me with your counsel, and afterward you will take me into glory. Whom have I in heaven but you? And earth has nothing I desire besides you. My flesh and my heart may fail, but God is the strength of my heart and my portion forever. Psalm 73:23-26

“When we honestly ask ourselves which person in our lives means the most to us, we often find that it is those who, instead of giving advice, solutions, or cures, have chosen rather to share our pain and touch our wounds with a warm and tender hand. The friend who can be silent with us in a moment of despair or confusion, who can stay with us in an hour of grief and bereavement, who can tolerate not knowing, not curing, not healing and face with us the reality of our powerlessness, that is a friend who cares.”

Henri Nouwen in Out of Solitude: Three Meditations on the Christian Life (Notre Dame: Ave Maria Press, 2004) 38.

I have a good friend, Ken Sharp. I love him. He said on Sunday that he was discouraged and struggling in his faith. He’s had some rough times lately.

So, rather than give advice or offer solutions (which I have done more times than I can count), I went over to his place yesterday just to check in, to ask how he was doing, to ask about his wife whose been in the hospital for a long time, to read Psalm 73 together, and to pray. He said it meant a lot.

As you think about your generosity, consider giving a warm tender hand or a listening ear. Sit with someone who is struggling and love them well.

I am learning this is one of the greatest gifts we can give people. The paradox is that such gifts don’t cost us any money, and simultaneously, they are priceless to the receiver. Ask God today if there is someone who needs a friend who cares and for the Spirit.

Therefore, if you are offering your gift at the altar and there remember that your brother or sister has something against you, leave your gift there in front of the altar. First go and be reconciled to them; then come and offer your gift. Matthew 5:23-24

“When I think back on the friendships, encounters, and confrontations of the past, I realize that islands of anger, bitterness, and resentment still lie hidden in my heart. And when I bring to mind all whom I personally know or about whom I have heard or read, I know how I divide them between those who are for me and those who are against me, those whom I like and those whom I do not like, those whom I want to be with and those whom I try to avoid at all costs.

My inner life is so filled with opinions, judgments, and prejudices about my “brothers and sisters” that real peace is still far away. As I think about Jesus’ words, I know that I must let go of all these divisive emotions and thoughts so that I can truly experience peace with all of God’s people. This means an unrestrained willingness to forgive and let go of old fears, bitterness, resentment, anger, and list and thus find reconciliation.

In this way, I can be a real peacemaker. My inner peace can be a source of peace for all I meet. I can then offer gifts on the altar of God as a testimony to this peace with my brothers and sisters. I have to start thinking about concrete ways to make peace with my brothers and sisters who have something against me. What do I have to lose? To make peace is to free myself from my easy judgments so that I can love my enemy and the God who holds me and my enemies together in the palm of His hand.”

Henri Nouwen in Road to Daybreak: A Spiritual Journey (New York: Image, 1990) 141-142.

If I am vulnerable, on my journey I have accumulated lots of knowledge, and knowledge puffs up while love builds up. When puffed up I have, at times, held such strong opinions that I cared more about being right than about preserving human relationships.

If’ I’ve gone from sharing thoughts to convicting you, then join the club. With Nouwen, I have chosen the road to daybreak. That means walking toward the light beckons me to realize that God cares more about me reconciling my human relationships than receiving my heavenly gifts.

If you want to join me on this way, know that we can be real peacemakers who offer gifts as a testimony of the peace we have received and that we get to share. We have nothing to lose and everything to gain. And most importantly, God who is watching our giving, rejoices in our growth.

As Jesus and His disciples were on their way, He came to a village where a woman named Martha opened her home to Him. She had a sister called Mary, who sat at the Lord’s feet listening to what He said. But Martha was distracted by all the preparations that had to be made. She came to Him and asked, “Lord, don’t you care that my sister has left me to do the work by myself? Tell her to help me!” “Martha, Martha,” the Lord answered, “you are worried and upset about many things, but few things are needed—or indeed only one. Mary has chosen what is better, and it will not be taken away from her.” Luke 10:38-42

“You are very concerned with making the right choices about your work. You have so many options that you are constantly overwhelmed by the question “What should I do and what should I not do?” You are asked to respond to many concrete needs. There are people to visit, people to receive, people to simply be with. There are issues that beg for attention, books it seems important to read, and works of art to be seen. But what of all this truly deserves your time?

Start by not allowing these people and issues to possess you. As long as you think that you need them to be yourself, you are not really free. Much of their urgency comes from your own need to be accepted and affirmed. You have to keep going back to the source: God’s love for you. In many ways, you still want to set your own agenda. You act as if you have to choose among many things, which all seem equally important. But you have not fully surrendered yourself to God’s guidance. You keep fighting with God over who is in control.”

Try to give your agenda to God. Keep saying, “Your will be done, not mine.” Give every part of your heart and your time to God and let God tell you what to do, where to go, when and how to respond. God does not want you to destroy yourself. Exhaustion, burnout, and depression are not signs that you are doing God’s will. God is gentle and loving. God desires to give you a deep sense of safety in God’s love. Once you have allowed yourself to experience that love fully, you will be better able to discern who you are being sent to in God’s name. It is not easy to give your agenda to God. But the more you do so, the more “clock time” becomes “God’s time,” and God’s time is always the fullness of time.”

