Tonight I met with other students from the ILM community and experienced a wonderful evening of prayer that offered us an opportunity to be attentive to our spiritual formation. We gathered at Most Holy Trinity church in San Jose, to pause as a community of faith, to give thanks, and to praise God! Students and alumni prayed together through meditation, scripture and song, with music provided by Institute alumni.
Two people acting as prayer leaders read the Parable of the Sower from Mathew 13:1-23, and later inspired us with their personal reflections. Everyone was invited to reflect (privately) on our talents and how we are being called to develop and to use them. We were asked to consider four questions; 1) What are the gifts that I am called to recognize in me? 2) What kind of soil have I prepared? 3) Have I created a space where God’s gifts can grow, or have I rejected these gifts or jeopardized their cultivation? 4) How have I responded to the gifts that God has given me?
We were also asked to turn to the person next to us and discuss our answers to these questions. That was hard, but after a couple of uncomfortable thoughts like where's the nearest exit, I turned to the guy next to me and we started talking. It turns out that he is also a first year student and the guy who, like me, had missed the first Wednesday and Saturday class. He had not been able to attend the first two lecture classes either, and he was feeling a bit lost. Of course he turns out to be a really nice guy and we enjoyed discussing each others responses.
Two people acting as prayer leaders read the Parable of the Sower from Mathew 13:1-23, and later inspired us with their personal reflections. Everyone was invited to reflect (privately) on our talents and how we are being called to develop and to use them. We were asked to consider four questions; 1) What are the gifts that I am called to recognize in me? 2) What kind of soil have I prepared? 3) Have I created a space where God’s gifts can grow, or have I rejected these gifts or jeopardized their cultivation? 4) How have I responded to the gifts that God has given me?
We were also asked to turn to the person next to us and discuss our answers to these questions. That was hard, but after a couple of uncomfortable thoughts like where's the nearest exit, I turned to the guy next to me and we started talking. It turns out that he is also a first year student and the guy who, like me, had missed the first Wednesday and Saturday class. He had not been able to attend the first two lecture classes either, and he was feeling a bit lost. Of course he turns out to be a really nice guy and we enjoyed discussing each others responses.
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