Contemplative Practice: Lectio Divina Intro
Diligently practice prayer and lectio divina. When you pray, you speak with God, when you read, God speaks to you. St. Cyprian
Gregg’s Recollection
It was years after my baptism, a decade or longer before I began to read Scripture regularly. And then, I focused on the New Testament. We attended Bible Studies, Sunday Adult Classes, and Small Group Bible studies. But, I did not practice reading at home.
Now, I have read through the New Testament a half a dozen times or more, and I’ve been through the Old Testament three times. I have found that over time Scripture lodged in my soul, and Spirit can bring an appropriate verse when I am in deep conversation or coaching.
And yet, in my four decades attending church regularly, I never heard a teaching on Lectio Divina from a pulpit or in a class or small group. I discovered it in my travels in circles of pastors. In the Living School, we studied and practiced Lectio. I do a weekly Zoom called Sacred Space where we do Lectio on a poem someone brings. Wade into the experience. Here is my layman’s description:
Lectio: a slow meditative reading of a short passage of scripture or other spiritual writing. Read it three times. It may help to read it aloud. Pay attention to any word or phrase that catches your attention.
Meditatio: now take that word or phrase into meditation, looking for deeper meaning. Let Spirit illuminate why that word or phrase resonates.
Oratio: now pray and seek to discern what God is leading you to do with what you have learned from reading and meditating.
Contemplatio: now simply rest in the presence of God. Each earlier step on this ‘Ladder of Monks’ takes you closer to your depths and the depths of God. Rest in that space, letting go of thoughts and seeking the face of God.
Journaling Prompts
Why do you think Spirit brings something different to you when you read Scripture today than when you read the same verses a year ago? How might you wade into deeper waters in your reading? Are you ready to move beyond literal reading of the text to the moral, mystical and unitive interpretations? Find out more about these lenses of interpretation in the full post on the website.
Find the full text of this post here
Scripture
Then he took the Book of the Covenant and read it to the people. They responded, “We will do everything the Lord has said; we will obey.”
Exodus 24:7
Afterward, Joshua read all the words of the law—the blessings and the curses—just as it is written in the Book of the Law. There was not a word of all that Moses had commanded that Joshua did not read to the whole assembly of Israel, including the women and children, and the foreigners who lived among them.
Joshua 8:34-35
They read from the Book of the Law of God, making it clear and giving the meaning so that the people understood what was being read.
Nehemiah 8:8
Their delight is in the law of the Lord and on his law they meditate day and night.
Psalm 1:2
Likewise the Spirit helps us in our weakness. For we do not know what to pray for as we ought, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us with groanings too deep for words.
Romans 8:26
In reading this, then, you will be able to understand my insight into the mystery of Christ, which was not made known to people in other generations as it has now been revealed by the Spirit to God’s holy apostles and prophets.
Ephesians 3:4-5
Until I come, devote yourself to the public reading of Scripture, to preaching and to teaching.
1 Timothy 4:13
Blessed is the one who reads aloud the words of this prophecy, and blessed are those who hear it and take to heart what is written in it, because the time is near.
Revelation 1:3
Ancient Writings
When we pray, we speak to God; when we read Scripture, God speaks to us.
St. Augustine
Diligently practice prayer and lectio divina.
When you pray, you speak with God,
when you read, God speaks to you.
St. Cyprian
The soul is fed each day with lectio divina…
St. Jerome
Listen and attend with the ear of your heart.
St. Benedict of Nursia
Learn to know the Heart of God in the Words of God.
Gregory the Great
One day when I was busy working with my hands I began to think about our spiritual work, and all at once four stages in spiritual exercise came into my mind: reading, meditation, prayer and contemplation. These make a ladder for monks by which they are lifted up from earth to heaven. It has few rungs, yet its length is immense and wonderful, for its lower end rests upon the earth, but its top pierces the clouds and touches heavenly secrets.
Guigo the Carthusian
Do you suppose that because we cannot hear Him,
He is silent? He speaks clearly to the heart
when we beg Him from our heart to do so.
St. Teresa of Ávila
Modern Writings
For the ancients, to meditate is to read a text and to learn it "by heart" in the fullest sense of this expression, that is, with one's whole being: with the body, since the mouth pronounced it, with the memory which fixes it, with the intelligence which understands its meaning, and with the will which desires to put it into practice.”
Jean Leclercq, The Love of Learning and the Desire for God: A Study of Monastic Culture
This is almighty God speaking.What is more wonderful, more precious than a true friend, who is there for us? Our communication with our Divine Friend needs to be a two way street. And, if we are smart, we let God get the first word in. Lectio Divina is letting our Divine Friend speak to us, through his inspired and inspiring word.
Basil Pennington, Lectio Divina, p.xi
The Christian knows that we do not know how to pray was we ought. It is the Holy Spirit who prays in us. We use Lectio to open the space for the Spirit to act in us freely and powerfully, to be one with us in prayer.
Basil Pennington, Lectio Divina, p. xii
The tradition of Lectio is one of the most ancient in the church. Lectio means, quite simply, ‘reading.’ During the first centuries of the church, most Christians could not read. Even those who could rarely owned a book. For centuries, Lectio was much more a matter of hearing the Word of God.
Basil Pennington, Lectio Divina, p 1-2
In true Lectio, by the power of the Word of God and of the Spirit, we do see, we do hear. The Word and the Spirit expand our listening. Their grace heals us of the binding prejudices, the fears, the selfishness and self-centeredness that would have us cling to our present parameters with the illusionary comfort of their controlled limitations.
Basil Pennington, Lectio Divina, p. 18
Lectio Divina is a contemplative way of reading the Bible. It dates back to the early centuries of the Christian Church and was established as a monastic practice by Benedict in the 6th century. Lectio is not Bible study or even an alternative to Bible study but something radically different. The practice understands Scripture as a meeting place for a personal encounter with the Living God.