contemplating abandonment

today, wednesday, is meant to be my 'contemplative' day. its the day in the week that i am supposed to set aside for the discipline of contemplation. but it really is difficult to do, as there's always something else to do. like today, i've got to write a sermon for sunday, finalise sunday's baptism service, do a rota for 'soul space', attend 'soul space' tonight, do various bits of admin, write a blog entry, and be prepared to deal with the inevitable interruptions throughout the day. not much space left for contemplation!

but as part of my spiritual reading this morning in the northumbria community's 'celtic daily prayer' book, was 'a prayer of abandonment to god', by charles de foucauld. he prays:

father, i abandon myself
into your hands.
do with me what you will,
whatever you do, i will thank you,
i am ready for all, i accept all.
let only your will be done in me,
as in all your creatures,
and i'll ask nothing else, my lord.

into your hands i commend my spirit;
i give it to you
with all the love of my heart,
for i love you, lord,
and so need to give myself,
to surrender myself into your hands
with a trust beyond all measure,
because you are my father.

as i read it this morning it caught me, like something you notice out of the corner of your eye and you have to look at it again by turning your head to face it. so i faced the prayer and read it again, and then again. i was aware of what a radical prayer it is, and how aptly titled ...'abandonment...'

i was aware that, in spite of my longings to do so, i couldn't really pray it with all sincerity and honesty and integrity. and i found myself wondering what state charles was in when he wrote it.

i wrote the prayer out in my journal, and noticed there was some different sensation in the physical act of writing that slows the mind and allows the heart to connect with something of the passion of the author. try it - write it out for yourself. feel the heartbeat....

it's an arresting prayer that draws us to contemplate the unknowable immensity of the love of god - the beating heart that powers the universe, and takes notice of us! this beating heart, this god who has not abandoned us to ourselves, or to the forces of nature that so easily overwhelm us, or to the sense of being inconsequential in relation to the enormity of the universe - this god, known ultimately in the person of jesus, calls us to face him.

turning to face god in the midst of the busy-ness of life is one small act of abandonment as the object of one's attention is, for a short time, not the busy-ness anymore but the source and giver of life itself. so abandoning yourself to god, is abandoning yourself to life.

Tags: contemplative, prayer, god, jesus, abandonment, life