The Practice of the Presence of God E-Book

Lawrence Brother

• Herausgeber: Paraclete Press
• Kategorie: Religion und Spiritualität
• Serie: Paraclete Essentials
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 169

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Beschreibung

The Practice of the Presence of God by Brother Lawrence is a timeless spiritual classic that has inspired millions for centuries. First published after the author's death in 1691, this beloved devotional reveals the simple yet profound secret to experiencing God in everyday life—not just in prayer or worship, but in the ordinary moments of daily work and routine. Brother Lawrence, a humble 17th-century monk, discovered that true peace and joy come from cultivating a constant awareness of God's presence. Whether washing dishes in the monastery kitchen or performing small daily tasks, he found deep fulfillment in offering every action as an act of love. His wisdom, captured in this beautifully rendered edition, reminds us that spiritual growth is not about grand gestures but about finding God in the smallest moments of life. Perfect for readers of: Christian devotionals, spiritual classics, contemplative prayer, and those seeking a deeper, more intimate connection with God. Whether you're new to Brother Lawrence's teachings or returning to them, this edition offers inspiration and encouragement for a life filled with faith, peace, and divine presence.

Leseprobe

THE PRACTICE OF THE PRESENCE OF GOD

BROTHER LAWRENCE

Foreword by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove

CONTEMPORARY ENGLISH VERSION BYROBERT J. EDMONSON, CJEDITED BY HAL M. HELMS

PARACLETE PRESS

BREWSTER, MASSACHUSETTS

The Practice of the Presence of God

2010 First Printing

Copyright © 2010 by The Community of Jesus, Inc.

ISBN 978-1-55725-694-2

      Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Lawrence, of the Resurrection, Brother, 1611-1691.

[Pratique de la présence de Dieu. English]

The practice of the presence of God / Brother Lawrence ; foreword by Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove ; contemporary English version by Robert J. Edmonson ; edited by Hal M. Helms.

    p. cm. -- (Paraclete essentials)

ISBN 978-1-55725-694-2

1. Spiritual life--Catholic Church. I. Edmonson, Robert J. II. Helms, Hal McElwaine. II. Title. BX2350.3.L37513 2010

248.4’82--dc22

2009053053

10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1

All rights reserved. No portion of this book may be reproduced, stored in an electronic retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means—electronic, mechanical, photocopy, recording, or any other— except for brief quotations in printed reviews, without the prior permission of the publisher.

Published by Paraclete PressBrewster, Massachusettswww.paracletepress.com

Printed in the United States of America

CONTENTS

FOREWORDby Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE

INTRODUCTION

 

 1    Eulogy of Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection

 2    Conversations with Brother Lawrence

 3    Letters of Brother Lawrence Written to Several Religious and Devout Persons

 4    Spiritual Maxims

 5    Brother Lawrence’s Way of Life

FOREWORD

Matthew’s Gospel tells us that after Jesus began his public ministry, the news about him spread and “people brought to him all who were ill and with various diseases, those suffering severe pain, the demon-possessed, those having seizures, and the paralyzed.” Jesus knew how to draw a crowd, but the people who flocked to him were not the sort of folks who pay to attend a seminar on spirituality. As a matter of fact, they were not very religious at all. The sick and broken in Jesus’ day had been told by every religious teacher they knew that their diseases and demons made them unclean. Jesus attracted crowds of people who thought they’d been cursed.

Seeing this crowd, Jesus pulled his disciples aside for their first teaching moment in Matthew’s Gospel. Still high on the excitement of being called by a rabbi, the disciples would have been more than ready to sit at the feet of their Master. But they must have been surprised by Jesus’ opening declaration: “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven.” You can almost imagine Jesus looking over the disciples’ shoulders at the rag-tag crowd of rejects who had come to be healed. Everyone the disciples had ever known called this crowd cursed. But Jesus said they were blessed. The kingdom Jesus invites all of us into belonged to them.

Some years ago, I was reading Matthew’s Gospel with a group of men at a homeless shelter. When we got to the fifth chapter, where Jesus offers this blessing to people who’ve been pushed to the margins, a resident of the shelter jumped to his feet and shouted, “Hey, listen ya’ll! He’s talking to us.” After years of living on the streets and begging to get a meal, this fellow knew what it felt like to be cursed. His enthusiasm at hearing Jesus’ blessing helped me hear the words afresh. I hadn’t felt that kind of excitement during a Bible study in a long time.

