9:19:45 3/3/2025 The Early days of prayer can be very powerful growing. . . As we are trying to present ourselves to God. Leaving things that are worldly, and the renewal in Prayer and Christ can be very empowering. Seeking the Lord’s Face, wanting to be Holy, can mean leaving old music, old habits, old ways . . . This is referred to as the Purgative way, purging things that separate us from God! Spiritual Consolations can then be found . . . A fire of love enflaming our soul, are gifts given by God to keep us going. These are separate from the Spiritual Fruits you will find when you are growing spiritually.
I’ve really been so very blessed in this. I got unemployed with Covid and was dumbfounded to find all my bills put on hold, including my mortgage and then getting an unemployment check on top of it. Course I invested into Solar and Water. But then Dawn was visiting and trapped here with the airports closed. It was wonderful to have her around, as she needed help and healing. She gave me a strong focus as my son had recommended that I stay alone in my new house.
Yes I have been alone, and am still now. I’ve had guests and AirBNB coming and going, but no dog or lover that I needed to tend to, take care of, or watch. Dawn was here for the first month of Covid, which was a total blessing. She kept me grounded and focused. I helped my dad move out and discovered my mom was Catholic. So soon, I was alone again and deep into LENT. Yes intensely accepting this responsibility: Prayerline 4-5am, Family Focus 5am, Charles Stanley 5:30am, TheJoyFM 6am, Exodus 90 and Lent Readings, Exercises (sit-up, pushups, 20 lb squats, 10lb side lateral lifts, 10lb interior curls, 10lb bicep curls), biked to St Pauls Mass, biked to St Raphaels Mass, Sun Ritual, swim. . . Wow, I did a lot to step into Catholicism.
Dryness in Prayer is the opposite from Consolations. Passive purification of the senses, the Night of Sense, Night of the Soul, to Seek God instead of seeking some feelings or anything else. Dryness is about your finding God and Focused on the Virtues that bring the Spiritual Fruits. This is another step in the stages of Prayer. Seeking Prayer and love in Jesus through the Dryness is powerful for growth. This is about maturity in Faith. This leads to changing the “way we Pray” too. Leading the Contemplation…
Purgative, illuminative, and unitive are the three stages of spiritual growth that are part of the classic spiritual path to holiness, these stages are fundamental -,-,-,-
Conversation with my Spiritual Director: Godoy morning, How is Sherry, OK with the new cancer treatment, good good, good. Yes, I know. My mom went to like a dozen different ones. Yeah, I know that that's not All right. I don't know. Dear father we ask for a great grace of strength, strength in our heart, our mind, and our soul in preparation for following you more closely. Give us the strength to pursue your will, to acknowledge your presence, and to change accordingly. Give us the strength to let go of our ego, drop our bad habits of resistance, give us the courage to persevere, and most of all give us the great grace to live out of love and to pursue love and understanding and an implementation of it. We pray these things in your most loving son's name. Father, son, and Holy Spirit, Amen.
All right. That was the newest and the latest and the greatest was no ego, no resistance, focus on what calls us to courage, courage to persevere, courage to persevere, and to pursue love and understanding. Persevere what the heck does that mean? Look it up, persevere and it gives me a dictionary. You think it'd be automatic? In the state, enterprise, undertaking, or experience of counter influences, opposition or discouragement. In the place, the state enterprise, or undertaking, in spirit of counter influences, oppositions, opposition and discouragement.
Boy, that's a crummy definition. That's bad. I'd see it's such a trip because whenever we share this stuff, I'm always learning and I know, resistance is easy, persevere. I bet you I spelled it wrong and it's giving me the wrong word. Which happens all the time “persevere”. There we go. That's better. “To Continue in a course of action, even in the face of difficulty, or with little or no prospect of success.” Yes, that's persevere, to persist and continue in a course of action, even in the face of difficulty. death's perseverance. That's better. Let’s see “pursue” is right, pursue love and understanding of it and an implementation of it so pursue love, and still I'm deep into this, it is the first time ever that I started writing some of the words you were saying with my pen. And then I looked down at the keyboard and it had that little microphone button and I clicked the button and your words appeared right to the screen and I was like, ooh. And I was like, oh, that was what I needed to do and yeah, so I actually got my server on.
