Inner Peace in Divine Love Retreat
Week Three – Love at work
Ex 14 – I see how God works in creation and me
Preparation
After slowly reading the prayer texts, I stand for a few minutes before the Trinity who each give me life. I imagine them preparing for their work today. I allow their desire for working in the world to wash through me.
Opening Prayer
I ask the Spirit for an interior knowledge of all the good I have received.
Desire
I ponder with deep affection how God is loving me.
Prayer
I consider how God works and labors on my behalf in all created things on the face of the earth.
I see how my Lord God acts in the manner of a person at work.
I see how my Creator works in the heavens, elements, plants, fruits, cattle, etc., giving being, conserving life, granting growth and sensation, etc.
Conversation
I respond to God as a friend, beautiful creature, or lover.
With the Communion of Saints in support, I express my gratitude.
I consider what, in all reason and justice, I ought to offer and give God. I conclude saying, as one making a gift with heartfelt love:
Take, Lord, and receive all my liberty,
my memory, my understanding, and my entire will,
all that I have and possess.
You gave it all to me; to you I return it.
All is yours; dispose of it entirely according to your will.
Give me only the grace to love you,
for that is enough for me.
Prayer Texts
Jesus answered the Jews, “My Father is still working, and I also am working. The Father loves the Son and shows him all that he himself is doing; and he will show him greater works than these, so that you will be astonished. Indeed, just as the Father raises the dead and gives them life, so also the Son gives life to whomever he wishes.
(Jn 5:17, 20–21)
Praise the Lord! How good it is to sing praises to our God;
for he is gracious, and a song of praise is fitting.
The Lord builds up Jerusalem; he gathers the outcasts of Israel.
He heals the brokenhearted, and binds up their wounds.
He determines the number of the stars; he gives to all of them their names.
Great is our Lord, and abundant in power; his understanding is beyond measure.
The Lord lifts up the downtrodden; he casts the wicked to the ground.
Sing to the Lord with thanksgiving; make melody to our God on the lyre.
He covers the heavens with clouds, prepares rain for the earth, makes grass grow on the hills.
He gives to the animals their food, and to the young ravens when they cry.
His delight is not in the strength of the horse, nor his pleasure in the speed of a runner;
but the Lord takes pleasure in those who fear him, in those who hope in his steadfast love.
(Ps 147:1–11)
For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, from whom every family in heaven and on earth takes its name. I pray that, according to the riches of his glory, he may grant that you may be strengthened in your inner being with power through his Spirit, and that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, as you are being rooted and grounded in love.
I pray that you may have the power to comprehend, with all the saints, what is the breadth and length and height and depth, and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, so that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
Now to him who by the power at work within us is able to accomplish abundantly far more than all we can ask or imagine, to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen.
(Eph 3:14–21)
Time: 35 Minutes
Preparation: 10 minutes. Opening Prayer: 1 minute. Desire: 1 minute. Prayer: 20 minutes. Conversation: 3 minutes. Listening Book: 10 minutes.
For greater guidance, depth and practical use of this exercise and retreat, source the First Spiritual Exercises here.
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