Three Stages of Faith Toward Spiritual Mastery
Faith, or having complete and unshakable confidence things will turn out okay, is a powerful spiritual practice. Along with gratitude, faith helps you make the most of your fate. Typically, those on the path to self-actualization experience three stages of faith.
Past Lives – Are They Still Affecting You Now?Have you ever observed two siblings who have completely different personalities? You wonder how it can be possible that they react so differently to things, when they grew up in the same environment with the same parents, right? Let’s take a bigger picture spiritual view of whom these children are.
Spiritual Progress – The Antidote to GravityIf we face the escalator of life that is forever moving us downward, then we must have a means to continually overcome its movement. More importantly, if we are to make progress despite its movement, we will need an increasingly progressive path.
Angels, Spiritual Warfare, and Eternity in Your Real LifeAs a spiritual director, de Sales would necessarily plumb the depths of spiritual experience of those he was helping; using techniques of spiritual enquiry that made people focus on their experience of the divine. A lot of such material is unearthed in how the Word of God mediates within the experience of the real life of a disciple ardent on spiritual intimacy with their Lord.
A Bevy Full of Blessings Over You and YoursGRANTED the special bond there is given to care for oneself, others, and for each other, there is blessing that may be prayed over us, others, and for each other. This is, as we say, the privilege of care that we have been given, to love, to live, to be, to enjoy, to sow, and to reap. Blessing is a very special accord. It is a solidarity with God that we might only enjoy – either in the giving or in the receiving. Blessing is oneness, a unity, a sprinkling of unanimity; that has the purposes of unequivocal love.
The Mowing of a LabyrinthIt all began as a simple guided meditation at a day of retreat. It became a spiritually directed backyard project to construct a labyrinth with unseen help.
Energy Divinity!The world is such an obscure place. It indeed has in its heart a plethora of surprises and mysteries which an ordinary man is mostly incapable of understanding. He gives it his own explanations and definitions, but never does any convince him or bring him a peace of mind. He finds himself stuck in the dilemma of science and religion, and that’s when he realizes that this universe has in its core some phenomena which are beyond his reasoning.
The Apostle Paul’s Threefold Ministry of Spiritual WarfareTHE Apostle Paul had more on his hands than invisible powers of evil. The Corinthian churches had ways about them that effused the flesh and the world, not primarily spiritual warfare. Indeed, Paul’s challenge was to fight a threefold sophistry – a spiritual trinity – the spiritual person’s common enemies – evil, three-in-one – with an abundantly more powerful threefold ministry of spiritual warfare.
With What (Faith) You Received Freely, Freely GiveSUFFERING is the great cause of Christianity – a faith that incarnates every time we do anything in the name of our Lord who suffered, who bore reproach, who said that no slave is more important than their master. We will suffer – in this life, nonetheless – so it is to our glory as much as it is to God’s that we can learn the purpose of suffering and therefore learn to give God great praise in it, though not for it!
Why Your Faith Is Such An Indispensable GiftONE question I’ve long asked myself in this season of reflection after our newborn son, Nathanael, passed away, is, how was that previous season – in the heat of an emotional battle of grief – together with two other significant matters – at the same time – even sustainable, let alone a time when our faith shone to the glory of God? (And I can even type those words with a tear running from each eye.) Isn’t it bizarre that I was, and still can be, so touched by the ethereal sense of loss, yet my joy has never been compromised?
3 Ways to Remember WHO You Are In ChristHENRI J.M. NOUWEN (1932-1996) said, “One of the great tragedies of our life is we keep forgetting who we are.” And, for want of freedom to that end, there are so many barriers we must sort through – self-condemnation, doubt, cowardice, forgetfulness, to name just a few – to acquire the mastery we need of inherent identity. Who are we?
3 Ways To Prepare for Questions About Your FaithHave you ever been asked questions about your faith? Questions such as, “How do you know there is a God?” or “If there is a God why do bad things happen to good people?” I have 3 great tips to help you to know how to answer those questions because they will eventually come!