I literally yesterday or the day before turned on my server, I had gotten a message from one of the million chat groups that I've been in, and it was a lady who is coming to her truth, so she's like, wow, I did it. Then she's like, how is everybody doing? Oh great, you know? And then her first question was hey, are you still doing your Airbnb Eric? And I was like, you know not now, but I could and I just need to redo that page and make it real for me here in my home instead of using the same Airbnb service . . . instead as crazy it is. Then like, that's my first web page for my server, and I realized that months ago.
What a wonderful muse said that one day, and I realized that my first page on my website needs to be “come visit for 50 bucks,” or whatever. You know, so that I can get a real income again and it just dawned on me that that's what I had to do. And here's this lady asking me, so as soon as I got home, I went upstairs and I turned on the server and I downloaded the FTP program and it came right up and I was connected to my server and there it was?!? I could see all my list of bullshit that's been there for a thousand years and I just laughed and I was like, oh I can move something right now. Look I can pick an . . . oh wow, look at that.
And I was like, oh, I haven't edited anything yet. So to pick up something and drop it over there means I'm messing it up. Because I don't know what I'm doing, because I know it's right out there now. It is what it is out there now, and you know, I've been looking at that for years and so I got to be really careful what I drop out there. And it's like, oh well, all I have to do is make a new index page. And ah, so I got off the server and I started trying to make find a web editor to make some changes, and I spent the day yelling and screaming at the thing.
I was so mad. I couldn't get anything to work, nothing at all. It was just so funny, because I got all caught up in the experience of how I knew my work and I knew what the task was, and I was just looking for the lead-in to get started. And I mean, just like anything I run into. It's like, oh, that shoe that's in the middle of the floor is what I pick up first, because I'll trip over it. You know? So if I'm walking into the kitchen and there's something I left to trip over, that's not good. You know? So everything that I do, I always have to set it right in front, in the middle of my space, or else I forget. And you know, I go around it or something, if I'm running somewhere else and I totally forget about things. And I realized I hadn't gone through all of this stuff. And um oh, of course I don't know what I'm going to write so I couldn’t get the Editor to work. You know, because it's all about the victory over his sin.
And that brings me right back to my son. It was just so strong. I mean, this morning, the same thing happened with the preachers, learning how you cannot live in rebellion toward God and have peace. It's when you and I become one with him, thinking the way he thinks, abiding in him, resting in him, trusting in him. This awesome relationship with God makes all the difference in the world, and I want to encourage you, begin your day with him and watch the peace of God absolutely protect in you all day long. Now, you're saying well, does that mean that I'm not going to have no problems? No! Does it mean that you're not gonna have any hiccups in life that day? No. Either with them or about them, in the middle of them or avoiding them, there going to be an awesome sense of peace.
This wonderful experience with him that makes it possible for you to override with the joy in your heart all the things you have to face. That oneness with God begins by receiving his gift of forgiveness through faith in his son, Jesus Christ. So it's such a trip to share this with you, and my son Christopher, because I keep getting the same information coming to me over and over and over; that sin is just not listening to God. And if you have that experience of a dream that wakes you up in the middle of the night and oh my God, Christopher's doing this because he knows the only way I can have my ritual done right, is for him to be the host and me to do everything I'm supposed to do. Wow, that hit me like a ton of bricks.
And it's obscene. It's scary for us. The rest of us that honor and respect women, you know, can't understand it, but the scary thing is that it's a lot more common than we know. Yes, but that's what that's what happens in our culture. Everything about our culture is training people how to live out of fear, how to experience fear. And that's what happened with my son who doesn't want to listen to Jesus. You know, that's where he's heading, you know, and that for me to have that realization, the morning that I'm doing this with you, was just you know, damn it, how strong can Jesus be in giving me a direction to share with my son or recognize something to share with my son?