The book you are holding in your hands has become a classic in Christian spirituality because it somehow articulates the joy that erupts when the crushed and the cursed hear the good news that we are, indeed, blessed by God. Brother Lawrence says God “tricked” him, surprising him with grace in just the place where he was sure he would be judged. His is the joy of the Prodigal Son coming home to his father’s outstretched arms. It is the joy of every person since Adam who has been overwhelmed by the chasm between themselves and God only to find that God lays down his own life to bridge that gap.

This book has been in print since its release in 1692 because we are made for the joy Brother Lawrence found. Like the Scriptures themselves, this book is timeless. And yet, rereading it in the midst of the challenges we face today, I am also convinced that this testament offers a particular gift to our time. For in a post-Christendom context, when we who follow Jesus must learn again how to live faithfully without being in control of society, Brother Lawrence reminds us where we find our greatest teachers—among the meek who will inherit the earth.

Before he was Brother Lawrence, Nicholas Herman served as butler to a prominent banker named Monsieur de Fieubet. Brother Lawrence knew firsthand the pecking order of the powerful in a kingdom built on pride. He carried this common sense with him into religious life, imagining his role in the household of God as something like the menial and precarious role he had played in Fieubet’s home. “I regard myself as the most wretched of all men,” Brother Lawrence wrote in a letter, “torn with sores and full of stench, who has committed all sorts of crimes against his King.” Yet, the surprise—the “trick” that brought Lawrence such joy—was that his Master not only forgave him, but he also invited him into conversation all day long. The practice of the presence of God was a gift to one who feared he was not worthy to step into the presence of his Master.

This is, notably, not a book “by” Brother Lawrence. It was rather compiled, and much of it written in the third person, by a teacher of the church in Lawrence’s day. This is important if we are to understand the gift that Brother Lawrence is for our time. For we live in a time when words have become impoverished. The proliferation of publications—magazines, books, websites, blogs, texts, and ad after ad—has desensitized our culture to the power of words. More than that, however, Christian speech suffers from a particular lack of credibility in the context of our literary crisis. Where the church has spoken loudest and proudest, we have also been accused (and often found guilty) of hypocrisy, excess, and meanness.

In such a context, it is helpful to recall that Jesus did not write a book but lived a life. The books we have about Jesus testify to the power of his life, death, and resurrection. More important than well-crafted words was the fact that the truest Word of all had taken on flesh and lived among us. Though the early church had writers, they knew in their bones the power of an incarnated word. From the lives of the martyrs to Athanasius’ biography of Anthony, the best books of the Christian community before Christendom were books written about others who had been transformed by God.

If we are to know something of God’s power to transform and renew the world in our own day, I suspect we will have to relearn the ancient pattern of celebrating lives caught up in the glory of God. The one who holds the pen or sits in front of the computer screen is only of marginal importance to such a practice. Yes, the written word is still important, and we can be grateful to all who have preserved it, translated it, and kept it up till now. But the power is in the word made flesh—the life of one who did not presume to write a book, but rather to practice the presence of God in a world where so many feel left alone.

“Blessed are the poor,” indeed, for in the poverty of our spirits and our words we are awakened to joy by a God who is rich in mercy.

—Jonathan Wilson-Hartgrove    Rutba House

TRANSLATOR’S NOTE

Before I set out to translate the book you are about to read, I had an image of Brother Lawrence as a jolly monk who took pleasure in cleaning pots and cooking. What could he have to say to me?

As I began to read the sections of the book in which others wrote about Brother Lawrence, I felt a growing awareness that this humble lay brother led a life that does, indeed, have much to say to me. And when I read his own writings, I was struck by the depth of his love for God and his life lived in obedience, humility, and concern for others. Then I understood why I was translating this book: it was because I so needed to hear what it has to say. Session after session in front of the typewriter brought deeper and deeper conviction of who I am, and greater and greater hope for what God can do in a life wholly given to Him.

