More on stability -- December 19, 2009

"Stability says that where I am is where God is for me". (page 151) That is being rooted in God; being stable with God. Often we want to be somewhere else, in the idea that God is there, and not here. The proliferation of bumper stickers over the past several years speak to this desire to be elsewhere: 'I would rather be sailing'; 'I would rather be fishing'; I would rather be doing something other than this.

I have a friend who has a bumper sticker on his car: "I would rather be here now". It reflects a commitment on his part to stability -- to a desire to seek God in the moment.

When I began a consistent spiritual practice, I thought -- indeed I hoped, that I would reap no end of immediate benefits. That didn't happen. What did happen is that it increased my desire for God -- and deepened my commitment to the practice.

To quote Joan Chittister as she drills down to manifest the importance of stability: "we don't pray in hope of becoming prayerful. We don't struggle in hope of triumph; we struggle in hope of growth." (page 153)

Stability is a pathway to a level of freedom that we cannot arrive at any other way.