And it's like, holy shit. You know, like yesterday to think about how much time I spent with that computer. And the first program I did was connecting to the server and it was perfect. Yes, It was perfect, and I just laughed. And then when I went to install the web editing crap, it was just a mess. One problem after the next, after the next. And it just was that I spent the whole day fighting with this crap. I literally shut off my machine two or three times because sometimes it really needs to be reset. You have to reset everything. or else it doesn't really work. And you know, it's got to reconfigure stuff and I've spent my whole life fighting with technology.
It's all I've ever done. I mean, that's what an engineer does. And I did river models, so I did really complicated technology. And I killed so many machines. I can't tell you how many times an engineer would say, hey, can we buy you a new machine? And I'd be like, oh, please. It'd be the first thing they'd say, could we buy you a new machine and the first thing I'd do, is just jump up a dance? I can't tell you how many times that happened. It's just it's just so funny because you have to swipe everything clean sometimes. And if your technology is screwed up, chances are you destroyed whatever technology they had installed in the first place. You know, it's inevitable that's part of why I've been on the beta list for everybody since time began. I mean, everybody wants me to be their beta, because I break everything. It's just funny, because I that's life. That's why I have such a hard time with relationships because I tend to break everything. I remember when in the house and in the kitchen and what happened? It's broken and so I can still use it, but it's broken. No, I can still use it and it still pissed off every woman I've ever been with, because they want everything to stay clean and perfect forever. And it just doesn't register, you know? It doesn't mean anything because it it's such a foreign concept that and people need to maybe that's what my son needs holy shit.
Oh my God, you have to be meticulous if you followed Jesus, because the slightest detail can backfire. And I've seen that happen so many times. It's obscene. It's supposed to belike this and it's funny what comes to mind now again. One time, I got up in the middle of the night and Jesus wanted me to go for a bike ride. And I was like, what? A bike ride now? And I was just like; “oh fuck you.” And I got up and I put on my shorts, and I went downstairs, and I got on my bike, and I went for a bike ride. So I'm riding my bike down the street and I'm just like okay, I love to ride. Thank you so much. I'm so grateful because I just love biking and to do that in the middle of the night, was just such a blessing. Yes, I was so grateful and I'm coming up to First Street North and it's one of the busy streets downtown in Saint Petersburg.
What is it? This truck goes right by, you know flying right by. But I mean, obviously I had the red light, so he was cruising on his green, and he flew right in front of me, I mean it was 10 to 20 yards away, as I hadn't even gotten to the intersection yet. He was at the intersection, so he was cruising and he hits the bump at the intersection and he keeps on going and something flies out of the back of his truck and lands in the street. And so I ride up to whatever, and I pick it up and I'm waving and I'm flashing my headlight, I have my light and I'm flashing it like this and he didn't slow down. He was gone. He was long gone. And it was a bicycle, a five thousand dollar bicycle. It was a real bicycle. I was like, holy shit. And I called the police department and they say, oh, another one, we'll take it. And they're like, we can look up the registration number. No, it's not in here.Ok and I called the manufacturer and they have a registration number too and nobody's listed it and I was like, holy shit. And it's sitting in my garage and I have ridden it twice. I mean, it's one of those real racing bikes, you know with the handlebars down here and all that And that's popped into my head again, and I'm thinking, dang, what do I need to do with that bike? And my house is filled with gifts from God.
