Share your Word for 2014
In ancient times, wise men and women fled out into the desert to find a place where they could be fully present to God and to their own inner struggles at work within them. The desert became a place to enter into the refiner’s fire and be stripped down to one’s holy essence. The desert was a threshold place where you emerged different than when you entered.
Many people followed these ammas and abbas, seeking their wisdom and guidance for a meaningful life. One tradition was to ask for a word – this word or phrase would be something on which to ponder for many days, weeks, months, sometimes a whole lifetime. This practice is connected to lectio divina, where we approach the sacred texts with the same request – “give me a word” we ask – something to nourish me, challenge me, a word I can wrestle with and grow into. The word which chooses us has the potential to transform us.
- What is your word for the year ahead? A word which contains within it a seed of invitation to cross a new threshold in your life?
Share your word in the comments section below by Monday, January 6, 2014 and you are automatically entered for the prize drawing (prizes listed below). Last year we had 840 people share!
A free 12-day online mini-retreat to help your word choose you. . .
This year I am offering all Abbey newsletter subscribers a gift: a free 12-day online mini-retreat with a suggested practice for each day to help your word choose you and to deepen into your word once it has found you.
Sign up here and you can start your mini-retreat today. Once you subscribe you will receive a confirmation email with access to the mini-retreat content (and you are free to unsubscribe at any time). If you are already a subscriber, the invitation will be in this week’s email newsletter.
Win a Prize – Random Drawing Giveaway on January 6th!
I am delighted to offer some wonderful gifts from the Abbey:
- 4 people will win a signed copy of Eyes of the Heart: Photography as Christian Contemplative Practice (mailed directly from me in Ireland to you, anywhere in the world)
- 4 people will win a copy of Naked and You Clothed Me: Homilies and Reflections for Cycle A with two reflections by Christine, plus also Richard Rohr, Rob Bell, Jan Richardson, Fr. James Martin, SJ, and many more!
- 4 people will win their choice of self-study online classes from following: Creative Flourishing in the Heart of the Desert: A Self-Study Online Retreat with St. Hildegard of Bingen, Soul of a Pilgrim: An Online Art Retreat, Seasons of the Soul, Lectio Divina: The Sacred Art of Reading the World, or Eyes of the Heart: Photography as a Contemplative Practice.
So please share your word (and it would be wonderful to include a sentence about what it means for you) with us below. Subscribe to the Abbey newsletter for your free gift. Share the love with others and invite them to participate. Then stay tuned – on January 6th I will announce the prize winners!
If this is your first time commenting at the Abbey, or you are including a link, your comment will need to be approved before appearing, which usually takes less than 24 hours.
680 Responses
Home
Clarity.
My word for 2014 is “peace.” I’ve spent the last five years praying for peace. Specifically, my prayer was to live from a place of God’s peace, rather than from a place of fear. Following childhood trauma, I learned to approach life from a place of fear. However, at this point in time, I’m able to look back on the past five years and see how God answered my prayer. Slowly, through many people, events, prayers, etc., God led me away from fear and towards peace. I now feel – truly – that I am at peace. So for 2014 I want to see what it is like to live for an entire year from a place of peace. I imagine it will be a year filled with God’s abundant blessings. Peace to all . . .
My wish for you this year is for peace within each and every day.
The word that has surfaced is perseverance. A friend gave me a star ornament with a starfish on it. She said it reminded her of me and my persistence at life and joy.
A day before I found comfort in James 1: 2
Consider it pure joy, my brothers, whenever you face trials of many kinds, because you know that the testing of your faith develops perseverance.
I know I already have the ability to persevere in tough times. I’d like to apply it to achieve something new.
It has to be two words, ‘Sacred Temple’. These words are my declaration that I will honour my body, my home and my environment as a sacred. I am beginning this journey with the course ‘Coming Home to the Body’
The word that chose me is “willing.” I have floated and danced and taken long hikes with “willing” in the past. And still, there is a beckon for me to climb deeper with it. I suspect that if I reach for this deeper willing that says YES to all that is, I will do so with no complaint. And I will not be afraid. What surrounds this great willing spirit is free and open and whole and ultimately empty. In this willingness, I am happy that I am not alone…
My word for 2014 is JOY.
My life has been almost devoid of joy for too long. I have allowed burdens of this life and regrests to keep me from experiencing true JOY. Since this is a Fruit of the Spirit it is a trait that God longs to grow in each of our lives. I would like to cultivate this fruit in my life this year.
My go to verse for the year is Psalm 30:11-12, “You turned my wailing into dancing; you removed my sackcloth and clothed me with joy, that my heart may sing your praises and not be silent. Lord my God, I will praise you forever.”
As I was having second thoughts about whether or not this was the word to choose and whether or not I should pursue a word/theme for the year, I opened a gift from a friend – the first thing I unwrapped was a rubber scraper with the word JOY boldly imprinted on the rubber. Confirmation.
The first verse I read this morning was Isaiah 43;19, ” for I am about to do somethign new. See, I have already begun! Do you not see it? I will make a pathway through the wilderness. I will create rivers in the dry wasteland.”
I am looking forward to the adventure of walking with God and being transformed by His Spirit so that I may reflect more of the character of my precious Savior and Lord, Jesus Christ.
My word is “ease.” I receive it in the sense of a surrender to what is — an absence of senseless struggle — an opening of the heart and a going with the flow. I tend to be overly analytical and to give significance to things that perhaps aren’t so very significant and, in the process, often to miss the things that are. With “ease” as a kind of mantra, I hope occupy a receptive, heart-based space for 2014.
My “word” is actually 2 phrases: Standing in the light, from my desire to remain focused and centered, and Walking in hope, for my desire to move forward in grounded hope in the midst of conflict and crisis. Distilled to one word: HOPE.
“No Resistance/Gelassenheit” is my phrase for the year 2014.
The included touch drawing that I did in November was titled: Rest. Do not resist. It began my exploration of this word for 2014.
I am becoming more aware of the flow of what is as it surfaces from deep and wild places within myself. Sometimes I close my eyes so I don’t see what is. I push it away. I judge it harshly. The implications of what is lead me into the unknown. I brace against it…. And yet, do not resist comes to me from the wisdom of my heart. How can I be Spirit led if I do not know the ground I am standing on? There is nothing to do, no reaction, no engagement, no holding, …. It simply is what is in this time and place. The chant of Macrina Weiderkehr ( in Seven Sacred Pauses) “I stand before what is with an open heart. With an open heart I dwell in possibility,” showed up as a wonderful way to practice ‘no resistance.’ I get tastes of being able to trust in the flow of my own life, even when I move into hard places. It is what is needed in the coming year of change and transition.