What I would like to offer you is a clear, step by step design to enable you to reflect on where God is leading you. This is deliberately a process that you can implement in your own community and without expense. Hopefully it will nurture your spiritual energies and affirm your sense of call.
I will provide the steps in two successive blogs. Soon this will also be available in a booklet from Amazon based on a larger design around the theme of “A Company of Pastors.” Feel free to contact me if you want advanced notice of the publication of this book. steve@smccutchan.com
TWELVE STEPS TO SPIRITUAL REVITALIZATION
Step One
- Identify a decent size church in the community, perhaps of a different denomination.
- Call the pastor and ask permission to use the church’s library and either their chapel or sanctuary for a personal retreat.
- If available, invite him or her to lunch on that day. If not, identify another pastor and make a lunch date.
- You will need a pad of paper, Bible, laptop or notebook with Internet connection, a devotional, and some magazines with listings of churches seeking pastors.
Step Two
- Begin the day with an exercise routine or an early morning walk to clear your mind.
- Eat a good breakfast and show up at the church between 8:30 and 9:00 a.m.
- If permissible, bring a thermos of coffee and/or some cold drinks.
Step Three
- Begin by clearing your mind of the normal pressures and demands of your life and simply rest in the presence of God.
- You can choose a good devotional like “A Guide to Prayer for Ministers and Other Servants” published by the Upper Room.
- Or choose the devotional that I have prepared for pastors based on the lectionary cycle, www.csspub.com
- Practice a time of Centering Prayer.
- Or leaf through the Psalms noting phrases that praise God. Pick out two or three phrases that seem to attract your attention and simply reflect on the aspects of God captured in these phrases.
- Regardless of your choice, this is an opportunity to reconnect with the source of your original call.
- Take your time. Do not rush through this phase of your retreat.
Step Four
- Following your devotions, return to your chosen space, and, in three to five year periods, review your life from the time you sensed your call to ministry to the present time.
- On paper, make notes of the major factors: people, places, challenges that moved you in one direction or another.
- It might be something someone said, a course you took, a place you visited on vacation, a good or bad experience. Do not be overly descriptive but note the various turning points in your journey.
- If there was a lull or break in that journey, note that as well.
- If you are married and/or have a family, note that whole process and how it affected your journey.
- Take your time and do lots of musing and reflecting on your life in the process.
Step Five
- Meet your lunch partner and share with him or her what you are doing.
- You will also find that as you talk further thoughts will occur to you process.
- Make notes of them as they occur.
Step 6-12 will be shared in the next blog.