This morning the dream ended with, oh who was it? It was a priest, where we were leaving some conference I was at, and all the people were doing what they were supposed to do at the end of it, where we were taking our gift in a bowl. The priest that came out and showed me his bowl, had four pictures in his bowl, and that was all. It's like walking away from the event with the rest of your life. And this is all you can take for the rest of your life. It was really powerful. And I looked in his bowl and it was just a picture. It wasn't, you know, a wallet or a key or, his cell phone or no, it was just a picture. I'm thinking, damn, I wonder that's where I wake up, you know, and I'm thinking, I didn't see all his pictures. I didn't see what was on his pictures. I mean, I wonder if it was him and his wife or his kids or, you know, his favorite dog. So my son has got a bowl with four pictures in it and one of them is him in his wedding. Oh my God. Holy shit. So I don't have enough to deal with, if you didn't notice because you are gracious enough to share your wisdom and your insight. And I spent the first half of our meeting telling you my chaos at this moment. And this is the right date. No, yes, he is the right date. And and I get this in the mail from Charles Stanley, as I bought a book from them. So you know, I gave them a lot of money and they want to keep me on their list, right? You know, that's that's the world we live in, right? So if I buy three books for my kids, I'm on their list, so I get one of these every month now and it's it's just, you know, their daily prayer thing. And and what's really cool about it is that he he talks about the same things on the radio show. So it's all connected. And then i read the exact same phrase, a meditation on our own sins. And I mean it's still one phrase that's in bold on the whole page is one phrase is the same idea, victory over sin. I mean, wow. So I am so blessed and I am just loving every second of it. It's just I mean, I talk to you about yesterday for hours and hours.
I jumped up yesterday in the middle of the night. I saw that the storm had taken down my sail. I put up a I had my backyard had these sails uh from from the garage sale lady. We cleaned out a house of a shipbuilder. He was building sailboats and he had I should have taken all the wood too, man. I took a bunch of his tools. I mean, we're cleaning out the house and we sell everything we can and the rest goes to the dump, you know, and I wish I had taken all the wood because he had piles and piles of wood, but I got the sails and I use them in my backyard. I got like four and before the hurricane there were four of them up, they cover the the back and I when the hurricane was coming, I pull them down. I take off this cable and I take off that cable and I take the sail and I wrap it around all my furniture and I tie it all in a clump into my backyard. It works great because nothing moves. It's all there tied up really tight. So who cares about the hurricane, you know, but after the second one, I had my accident or I had my accident in between them. So I hadn't been in a backyard for two months. And I mean, I did finally clean the front yard, but when I finally got to the backyard, I mean, one sail was shredded. It was just tore to pieces. Another sail had three or four holes in it. Only one of them survived. So I only had one sail to put up in my backyard and I put it up last week and I was so thrilled wow, I got one up. and I'm laughing at myself because I put it over my bikes, so at least my bikes weren't getting wet. So, you know, at least I had someplace to put my bikes now. And and it came down yesterday or the day before. And I was like, damn, another storm I got to put a bigger pole up. I didn't tie it down, tight enough, you know, it's how many cables can you run through your backyard, you know? And I was like, damn, I got to ask Kevin if we can put another pole in, that's what I need to do, is I need to see the red pole there. There's another we need to put another one over here. And so in the middle of night I'm like recording this out my window. Hey Kevin, can you come spend the day and help me put up this pole over here and and I mean that's another day in the life kind of things. And oh yeah, like this is from the hurricane too. This is, you know, can you see the little bump on my finger? You can really see that? I can't believe it. That is when you take a piece of cable for your hurricane and you put it on a cement block or a steel block and you take your ax and you go chop. You hit the steel on the steel, whatever's in between is history. So, steel on steel works great for cutting cables, but Ouch.
Oh, I'm saying too much. I'm sorry. My time is up. Oh, no, I got a minute. So the piece of cable shoots right through the middle of my finger. And and I tried to pull it out. I knew there was something in there and I even went to my neighbors with the tweezers and nobody was home. So I was like oh well, I guess I got it out, or maybe I got it out, maybe I didn't get it out and I just said this today. Dr. Jim and I had lunch. Dr. Jim came here for lunch. I had two guys Mike and Dan came with Jesse and Julie. Jesse is the lady that runs the CGS and I said hey Jesse, you think I could get Mike over? Can you guys over for dinner?
