The Practice of the Presence of God: With Spiritual Maxims

by Brother Lawrence, Tessa Bielecki (Foreword by)

Overview

A Christian classic on cultivating intimacy with God through life's everyday tasks.

This enduring classic of devotion consists of the letters and recorded conversations of a simple seventeenth-century lay brother who, through the most ordinary of activities, was able to achieve a profound intimacy with God. At any moment and in any circumstance, he taught, we can “practice the presence of God”—by thinking on Him, loving Him, and offering up our daily tasks as acts of worship. This volume also includes Brother Lawrence’s “Spiritual Maxims,” a summary of his teachings in the form of short aphorisms and sayings.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781590304266
Publisher:	Shambhala
Publication date:	06/02/2015
Edition description:	Reprint
Pages:	152
Product dimensions:	4.26(w) x 6.82(h) x 0.47(d)

About the Author

BROTHER LAWRENCE of the Resurrection (ca. 1611–1691), born Nicholas Herman, spent most of his life serving as a kitchen hand and errand boy at the Monastery of the Discalced Carmelites in Paris.

Read an Excerpt

Chapter 1 First Conversation

I met Brother Lawrence for the first time today. He told me that God had been especially good to him in his conversion. He was eighteen at the time, and still in the world. He told me that it had all happened one winter day, as he was looking at a barren tree. Although the tree's leaves were indeed gone, he knew that they would soon reappear, followed by blossoms and then fruit. This gave him a profound impression of God's providence and power which never left him. Brother Lawrence still maintains that this impression detached him entirely from the world and gave him such a great love for God that it hasn't changed in all of the forty years he has been walking with Him. Brother Lawrence had formerly been a servant to the treasurer of the monastery and had been very clumsy. He believed that in order to be saved, he'd have to be punished for this clumsiness. Therefore, he sacrificed all of the pleasures in his life to God. But, rather than punishing him, God gave him nothing but wholehearted satisfaction. Often, he would tell the Lord endearingly that he felt deceived, because his Christian walk had thus far been so pleasant and not filled with suffering as he had anticipated.

Brother Lawrence insisted that it is necessary to always be aware of God's presence by talking with Him throughout each day. To think that you must abandon conversation with Him in order to deal with the world is erroneous. Instead, as we nourish our souls by seeing God in His exaltation, we will derive a great joy at being His. Another thing he mentioned was that our faith is too weak. Instead of letting faith rule our lives, we are guided by our petty, everyday, mechanical prayers, which are always changing. The Church's only road to the perfection of Christ is faith.

The dear brother remarked that we must give ourselves totally to God, in both temporal and spiritual affairs. Our only happiness should come from doing God's will, whether it brings us some pain or great pleasure. After all, if we're truly devoted to doing God's will, pain and pleasure won't make any difference to US. We also need to be faithful, even in dry periods. It is during those dry spells that God tests our love for Him. We should take advantage of those times to practice our determination and our surrender to Him. This will often bring us to a maturity further on in our walk with God.

Brother Lawrence wasn't surprised by the amount of sin and unhappiness in the world. Rather, he wondered why there wasn't more, considering the extremes to which the enemy is capable of going. He said he prayed about it, but because he knew God could rectify the situation in a moment if He willed it, he didn't allow himself to become greatly concerned. To succeed in giving ourselves to God as much as He desires, we must constantly guard our souls. In addition to being involved in spiritual matters, the soul is involved in the things of this world. But when we turn our backs on Him, exposing our souls to the world, He will not so easily answer our call. When we are willing to accept God's help and guard our souls according to His desires, we may commune with Him whenever we like.

Table of Contents

	Introduction: Dorothy Day	1
	Editor's Introduction	14
	Conversations
	The First Conversation--August 3, 1666	23
	The Second Conversation--September 28, 1666	27
	The Third Conversation--November 22, 1666	36
	The Fourth Conversation--November 25, 1666	40
	Letters
I.	To a Nun	49
II.	To a Nun	54
III.	To the Same	58
IV.	To a Woman in the World	62
V.	To a Religious	65
VI.	To a Nun	73
VII.	To a Woman in the World	76
VIII.	To a Nun	78
IX.	To the Same	81
X.	To a Woman in the World	84
XI.	To a Nun	86
XII.	To a Nun	91
XIII.	To a Nun	94
XIV.	To the Same	96
XV.	To the Same	98
XVI.	To the Same	100
	Spiritual Maxims
	On Faith	105
	Necessary Practices for Attaining the Spiritual Life	106
	How We Must Worship God in Spirit and in Truth	110
	Of the Union of the Soul with God	111
	Of the Presence of God	114
	Means for Attaining the Presence of God	117
	The Benefits of the Presence of God	119