1 John 4:8
God is LOVE
8 Whoever does not love does not know God, because God is love.
Matthew 6:5-6
Prayer
5 “And when you pray, do not be like the hypocrites, for they love to pray standing in the synagogues and on the street corners to be seen by others. Truly I tell you, they have received their reward in full. 6 But when you pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen. Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you.
The days of one's life can become ordinary, without the fanfare of celebrity, power, or glory...Now, I believe that this is a good thing...When Jesus said, when we pray, go into your room, close the door and pray to your Father, who is unseen...Then your Father, who sees what is done in secret, will reward you...Prayer meant being alone with God in a closed room...
Some earliest followers of Jesus began living alone and praying alone...They believed in the idea of monasticism, which meant a seclusion from the regular world, and focusing their lives on God and His Son...The first monks lived alone seeking God...These monks began living alone, as the word monos means alone or single...Christian monks lived the simple and ordinary lives seeking God and His Son by being alone...But to eat and have water and have clothing and shelter their days contained many ordinary tasks...And much beyond their daily tasks they sought God, and dedicated their lives to Jesus...And their lives each and everyday were simple and ordinary and dedicated to God...They looked to find God and affect their lives...They sought to love Him and His Son...
Unlike the earliest monks, yet knowing what ordinary daily tasks are, each day of my days are most ordinary and routine...I seek God and His Son, but not in a singular way...And I am sure not as often as the monastic monks...
The everyday world does not always offer us the ability to show heroism and courage much of the time...If we live alone, like the monks did and do, then heroism can be further removed...Most of the time we are getting up out of bed in the mornings, then working, or doing our daily routine, and then doing what we do each evening, and then doing our weekend routines each and everyday...Much of our routines maybe the same each and everyday -week in week out...But God wants us to be with Him in all our routines, simple, ordinary, or extraordinary...And I believe, to live in the simple and ordinary is to find LOVE, find Jesus and to live...And in our daily routines is what we call life...And routines are and become practical...
But prayer and faith are really not ordinary things for a monk or for us...They are the Way we communicate with God and His Son...I am not sure how much grandeur in each of our daily prayers and our daily faith there is...Faith is sometimes like Job did in his suffering, and that was hold on and endure to what is in front of us at that moment...But to seek, find, and fall in love with God and His Son mean everything...The love for Them will make each and everyday amazing...They are the Ones who give us an Abundant Life...
A poem by Father Pedro Arrupe, I think sums this up...The poem or prayer is called Fall in Love:
Nothing is more practical than
finding God, than
falling in Love
in a quite absolute, final way.
What you are in love with,
what seizes your imagination,
will affect everything.
It will decide
what will get you out of bed in the morning,
what you do with your evenings,
how you spend your weekends,
what you read,
whom you know,
what breaks your heart,
and what amazes you with joy and gratitude.
Fall in Love,
stay in love,
and it will decide everything...