Ouch! I’m talking too much again. Times up. I'm not saying the right thing. Shit. Ouch. Yes, my time is up, okay. your turn, dude. It's, fif4, 55, 56. I'm watching the little numbers on my thing and I'm saying, hey, I'm supposed to shut up. So what questions do you have for me? I mean, you haven't really talked about anything spiritual other than uh everything is spiritual. I was very clear about stopping because Jesus is very clear with me. And when I do not listen, I get a cramp in my leg.
So it hit me three times. So I recognize I need to shut up, because I don't want another cramp in my leg. And so I realized that I've said too much and you could have responded to every word that I said and at any moment you could have said, you recognize you might have to interrupt me. You recognize that. and and it works because I'll shut up really quick when you interrupt me, because I recognize that I get lost. I'll see, look at that. I got pen to the paper already, but I don't have the right pen. The computer pen and I need a regular pen. You see, I got a paper that I always write on here. And it's funny because I start with the time and when I look down at the time, it was 333. Oh, but that's not the right time this is 632. Do you just going to it's such a wonderful life, you know, and see my responsibility is to write it down and keep track because that's how I learn. And I won't learn it if I don't write it down.
So that's part of why you have been such a challenge for me to grow my relationship with Jesus, because you've invited me to share my relationship with Jesus with you, and getting a cramp when I don't listen is a gift. It really is, because I didn't listen when this happened wherever it is, there it is. And I showed it to Jim yesterday, Wednesday. When was he was here Tuesday for lunch? I made so much food for Jessie and Julie. It was so funny when I asked Julie I was like hey, you guys got to come over for dinner. You can bring your daughter. It'll be the three of us, four of us. Yay, that'd be perfect. And she's like what? And I said, well maybe you know and it was so funny because her she works with Julie. They run CGS together or they do things together. And Dan and Mike are two of the guys in the men's group.
I ran into Julie at Todd's introduction to the Exodus 90 at that bar night that we had. I ran into Julie there and Julie's like yeah my husband is Dan. And I was like you're the one that sent me to the men's group, aren't you? And she's like yeah, I know I told Dan to watch out for you. I was like thank you so much and she's just laughing because you know, it's been three years since she said that. You know, now I'm back in the ladies group, so I see her once a week too. So it's just so cool because I see Jesse once a week in the ladys group and then I see the men too. I didn't even realize who's connected to who. You know? And so I invited her, hey, come over for dinner. And they're like, okay, we'll pick a date. And it took a month to pick a date, but they finally picked a date and it was Saturday night. So Saturday, I spent the whole day making food. I did, the salad, the fruit salad, the peanut salad, that fish salad that every salad I love. I made them all, and then I had to buy some meat. I had to cook some kind of meat and so the farmer's market had their organic pork, Publics had organic lamb and the other place had organic beef. So I just get a piece of everything. And I made a ton of food. My whole kitchen was filled with food, so when they came over, we just sat and ate I mean we just ate and ate, three hours of eaten. And it was so much fun and they were really cool.
And the next day I got a note from Jim: “Hey, let's go to lunch.” And I was like, okay, great. And I jumped out and I started getting ready to go and I walked to the door and it was raining outside. I was ready to jump on my bike and it was raining and I was like hold it.
Hey Jim, can you call me on the phone?
Oh, hey, Jim, what about lunch? I don't want to ride my bike in a rain. You feel like coming here?
Oh, sure. I'll be there in two minutes.
Oh, okay. And he was there in two minutes.
And it was so funny because all the food was made already. It was all done. And all I had to do was get him a plate. It was really funny because he came over and, we sat down and I started giving him the bowls of food and I forgot to give him a plate. So, he had this silverware and he had his napkin in his lap, and I was bringing out all these bowls of food and he didn't have plate to put anything on. So anyway, we had a good meal and it was just beautiful.
