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Why spiritual practice?
We sense that the time has come again for the Christian faith to be practised, lived and loved, more than just learned as knowledge (as important as that is). The disciples learned a way of life from being with Jesus as well as from hearing him teach. So the Christian path is something that we do, even something that we become, as much as something that we believe. We hope that you personally will find this reorientation towards a life rooted in spiritual practice liberating and life-enhancing, and that this will be an experience that you will share with the children you work with. When working with this material, ask yourself:
• What could this practice look like for me?
• What could this practice look like in the lives of these children?
• How can I help them to explore these possibilities in the time we have together and in other settings (home / family meal / school / church / all-age service etc)?
This month’s practice:
God wherever we go A life of blessing
Background
Place in the Christian tradition
At the heart of this practice of blessing is the revelation in the Jewish-Christian story that there is something else going on beyond the limits of our concerns, fears, actions and ideas. Blessing suggests that there is a deeper reality of goodness at work.
It takes us into a long-lived experience that God is close, that God is personal, and that God is good. The final act of Jesus, the Gospel writer Luke tells us, was to bless his followers, and this rag-tag group went on to change the world. Jesus’ final act was thus just a beginning. In the ancient and unfolding Jesus tradition there is an undeniable sense that in the act of blessing, something shifts around us. A blessing is more than the words that are voiced, greater than any gesture made: possibilities are opened up. God’s blessing changes things.
Our contemporary context
It can be so hard to sense God’s presence in a tough and demanding world, but God is present, and this task is a vital one. It’s about discovering God as already here, and marking, celebrating and living out from that presence. It’s also about becoming willing to become small signs of God’s presence – to become people who bring blessing, so others may encounter something of the God-who-blesses in us.
This practice is about nurturing the act of blessing in our daily lives and letting the act of blessing change both the giver and receiver so that we become blessing in our very being.
The practice
This month’s practice
• Builds on the first two practices in this series: a simple practice of stillness and prayer, and an act of hospitality and community.
• Begins in being thankful for the blessings that we receive.
• Focuses on enabling children to imagine how they might bless others.
• Opens up the possibility that through the practice of blessing we may naturally become people of blessing.
The practice in four steps
Combine as many of these as will work in your setting:
What’s kindness like?
Ask the children to talk, write or draw about a time when someone has been kind to them. In the conversation that follows ask, ‘How did that make you feel?’ Explain that another, bigger and more powerful word for these kind actions and kind conversations is blessing.
Offer your blessing
Offer the children your own blessing. This may be in words, actions or both, but it must just be a simple gesture of kindness from you to them. Perhaps something you have made for them, or a blessing in words.
Who do you want to bless?
Ask the children to think of someone they might like to bless. Explain that it’s easier to bless people that we love or like – and that’s fine. Some children might want to think about blessing someone they do not get on with.
Make a blessing
Create space for the children to imagine what this blessing of someone might look like. It may be something very specific or it may just be being thoughtful and kind. Both are good – it is the intention that matters.
The practice in different settings
Solitary ideas
On our own it’s helpful to nurture a practice of thankfulness for all the kind and good things that have happened to us. The end of the day is a great time for this. Explain that this can be a prayer.
Ideas for the family
Encourage each family member to express their thankfulness whenever someone does or says a kind thing. It’s great for adults to make this their own practice and model it within the family.
Ideas for a Sunday School group
Facilitate the children in creating a piece of art together, based on one of the great blessings at the end of the New Testament Letters, such as Ephesians 6:23: ‘Peace be to the whole community, and love with faith, from God the Father and the Lord Jesus Christ’.
Ideas for a family service
Ask everyone to imagine ways in which we, as a church community of all ages, could become a blessing to the wider community. Ask everyone to have a conversation with those around them, and then write or draw these onto post-its which are put up on a board for all to see. Find a way for these to be considered for action by those who make decisions in the church – perhaps with the aim of one coming into being soon, and another in the longer term.
Other ideas for the month’s practice
• Find a way to explore the idea that there is no end or limit to kindness or blessing – like draining the sea with a bucket.
• Ask your priest, pastor or minister to talk about how they ‘do’ blessing in the context of a service, and how that spills out into everyday life for them.
MORE RESOURCES
The practices have emerged from our own experience and study of practices within Christianity. For more information and source material for the practices see Cave, Refectory, Road and Running Over Rocks (Ian Adams), Slugs and Snails (Carolyn Edwards) and belovedlife.org
