PREPERATION DAY 1

Preparation Day 1

 

Rules of Engagement

 

Welcome to your first preparation day for your spiritual journey. Divine love is an abiding relationship that God invites you to share daily. Listen to the wisdom below to help prepare you to enter this relationship with Christ Jesus in the Whole-Life Confession journey.

 

+          If you are looking for quick fixes to spiritual or psychological problems, you will soon lose heart. The full healing of your wounds, and the path to complete peace, only begins on this earth. You will achieve no final victory for what ails you this side of eternity. However, you will find the path to that final victory, and it is here that you will find peace.

 

+          If you are being asked to do this spiritual journey to fulfill someone else’s plan, or for any sort of program requirement, kindly tell your sponsor, “No thank you.” Unless you engage this in complete freedom of heart, you will fail in its practice, and undermine its purpose.

 

So how should you engage this prayer journey? St. Ignatius wanted people with generous hearts who were aware that they needed God’s help.

 

+          Jesus proclaimed that the sick needed a Physician, not the well (Mk 2:17). We are all sick, and only those willing to see their spiritual ills will submit to the Divine Physician’s healing embrace in the Whole-Life Confession journey. If you know you are ill, and believe you cannot get better without God’s help, welcome.

 

+          Jesus calmed the storm that terrified His disciples (Mk 5:35-41). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are distressed about the chaos in your life and believe God is calling you to a secure shore.

 

+          Jesus can heal chronic illness, but He has come to forgive us our sins, and open to us eternal life (Lk 5:17-26). Engage in the Whole-Life Confession journey if you want to experience Jesus’ power to forgive your sins.

 

+          Jesus encouraged John the Baptist and his followers not to take offense at Him when their faith in Him brought them suffering and threats (Mt 5:2-6). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if the practice of your faith is causing you to suffer persecution for Christ’s sake. Hold fast to belief in Him as the Son of God, and take no offense.

 

+         Jesus invited the weary and the overburdened to find rest in Him (Mt 11:25-30). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are weary with your life and find yourself overburdened.

 

+         Jesus invited the rich young man to surrender his possessions and follow Him (Mk 10:17-25). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are ready to let go of what is holding you down and are willing to follow a new path.

 

+          Jesus invited Zacchaeus to come down from his tree and follow Him home (Lk 19:1-10). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if your privilege, position, and places of honor have not brought you the peace, security, and hope they promised.

 

+          Jesus invited the woman of Samaria to drink the living water that wells up to eternal life (Jn 4:4-42). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are ready to surrender the cynicism of failed love and relationships, ready to forgive, and ready to move forward with your life.

 

+          Jesus chided the work-anxious Martha to allow Mary to sit at His feet (Lk 10:38-42). Engage with the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are ready to sit still awhile, each day, and listen to the Kingdom within.

 

+          Jesus invited Peter to join Him in His work (Lk 5:10-11). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you trust that your sins, addictions, and failures do not limit Jesus’ desire to take your hand in discipleship as He writes your Sacred Story.

 

+          Jesus demanded to know the names of the Gerasene’s demons (Mk 5:1-20). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are weary of your spiritual, psychological, and material demons. Welcome the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are willing to name them, with Jesus by your side, and allow Him to deliver you and heal the spiritual and psychic darkness—the habits, sins, and addictions—that rob you of freedom and peace.

 

+          God invited the Blessed Virgin Mary not to fear but to say yes and participate in the eternal plan of salvation (Lk 1:26-38). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you are ready to let your heart be Christ’s home and so labor with Him for universal reconciliation.

 

+          Jesus invited His disciples to dine with Him (Jn 15:1-17). Enter the Whole-Life Confession journey if you desire unbounded love, joy, and peace and to "share in (Christ’s) His sufferings so that (you) we may share in His glory."

 

+          Jesus invited anyone wishing to follow Him to deny themselves, pick up their cross daily, and follow Him (Lk 9:23). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if you can willingly allow Christ to reveal your narcissism and, by His grace, transform your life into Sacred Story.

 

+          Jesus invited His disciples to keep a vigilant heart, to reject carousing and drunkenness, and to avoid getting trapped in the anxieties of life, lest they be surprised on the day of the Son of Man (Lk 21:34-36). Engage the Whole-Life Confession journey if today is your day to hearken to the Son of Man and to return to God with all your heart.        

Complete and Continue