In 1976, I entered my first year of college. As I wandered through the bookstore that first day purchasing text books, I happened upon a little paperback book that became my favorite devotional book for the next twenty years, next to the bible. Practicing the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence. He was born in the Lorraine province of France in 1605 and became a soldier. After the war he was led to become a lay monk in the Dicalced Carmelite order in Paris and spent the rest of his life working in the kitchen and later repairing the sandals of the 100 or so monks at the priory.
Brother Lawrence was able to cultivate a constant devotion and communion with God all the while still having to wash pots and pans, order wine, and repair sandals. He wrote about how he did this in letters to a close acquaintance and these letters were later published after his death. This spirituality of walking with God in a constant awareness of His presence has been a challenge and a blessing to millions of believers since the 17th century who have read the letters of this simple monk. I was greatly blessed to finding his writings in a bookstore some three hundred years after they were written. It's ironic to me now how one of the most influential devotional books in my Christian life was written by a monk in a church that I had long left as stale and irrelevant.
"God knows best what we need. All that He does is for our good. If we knew how much He loves us, we would always be ready to receive both the bitter and the sweet from His Hand. It would make no difference. All that came from Him would be pleasing.
The worst afflictions only appear intolerable if we see them in the wrong light. When we see them as coming from the hand of God, and know that it is our loving Father who humbles and distresses us, our sufferings lose their bitterness and can even become a source of consolation.
Let all our efforts be to know God. The more one knows Him, the greater one desires to know Him. Knowledge is commonly the measure of love. The deeper and more extensive our knowledge, the greater is our love. If our love of God were great we would love Him equally in pain and pleasure."
He passed away a few days after he wrote this last letter.
I encourage any believer to read this short little book. I believe it can be helpful in drawing you closer to God. It is available as a free download from this website:
PracticeGodsPresence.com
I bought this book two years ago, and was struck by how much the narrative repeats itself throughout the book. The theory dovetails well with St. Therese's "Little Way". These monastics must be onto something, eh?
ReplyDeleteI think so. They had a love and desire for God that is such an example for us.
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