Twenty-five years after this translation’s first release, it continues to be my prayer that as you follow the example of Brother Lawrence, you, too, will be filled with the presence of God.

—Robert J. Edmonson, CJ

INTRODUCTION

In the annals of Christian history, there are many heroes and heroines of faith, many inspiring examples of women and men who “toiled and fought and lived and died for the Lord they loved and knew.” The book of Hebrews in the New Testament gives us a great “roll call of faith” in the eleventh chapter. The author of that epistle reminds us that we are “surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses,” and clearly meant to strengthen and encourage those who may have been growing weary, or in danger of letting down in their spiritual warfare. The examples of those worthies who had gone before was meant to invigorate those who still stood on the front line of battle against the world, the flesh, and the devil.

The Church, from very early times, began to take note and keep record of stalwart souls who stood the test and became an example for others. The Christian community made a practice of remembering these people, honoring their memory and taking heart by retelling incidents and stories remembered by those who knew them. These stories were passed on, and became the core of a whole literary tradition of “saints’ lives.”

As time went on, some of the stories were embellished with legends that crept in from pre-Christian sources, and it became fashionable to debunk and disbelieve the stories of saints. The skeptical mind can always find reason to refuse that which does not fit into its prejudged categories, and for this reason, many people miss the authentic blessing that could come from the study of the lives of these saintly individuals. And ironically, one of the things that careful archeological research has done, both for the biblical stories and for the stories of the early Christian martyrs, is to underline the essential accuracy and truthfulness of many of our oldest legends!

Malcolm Muggeridge wrote a little book about six Christians from different periods to show how they witnessed to the reality of God in their own times. He compared them to spies left behind enemy lines, calling them “God’s Spies.” He called the book A Third Testament, making the point that God has not left Himself without witnesses in every age, and that it is the purpose of those people whom God chooses to call His people prophetically back to Himself.

In the case of Brother Lawrence, we do not have to depend on misty legends. What little information is available, we have directly from his own hand and from the writings of one who personally knew him, Abbé Joseph de Beaufort, vicar-general of the Diocese of Paris. The very paucity of material intrigues us and tempts us to want to know more, but what we have is enough.

Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection was born Nicholas Herman in the French village of Herimenil in the province of Lorraine in 1611, of poor but pious parents. We know nothing of his schooling, though it could not have been extensive. His language, quoted several times, shows the rusticity of his peasant background, yet this very simplicity makes his wisdom and devotion all the more remarkable, since they always bear the originality and freshness of one who proceeds from inner knowledge, rather than repeating what has been learned from others.

As a young man, Nicholas “had the misfortune of becoming involved” in the military conflict between Lorraine and a neighboring German area. Such conflicts were all too common in Europe at that time. Thinking that he was a spy, the German troops captured Nicholas and threatened him with death. He was able to convince his captors that he was not a spy, and eventually they let him go.

Another armed conflict at this time brought Swedish soldiers into his home province, and in the ensuing battle, Nicholas was wounded. He returned to his parents’ home to recover. These two experiences ended whatever taste he had had for the military life.

By his own account, a remarkable spiritual awakening had occurred when he was eighteen years old, about the time he entered military service. De Beaufort’s words, dated August 3, 1666, tell it best:

He told me about his conversion at the age of eighteen before he entered the monastic life. God blessed him with an unusual and remarkable measure of his grace. One winter’s day he saw a tree stripped of its leaves, and considered that sometime afterward these leaves would appear again, followed by flowers and fruit. He then received a lofty awareness of the providence and power of God that never left him. This awareness caused him to become entirely detached from the world and gave him such love for God that he could not say whether it had increased during the more than forty years since he had received this gift.

Like every description of an encounter with the living God, words fail to do justice to it. Someone has commented that too many people who had mystical experiences that they admitted were ineffable, would then make the mistake of trying to put them into words. We can take our own inner awakenings, however—those indescribable moments when the heavens seem to open, and we catch a glimpse of something glorious beyond thought or words—and read Brother Lawrence’s words in light of them.

After leaving the military life, Nicholas was employed as footman to Monsieur de Fieubet, a prominent banker. A footman was a servant whose duty was to attend the door and the table, and to perform various other tasks. Concerning this time, Brother Lawrence recalled that “he was a clumsy fellow who used to break everything.”