And what I mean is I have so much blessing in my life that is so overbearing. and I am honored to share a moment of it with you. And for you to see me cramp up, nobody has ever seen this. I mean, I used to tease my kids that “I'd stub my toe” and they didn't believe me. They didn't believe me, but I, you know, damn it, I don't want to get my toe stubbed again. You better believe it because I don't want to show you the next time and it was so funny because I remember stuff like this, and I stubbed my toe a month ago, just once though. And I think it was a month or two. I don't remember.
But I've just been there all my life. And Charles Stanley had the same experience. He was born into his faith, and he recognized it when he was like 12 or 13 or something like that. And that's interesting because I've been trying to find out, when you asked me about my origin story and I always try to find the key events. And it's like when I started Lent was a big event.
So when my parents were here visiting last week, that was the only thing I wanted to talk about with anybody, was Lent and that was it. That was all that was on my mind, and it was so funny because I sat next to Sharon, and asked her. Oh yeah, that was in August. You know, it’s funny because Sharon has really tried a lot to be part of my family, and she married my dad, you know she tried to create family, just like my wife, Kim. Kim wanted family more than anything. You know, from their perspective of what family is, you know, changes everything, right? You know, especially when a woman gets involved and she wants family, that's a big deal. All right, to see, that's something we understand. That's how everybody understands.
So, dear Dick Alexander, what insight and direction can you share with me? I have just gotten to the first of week eight, so I’m on page ninety seven, ninety eight and I have not gone past this yet. So this is where I am looking at sin. So this is why I guess I got a focus on this with you, huh? I'm on on page 97. Ninety seven and 98. And it's really funny because I just went into my blog yesterday or last night, you know, and when I go back and I read it, it's really strong because the Exodus 90 talked about sin as well, just like my son. See, that's how Jesus plays with me, if I'm not listening, things don't work. And the only time things work right is when I'm listening to what he wants me to do. and he's been very, very clear and very, very strong for a long, long time, and I have been blessed because I just listen and I go along with all this craziness.
Like jumping up in the middle of the night and riding my bike. What? It's not even midnight yet. What do you want me to go biking for? I want to go to sleep. and I you know, I usually get in bed at six o'clock because it gets so dark so early, so I'm falling asleep at 6 o'clock. And I mean, if I'm walking around the house and the sun starts to go down, I start to You know, I literally grab my stuff, go lay down in bed, you know, at six o'clock and I'm lucky if I'm asleep before it's dark, dark, dark, at eight, or nine o'clock. I'm usually asleep before then. So to wake up at 1 am or 2 am is not a big deal. I mean, I woke up at three, this morning. Yeah, sometimes I'll just roll over and go to sleep and sometimes I'll turn on the Exobus 90. I was in tears this morning too. That was really strong because the beginning is so beautiful the way they start this now, they've actually gotten really professional about what's the first thing you thing do.
Father, son and Holy Spirit, Amen. Let us remember that we are in the loving presence of God. Thank him for his loving mercy toward you. Take one minute of silence now, praying for God's blessing on you, your family, your fraternity and all Exodus men. So the very first three lines are all Jesus, all about spending time with Jesus, and then stop and take a minute of silence. and so the very first thing I do every morning is stop and pray for my kids, and the men of the fraternities. That's what is so strong about this, is that how it's written and how it's defined has enhanced my relationship with Jesus, because I have never stopped and said the words vocally of anybody's name.
I have never done that. And I mean not even when my mom was dying, I'd pray for my mom, but I wouldn't use her name. I just never did that, I just didn't understand that. And for me to say it out loud, it was just so really incredible, the way they do this starting with the loving presence to bring Jesus into your heart. Thank Him for his mercy, recognize that you know Him. And now step into the silence, pray for Jesus. Pray with Jesus, share your love with Him and it is real and intimate because I know Jesus is there with me all the time. And I know that when I say bring out the vibration of God, I mean, God created everything there is with the word. You know, let there be light. Let there be everything was created by God with just the Word. For me to stop and use our father who art in heaven hallowed be thy name, thy kingdom come, thy will be done on earth as it is in heaven.
