Friday, June 30, 2006
Runcorn, D(2006)Spirituality Workbook
The word 'rule' can be off-putting. It sounds impersonal and authoritarian. Human and spiritual progress is surely not for measuring against the precise straight edge of a ru)cr. Holy, Jiving is not a matter of submitting to a set of rules. But there is wisdom in seeking some means of assessing whether we are making any progress in our Christian living. This is responsible discipleship.
It may help to suggest other ways of picturing our relationship to a rule of life. pp58
Rule as scaffolding
The job of scaffolding is to offer a secure containing structure that enables the real building to happen within it. The scaffolding is not itself the real building of course. It enables the real building to happen. Nor is scaffolding meant to draw attention to itself. It is only needed to enable a chosen work to be successfully completed. When that has happened it is entirely disposable.
Rule as punctuation
Read a paragraph aloud from a magazine or newspaper, ignoring all the punctuation - pauses, commas, full stops etc. It sounds chaotic and the sense of the passage is quickly lost. In the same way our lives need punctuating - pauses, full stops, breaks, commas - to help us make 'sense' of our living and discern where its deeper meaning and significance lies.
Rule as guidepost and support
The Latin word for rule is regula, which suggests a signpost or handrail. This is a gentler and more nurturing picture of a rule. It is something that offers support and gives direction in my journey of life and faith. A handrail is a support when travelling over uneven terrain. It is something to lean on. pp59
The East Window The West Window
What is starting to rise above the What is dying off in your life, what
horizon? The earliest beginnings of is sinking below the horizon? Are
something? Are there things you there things you should grieve over
should celebrate and welcome? but let go?
The North Window The South Window
What holds you steady, keeps you What is warming the creativity of
coming from, or pointing in, the your life, where are the growing
same direction? What is your value tips, what is it in you that wants to
base? develop?
117
#
It may help to suggest other ways of picturing our relationship to a rule of life. pp58
Rule as scaffolding
The job of scaffolding is to offer a secure containing structure that enables the real building to happen within it. The scaffolding is not itself the real building of course. It enables the real building to happen. Nor is scaffolding meant to draw attention to itself. It is only needed to enable a chosen work to be successfully completed. When that has happened it is entirely disposable.
Rule as punctuation
Read a paragraph aloud from a magazine or newspaper, ignoring all the punctuation - pauses, commas, full stops etc. It sounds chaotic and the sense of the passage is quickly lost. In the same way our lives need punctuating - pauses, full stops, breaks, commas - to help us make 'sense' of our living and discern where its deeper meaning and significance lies.
Rule as guidepost and support
The Latin word for rule is regula, which suggests a signpost or handrail. This is a gentler and more nurturing picture of a rule. It is something that offers support and gives direction in my journey of life and faith. A handrail is a support when travelling over uneven terrain. It is something to lean on. pp59
The East Window The West Window
What is starting to rise above the What is dying off in your life, what
horizon? The earliest beginnings of is sinking below the horizon? Are
something? Are there things you there things you should grieve over
should celebrate and welcome? but let go?
The North Window The South Window
What holds you steady, keeps you What is warming the creativity of
coming from, or pointing in, the your life, where are the growing
same direction? What is your value tips, what is it in you that wants to
base? develop?
117
Comments:
Post a Comment
