An image to ponder: You have a spiritual mailbox and perhaps have been
unable to live your truth. Each time this occurs, the number on your
mailbox changes, causing the spiritual blessings addressed to you to be
undeliverable. God does not reroute blessings if you are the cause of
the interference. However, if you remain true to yourself, the heavens
can find you even if the outer world seems not to approve of who you are.
Always choose to be truthful in the highest sense — and you will find that
goodness and inner beauty will accompany you along the way.
If there is any focus that the spiritual leader of the future will need, it is the discipline of dwelling in the presence of the One who keeps asking us, "Do you love me? Do you love me?" It is the discipline of contemplative prayer. Through contemplative prayer we can keep ourselves from becoming strangers to our own and God's heart. Contemplative prayer keeps us home, rooted and safe, even when we are on the road, moving from place to place, and often surrounded by sounds of violence and war. Contemplative prayer deepens in us the knowledge that we are already free, that we have already found a place to dwell, that we already belong to God, even though everything and everyone around us keep suggesting the opposite.