So this goes right, and it is so easy every morning to start with that, to have someone physically lead you through the prayer is the great blessing. It really is. And they've got over a million people or half a million people doing exodus this year. I mean that the CEO of the company who's the geek who did, you know, software engineering started out thinking he was going to be a priest and went up and signed up for a seminary and then dropped out because he became a software geek instead. And this is what he developed. And he's really cool. And so he's part of the exodus team now that actually presents the morning readings and presents everything. So we are on the cusp of shifting our consciousness and you're involved in that.
That's part of what we're doing. And so when I stop to catch up with you, it's a tremendous blessing for all of us. because you help define my next assignment. Right? So I've been babbling again now it's gonna hit 50. So you got ten minutes. And I'm going to try to shut up again. And it's really funny my legs didn't cramp up at all. I was nervous there for a minute and maybe I needed to show you something on the blog. I don't know. Maybe I need to share this or . . . that's what it was, this morning when I did this I was in tears because it was so strong and you know, I flashed back to remember when I first started exercising and I remember talking about that with Todd and Kevin, what do you mean you didn't ever exercise in the high school? And I was like, yeah, right. They were lucky if I did it once. Once, not just once a day. I mean once total. They did it every morning and they're crazy.
They didn't think I could, so I do one then they're happy, and leave me alone. You know it's really funny when nobody understood what I said in my welcome presentation. What do you mean “you grew up in the woods?” It doesn't register to anyone. They don't understand what that means. You know what do you mean “I didn't start reading into high school?” Well, I didn't have to. So I didn't. What do you mean you didn't have to? Well nobody understands. It really is funny, you know. So now it's at 55 minutes with you, so I better shut up.
You should go back and listen to this. I will. It is just your stream of consciousness, and then ask yourself, how's that working for you? It has actually been wonderful. . . I need you for helping with this because this is part of how I'm growing and understanding. These lessons and how exodus 90 and the ladies class and the church and everything is all on the same vibration, on the same path forward. So the timing and the sequence of going through it all is exactly where it needs to be. And I trust that, and I recognize that. So this next day or two in the lessons, that you've done a thousand times now, okay, two thousand times I don't know. Maybe you've done it a thousand times this week. But it's funny because it's week eight, number eight page 97, and just yesterday I took pictures of these four pages. One, two, three, four, so they're on my widget and I go in there and I highlight it and I copy it out and I put it into my blog and you see all this stuff. So maybe that's what I need to do, see, read, and markup? I'm sorry, please forgive me.
Thank you. I love you. The hoopah hoopah, hoopahupa, and it's funny because the page with my dad's picture was actually the last page that had everything in it. And it's funny because I don't keep track of how much I babble. And that's what you just said about my stream of consciousness doesn't slow down. know, if the intent is to work with me on the spiritual exercises. Then we need to start with that. But what comes to mind is focus, say Yes. Are we gonna focus on this exercise? What's your experience with sin and grace. Let's say the stream of consciousness distracts you, or robbed that opportunity for today.
Ah. oh, I see. And I still can't find what I did. Oh, that's so bizarre, because what I sent you is just the chip off the iceberg of what we shared. The last line of what I sent you is the place where we're beginning. and that's just another distraction. right? That's it, right there. That's what I just sent you. And it still doesn't have the last line now it's not there. See that's why I'm struggling I guess because the sin for me is just right there. Everything I do, I write about because that's how I keep track of it all. And when I'm working on a lesson with you, I'm writing about it all the time and the thing about sin is stepping away from Jesus and if I don't step away from Jesus, then I don't have any sin. And the sin that's coming up for me is the distractions that pull me away, or pulls me away from Jesus. And that's the only sin that I have. Oh, because I'm always trying to open up.
