“Cultivating Sacred Space” week 4: Walking in Infinite Love
Questions for Reflection and Discussion
1. Share about your experience at the Fall Day of Service last week. In what ways has service been a way you have experienced God?
2. What was your personal experience with the practices from the week before: Head (reflection), Heart (expression), and Hands (service)? What seemed to work for you and what was not so helpful? Is this a practice you could see yourself using in the future?
3. What insights did you gain from the message this past Sunday? What was most helpful for you? What did you find uncomfortable?
4. Read Exodus 3:13-15. What about this story suggests God is personal (a person or a being)? What about this passage suggests God is a force or presence (being or existence). How might each of these perspectives help us understand and experience God more? What are
their limitations? In the story God self-names as a verb rather than a noun. What insight might this give about the nature of God?
5. On Sunday the speaker shared that God’s “Being” might be what we experience through the depth of our life: love, loss, pain, joy, suffering, emotion, beauty, horror etc. How have some of these kinds of experiences impacted your own spiritual growth?
6. Take some time to do this week’s prayer practice (see below) together has a group. It’s written so someone can read it out loud as a guide. Afterwards, discuss how it went and plan to practice it on your own during the week.
Prayer Practice for the week: A Practice of Being
This is a practice of simply “being”. There is no need to stress or strain, no need to perform or prove ourselves. Because God is Love, we can relax and just “be”. Center yourself by sitting comfortably in silence with your back straight, feet planted on the ground, arms relaxed, and
hands supported in your lap. Close your eyes and relax your shoulders. To begin, focus on your breathing allowing tension to flow away from your body, and your spirit to be at peace. We will slowly and consciously walk through 4 stages in this exercise. Just relax and go with the flow.
Stage 1: Acceptance
Take a moment to consciously accept that God is present to you right now – present in all your reality. You can’t make this any more real or any less real – it’s all God. So just reax and accept it. God just “is” – and God is love. Let’s take a minute to accept this.
Pause for 1 minute.
Stage 2: Letting go
Let go of any evaluative thoughts. These could be thoughts like “Is God really here?” or “Would God really want to be with someone like me?” or “Why on earth am I doing this?”. Don’t analyze yourself or God. Just choose to ignore evaluative thoughts and let them go. Let’s take a minute to do this.
Pause for 1 minute
Stage 3: Resonate
Consciously choose to absorb God without reservation. Ease your way into this, relax, be aware of your breathing and with each outbreath sink deeper and deeper into God’s love. Let’s do this for a minute.
Pause for 1 minute.
Now begin to reflect that love back to God. Imagine that you are in a constant cycle of receiving God’s love and reflecting it back. As you breath in – receive God’s love. As you breath out – pour out your love to God. Consciously feel that you are part of this same vibration with God and let it resonate and grow with every breath. Let’s take a minute to do this.
Pause for 1 minute.
Stage 4: Just Be
Remain in this posture of giving and receiving love. Let go of any worries about who, what or how you are. Just be conscious that you are… just “be”. Let’s take a few moments to just “be”.
Pause for 2 minutes.
Now return to consciousness of your breathing. Open your eyes and be aware of your surroundings – and give thanks that God is in you, and you are in God in all of this reality you experience.