Henri Nouwen in The Inner Voice of Love: A Journey Through Anguish to Freedom (New York: Image, 1998) 105-106.

In my work, I have allowed people and issues to possess me, which means often my work has enslaved me. Not only does this steal my joy. It robs me from the opportunity to extend rich generosity. Perhaps you can relate?

When I revisit today’s Scripture, I find myself in the example of Martha. She sees all the work that need to be done. Unlike Mary, she is distracted from the one thing that she should have been focused on: Jesus.

I am learning that when I give my agenda to God and focus on the one thing that is needful for me, namely, receiving whatever Jesus has for me daily, the rest somehow falls into place and gets sorted.

This is actually the best kind of giving too. When we give our agenda to the Father and receive from Jesus whatever He has for us, we are empowered by the Spirit to live, give, serve, and love generously.

It is a sin to despise one’s neighbor, but blessed is the one who is kind to the needy. Proverbs 14:21

“I want to help. I want to do something for people in need. I want to offer consolation to those who are in grief and alleviate the suffering of those who are in pain. There is obviously nothing wrong with that desire. It is a noble and grace-filled desire. But unless I realize that God’s blessing is coming to me from those I want to serve, my help will be short-lived, and soon I will be burned out.

How is it possible to keep caring for the poor when the poor only get poorer? How is it possible to keep nursing the sick when they are not getting better? How can I keep consoling the dying when their deaths only bring me more grief? The answer is that they all hold a blessing for me, a blessing that I need to receive.

Ministry is, first of all, receiving God’s blessing from those to whom we minister. What is this blessing? It is a glimpse of the face of God. Seeing God is what heaven is all about! We can see God in the face of Jesus, and we can see the face of Jesus in all those who need our care… We so much need a blessing. The poor are waiting to bless us.”

Henri Nouwen in Here and Now: Living in the Spirit (New York: Crossroad, 1994) 82-83.

Generosity is often viewed as going one direction, from the giver to the receiver. Nouwen alerts us today that the reason God desires that we help the needy is because they have a blessing for us.

Right now, GTP and GenerousChurch staff are in Southeast Asia doing a multi-day Generosity Design Lab for a team from the Philippines to help them create a generosity curriculum.

Why do this? Is it to generate greater giving from God’s people? That’s part of it, for sure, but that’s only half the picture. The goal must never just be to get people to give more money to solve problems.

When we approach poverty for example as solving a problem, we will be endlessly disappointed because the poor will always be with us. So what is the alternative? God wants us to do it to show love and when we do we receive it in return.

When we approach it as showing love, we receive love in return and the blessing we receive often outweighs the blessing we give. So, let me take you back to the generosity curriculum. Why help create it?

With our friends at Christian Stewardship Association (Philippines), we want to multiply stewards across the Philippines who understand that generous living will come with a blessing that far outweighs the cost.

Why? This brings heaven to earth! It helps people meet Jesus one person at a time or one church at a time. As groups use the contextualized generosity curriculum, we unleash multitudes of generous disciples who give and receive blessing.

The Lord had said to Abram, “Go from your country, your people and your father’s household to the land I will show you.” Genesis 12:1

“The call to community as we hear it from our Lord is the call to move away from the ordinary and proper places. Leave your father and mother. Let the dead bury their dead. Keep your hand on the plow and not look back. Sell what you own, give the money to the poor, and come follow me (Luke 14:26; 9:60, 62; 18:22). The Gospels confront us with this persistent voice inviting us to move from where it is comfortable, from where we want to stay, from where we feel at home.

Why is this so central? It is central because in voluntary displacement, we cast off the illusion of “having it together” and thus begin to experience our true condition, which is that we, like everyone else, are pilgrims on the way, sinners in need of grace. Through voluntary displacement, we counteract the tendency to become settled in a false comfort and to forget the fundamentally unsettled position that we share with all people. Voluntary displacement leads us to the existential recognition of our inner brokenness and thus brings us to a deeper solidarity with the brokenness of our fellow human beings.

Community, as the place of compassion, therefore, always requires displacement. The Greek word for church, ekklesia – from ek = out, and kaleo – call – indicates that as a Christian community we are people who together are called out of our familiar places to unknown territories, out of our ordinary and proper places to the places where people hurt and where we can experience with them our common human brokenness and our common need for healing.”

Henri Nouwen in Compassion: A Reflection on the Christian Life (New York: Image, 1996) 61-62.

Hope you like the new header photo. I like to take a 3 mile walk with Grace St. Catherine (our German Shorthaired Pointer) and dawn in the summer. I felt God’s presence with me when I saw the sunrise through this tree.

If we think back to God’s call to Abraham it was to leave his comfort zone and go to a place that God would show him. That’s the call to each of us as followers of Jesus. To experience real community we must choose voluntary displacement.

I’m writing a devotional book with a friend, Travis Shelton, entitled Community. As I explored this idea in Nouwen’s thinking this morning, I am struck by the way it leads to generous living. We abandon the cultural trappings and follow Jesus.

He directs us to go, sell, and give when the world tells us to stop, buy, and keep. He shows us that only in selling and giving do we actually get what we are looking for: life a hundred times better than we can make it on our own.

So, on this Lord’s day, ask God what voluntary displacement looks like for you. What ordinary and proper places do you need to leave in order to experience community and grasp generous living with fellow humans?