I wrote out all this stuff yesterday just this morning I was reading over it again because it was the presence of God. God's presence in our life is the fundamental, is ground zero and grace prevails because of God being present in our life. That's a very first line in all this, I've been rambling about all the presents that I have and recognizing that relationship is everything for me. And so meditations on sin is the slightest distraction. Like I noticed that in church the other day that I had to remember to say Saint Mary and Saint Joseph just like I have to remember it to say people's names when I pray that I learned this morning. Yesterday or Sunday I learned I had to say Saint Mary and Saint Joseph, just like I say, Lord Jesus and saying the words is important! I mean, I've told you for years now I always go “I love you Lord Jesus. Thank you Lord Jesus. I love you Jesus. Thank you Lord Jesus.”
When I do things with my hands and I'm focused, I need to bring in Mary and Joseph and I've really been able to do that and I need to do it all the time. And so that's what came to I me Sunday. So the presence in the spirit is ground zero and everything that I do that interferes with that is sin. And so one of the things that I'll leave you with this today, um one of my favorite analogies for our spirituality versus how the secular world works and how we've been trained and conditioned to live our lives. If you think of the analogy, between fast food and fine dining. Right. You know, like your dinner that you had with the Mike and Dan, Jesse and Julie. Isn't that funny they both changed? Jesse Julie, Mike and Dan that was just you and them for that dinner, that you said was a three hour dinner. Okay. So you guys savored each other's company. You honored the connection that you have with one another.
And so another analogy came to mind as you I'm gonna say rattle off the phrase I love you Lord Jesus, thank you for Jesus, okay? You should savor it.. Please. Yeah. Because there's somebody said, you know, um I love you God. I thank you Lord Rafi. So it can sound like you're doing it without the heart. And that's, where my dream ended this morning with that bowl with four pictures in it. And so to savor that connection with one picture, to savor that relationship in another picture, to savor the insight and direction from Dick Alexander. It is critical, so those are my four pictures. And I gotta add one more picture in there. I gotta share this with Dr. Jim. You just need to slow down and experience the great grace that God has given you, which is your life.
And I'm gonna take you back to the fruit of the spirit. One of the fruits of the spirit is self control. In a great contemplation that I give everybody, is a contemplation on how do you want to be in this life? And then compare and contrast that with how does God want me to be in this life? And then line those two up. Right. I can at least in my contemplation see those two questions. I don't see God wanting us to be frantic. or um in chaos or frustrated or anxiety or any of those things, and that's why you might go back because I think I gave you this activity to take the fruit of the spirit seriously. It's one of the strongest things that we have in the Bible. If you think of the phrase the fruit of the spirit, meaning, if I'm in the spirit of love. Love is going to manifest, and peace is going to manifest, the opposite of peace is chaos.
And so the exercise was to write down each word and then in another column write down the synonyms of love, of joy, of peace, and then in another column write the antonyms. So that you become aware that I want more love in my life. I want more joy in my life. I want more peace in my life, gentleness, kindness, patience, self control. It's true that I need to be aware of my control or am I out of control? And build my awareness, but that's why the exercise of how do I want to be? Or how is that famous question, you know, how's that working for you? If I challenge everything, one of my favorite phrases, you have to be when we want to go down the spiritual path, we have to learn to challenge everything to challenge everything that I do, challenge everything that I say, challenge everything that I think. Because our truest self is made in image and likeness of God. Ourself is to be loved and have joy, peace, so forth. See, that's to be aligned with God. Yes, if I'm feeling any of the annoying words in my life, that helps build my awareness. Am I aware of what I want to be? Am I where God wants me to be? And if I answer no, well, now I know the work that needs for me too. Yes, I think he's happy with where I'm at, and I just gotta keep going. So it's going good. Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you. not be with you next week. I'll see you in two weeks. Okay. Sounds good. Thank you. God bless.
