Lectio
“Abba John gave this advice, ‘Watching means to sit in the cell and be always mindful of God. This is what is meant by, “I was on the watch and God came to me.”’”
— Abba John the Dwarf, The Sayings of the Desert Fathers
Meditatio
Christian mindfulness, what the desert monastic tradition calls watchfulness, is the prayerful, inner attentiveness of the mind to the presence of God. In essence, it is a practice of gratitude: the acknowledgment that God gives Himself to us in this very moment, no matter how mundane or painful or joyous. It is to practice, in graced awareness, from moment to moment and hour to hour, being present to the presence of God even in our most ordinary activities and experiences.
In truth, we come to discover that, with an awareness of God in every moment, what seemed unremarkable is remarkable after all. How miraculous it is that I have come to have dishes to wash or homework to do or a child to take to a sporting event. What a blessing it is that I get to laugh with my friends or be by a loved one’s bedside as they live out their last days. How truly wondrous it is that I am able to feel everything, from deep, resounding joy to unbearable, agonizing pain, and that I get to feel these with and for the Lord who sustains me in all of my many feelings.
Watchfulness is to bring, by God’s invitation, the prayerful attentiveness of Mary to all of the necessary chores and preparations of Martha. It is not only to bring the better part to all of our affairs but to find the better part in them, which is to say, to find God’s gift of Godself in all of our affairs, where, in some mysterious way, He draws us toward our purification and sanctification.
This watchfulness is not, however, an end in itself. Nor does it produce or achieve anything in us. Rather, it is something given, something revealed, something consented to. Practice does not earn the gift; it is how we come to notice what is already given. We cannot practice the presence of God, but by His grace, and by our prayerful surrender to the loving work of that grace in us, we can practice noticing His presence, being attentive to it, and being watchful of how it moves throughout our hearts and lives.
This is not easily done in the midst of everything else that demands our attention, however, and so Christ invites us to step away regularly from the busyness of our days, to pray to the Lord in solitude, to listen for His voice in secret, to sit in our room or our cell and to pay attention to the presence that is always attending to us.
Over time, the graced awareness of His presence begins to reveal itself in more aspects of our lives, sometimes obviously and undeniably, but often subtly. In this way, the Lord gives us the ability to be watchful to His movements, to His ever-present love unfolding as His life within us and before us.
Our watchfulness, then, even as we practice it day by day, is not our own concentrated awareness of God, but a recollection of an attentiveness already given: God’s own self-communication awakening us to His presence within us, His creatures, as well as in the horizon of creation.
Oratio
One Hour More
come to my assistance
my sweet Lord
that I may remain present
to Your presence within me
to my emptiness without You
only one hour more
and another after that
awaken me to love
my vigilance is Yours to give
help me to receive it
to receive You
to keep watch with You
even in the hour of suffering
to remain awake with You
now and forever
if it be Your will
Contemplatio
Whatever fills this moment (the dishes, the worry, the ache), He is in it, giving Himself. You need not understand how. Let your attention soften, and rest in silence, consenting to the presence that has never left you.
Related Scripture
“Then he came to the disciples and found them sleeping; and he said to Peter, ‘So, could you not stay awake with me one hour? Stay awake and pray that you may not come into the time of trial; the spirit indeed is willing, but the flesh is weak.’”
— Matthew 26:40-41
For Further Reading
If you enjoyed this post, you may also like Listening to God: James Finley and the First Rung of Prayer (Lectio Divina), which explores how prayer begins in a quiet receptiveness God has already made possible, there through listening before speaking.
Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity.
Wrestling With God.
Returning To Love.
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