Devotional Thoughts: Devotional Thoughts

Have been posting my reflections on Job.

But this morning, thought I'd take a different turn on "devotional thoughts."

Devotion according to Merriam-Webster:

1 a: religious fervor : piety b: an act of prayer or private worship - usually used in plural c: a religious exercise or practice other than the regular corporate worship of a congregation2 a: the act of devoting b: the fact or state of being ardently dedicated and loyal

Thought according to m-w.com:

1 a: the action or process of thinking : cogitation b: serious consideration : regard carchaic : recollection, remembrance2 a: reasoning power b: the power to imagine : conception3: something that is thought: as a: an individual act or product of thinking b: a developed intention or plan c: something (as an opinion or belief) in the mind d: the intellectual product or the organized views and principles of a period, place, group, or individual

Using Scripture to prompt "devotional thoughts" is quite understandable and well worth doing.

Are their other ways to start the engine of the soul toward "a religious exercise of cogitation and serious consideration" besides opening up the Scriptures?

Indeed there are.


image source: http://www.nih.gov/nihrecord/07_28_2006/story02.htm
ed. note - an interesting article about the labyrinth at the National Institutes of Health!

A couple of months ago, I walked a labyrinth on the grounds of a little church. I was driving and saw it and thought why not stop and take a look and try it out. I can't even remember the name of the church! But I can remember feeling that the physical act of slowly walking this twisty path was a metaphor for the journey of life. And as I walked this path, my mind was drawn toward God and how God walks with me in my life.

I did a quick Google search and here is a web page about the labyrinth at Grace Cathedral in San Francisco and some explanation about the concept. Excerpt:

Walking the Labyrinths at Grace Cathedral

The Labyrinth is an archetype, a divine imprint, found in all religious traditions in various forms around the world. By walking a replica of the Chartres labyrinth, laid in the floor of Chartres Cathedral in France around 1220, we are rediscovering a long-forgotten mystical tradition that is insisting to be reborn.

The labyrinth has only one path so there are no tricks to it and no dead ends. The path winds throughout and becomes a mirror for where we are in our lives. It touches our sorrows and releases our joys. Walk it with an open mind and an open heart.

For me, two other methods are tried and true to help me focus my mind on God and the life I've been given to live to the full... jogging alone and writing in a journal or on this blog.

Hope you spend some time some how today with devotional thoughts!

If you are a regular or accidental reader of this blog, would love to hear from you how you start the ball rolling on contemplation!