The combined period of service in the military and as a footman lasted a number of years. It was one of the frequently remembered regrets in his later life that he did not more quickly leave the world to devote himself entirely to the service of God.

Nonetheless, drawn more and more from the vanity of the age, Nicholas sought counsel from an uncle who was a member of the Carmelite Order. The uncle confirmed his growing conviction that the only safe path was to withdraw entirely from the world and its subtle corruptions. “The air of the world is so contagious,” said the uncle, “that if it does not strike dead all who breathe it, it inevitably alters or corrupts the morals of those who follow its ways.”

The “ways” of his age were certainly among the most corrupt of history. For this was the age of Louis XIV, the Sun King. Ambitious, vain, and convinced that everything was his by divine right, Louis made almost continuous war a part of his policy. Furthermore, his court was notorious for its immorality, vanity, and worldliness. The palace of Versailles today represents the worldly splendor with which the age was fascinated. In addition, the systematic persecution of Huguenots by the government led to the emigration of 250,000 people. Controversies within the Church stirred passions and resulted in the banishment of the great Archbishop François de Fénelon, who had been chosen earlier as tutor to the King’s grandson and heir to the throne, and in the imprisonment of such other souls as Madame Guyon for her supposedly heretical teachings.

Nicholas first sought spiritual surrender in the solitude of a hermit’s life. This he was able to do under the tutelage of a gentleman of means, who had himself become weary of the world and was seeking to devote himself fully to the spiritual life, “to taste how sweet the Lord is to those who search for Him with all their heart.”

What had proved a blessed state of spiritual fulfillment for some, however, proved to be a place of torment for Nicholas. He found his own emotions running the gamut from joy and peace to sadness and agitation, and from fervor of devotion to complete dryness. It was not long before he realized that the hermit’s life was not for him. In 1649, he presented himself as a candidate in the Order of Discalced (Barefooted) Carmelites in Paris.

The Carmelites consisted of lay brothers and brothers in Holy Orders, and their known history goes back to the thirteenth century, when a group of them lived near the well of Elijah the prophet on Mt. Carmel in the Holy Land. They were one of the most austere of monastic communities, devoting themselves to prayer and contemplation. Shortly after the middle of the sixteenth century, a drastic reform had been attempted by St. Teresa of Avila and her disciple St. John of the Cross. Their work was so strongly opposed by the leaders of the Carmelites that ultimately the Order was divided officially between the regular Carmelites, practicing a modified, less severe form of religious life, and the barefooted Carmelites, who sought an even more austere form of self-denial. The refusal to wear shoes was intended to express reverence, humiliation, poverty, and penance, and the brothers wore sandals or went completely barefooted.

In this latter community, Nicholas found the theme that would echo through all his own writings and in those conversations that have been recorded: the absolute negation of everything that does not come from God. In this the Order was following the teaching of St. John of the Cross. The community also put great emphasis on prayer and meditation. Its constitution, drawn up after the division in 1567, prescribed three hours of prayer daily, and one of them, at least, was to be spent “reading aloud the point to be meditated on during the mental prayer that followed.”

When he entered the Carmelites, Nicholas was given the name of Lawrence of the Resurrection, by which he would be known to succeeding generations. The practice of giving new names to persons entering the Religious Life has a long history and is still in effect. He says that when he entered, he expected to be “flayed” for his clumsiness, but that instead, “God had fooled him, since he found only satisfaction,” and he adds that he often said to God, “You have deceived me!”

In his early days in the Religious Life, he often spent his entire prayer time rejecting stray thoughts and falling back into them again. In fact, he confessed, he had never been able to pray by a rule like the others, and that after the required time of meditation he would not have been able to say what it was about. How easy it is to identify with his difficulty in sustaining a spirit of prayer for a long period!

His solution to this difficulty was a simple one: he developed the habit of continual conversation with God. Whether at prayer or at work, it became his practice to focus his heart and mind on God, thanking Him, praising Him, and asking for His grace to do whatever had to be done. And if he allowed himself to forget God, he confessed that to Him, drawing his thoughts back to God, like wayward children.