A Coronavirus Prayer

A Coronavirus Prayer

-Written while praying for Ellen who is hospitalized in New York City with COVID-19, and reflecting on John 11

Looking at the world through eyes of compassion

Heart open wide to embrace what is broken

Seeing the beauty, tragedy, hope

Your beloved one is sick

Eyes welling up with tears

streaming down

growing puffy and red

How many days with the fever?

Chest tight, dry cough, struggle to breathe?

Weak, oxygen low

It’s time to admit

To the hospital

To the fear

To the loneliness

To the helplessness

To the desperate need for you

Yes, you wept

Wept with your friends

“See how you love her”

“See how you love him”

Every time I hear the word ventilator 

I will weep with you

Weary from sorrow

Heart strained by love

This will be my prayer

Sharing your heart

Tender compassion

© Dale Gish 2020. All Rights Reserved.

This prayer was inspired by the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola. If you are interested in praying the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius with me starting in September, please contact me.

Rogier van der Weyden -Descent From The Cross

Book Review: When Narcissism Comes To Church

In an individualistic society with a lot of individual and corporate brokenness, it’s not surprising that most of us can recount painful stories about people who have used us and wounded us, showing little concern for the damage they have done. We find it in our families, at our jobs, in our politics, and yes, even in our churches. We may not understand the psychological diagnostic criteria, its causes, or its treatment, but we have experienced the destruction and havoc narcissism causes. 

Chuck DeGroat’s new book, When Narcissism Comes To Church: Healing Your Community From Spiritual and Emotional Abuse published by InterVarsity Press, is an important resource for individual Christians and churches who want to understand, protect themselves from, and recover from the wounds of narcissism. It’s accessible for church leaders and congregants, providing us with a wealth of insight and a helpful framework on how to respond, and is deeply grounded in a vision of God’s ongoing work of healing and restoration. 

Are you the kind of person who should not read this book? Here is a helpful guide: If you want to keep your head in the sand and not see the emotional and spiritual abuses happening in our churches, don’t buy this book. If you would rather not become more aware of your false self and your own narcissistic tendencies, cancel your order. If you have been trying to avoid acknowledging and healing from your wounds from narcissism, there are thousands of other books to choose from. If you enjoy throwing your hands in the air and saying narcissism is narcissism and there is nothing to be done about it, then delete this book from your Kindle.  

But for the rest of us, this challenging book is well worth reading. This book helps us in so many ways: to better understand narcissism, to recognize the damage it causes in our churches, to become more self-aware of our own narcissism, as a step towards our own healing, to envision what a road to redemption might look like for the narcissist. 

Chuck DeGroat

A Wise Counselor, Teacher and Spiritual Director

Chuck Degroat has a lot of wisdom to share on the subject. He is a licensed therapist, a professor of counseling and Christian spirituality at Western Theological Seminary in Holland MI, and a spiritual director. For years, Chuck has been counseling both narcissists as well as those who have been victimized by them, and brings their stories to life, to help us understand the realities of narcissism and the consequences for families and churches.

A fascinating feature of this book is that DeGroat looks at narcissism through the lens of the Enneagram. The Enneagram is a tool for self-understanding and for examining the false self, which has nine basic types, and then many more subtypes as you get deeper into it. DeGroat takes these nine Enneagram types and looks at how narcissism gets played out for each of the nine types. Since most of us have some tendencies towards narcissism, it is fascinating to read through each type and to notice how your Enneagram type lives out Narcissism. The section on each Enneagram type also includes a story of a narcissist of that type. You will likely find yourself thinking of people you’ve met as you engage with these characters. 

Two chapters go deep into the characteristics of and the inner life of a narcissistic pastor. Again, DeGroat has illuminating stories of pastors and how that narcissism plays out in the role of a pastor. If you have ever experienced a narcissistic pastor these chapters will likely ring true and may be helpful for you in your healing process. Essentially DeGroat says to us, you aren’t crazy, that’s how it is like to interact with a narcissist, and here is what was going on in the narcissist that led to your experience.

Chapter 6 looks at narcissistic systems, churches that are either narcissistic themselves or have become narcissistic as a result of a narcissistic pastor. Simply removing a narcissistic pastor often doesn’t fix the problem as the dynamics in the church have to be reworked to become healthy again. You will likely find yourself reflecting on your own church experiences and dysfunctional systems in a new way. Again, I found DeGroat naming the dysfunction helpful to me as I reflect on my own church experiences.

There are two chapters that look at spiritual and emotional abuse in the church as well as steps that can be taken to heal personally and heal churches that have suffered under narcissistic leadership. DeGroat names the dynamics, abuses, and dysfunctions, but also has eyes of hope for the work of healing and restoration that God wants to bring to those who are suffering. The recovery and healing process is not easy, but DeGroat outlines the way forward towards new life. DeGroat has a pastoral heart and does an excellent job of naming the sin and brokenness but also the hope and healing work that God is at work doing. 

I found Chapter 9, Transformation for Narcissists (Is Possible) to be moving and deeply affecting. As a spiritual director, I get to sit with people and experience God’s heart for them, in all kinds of life situations. In this chapter, DeGroat models the ability to sit with narcissists holding the destructiveness of their behavior but also seeing them as beloved children of God, holding out hope for the slow, hard work of being transformed and growing into more of the fullness of who God has created them to be. 

This is such a gift to us as we reckon with narcissism, but also to us as we seek to be human, Christian, and embody God’s love in this broken world. Deep down we all want to be seen, known and cared for in this way. Thank you, Chuck, for this gift you have given us. I can already tell that I’m going to be reading this chapter many times. 

It’s been one week since I finished reading this wonderful book and this book continues to live with me. I find myself reflecting on my own false self more and what it would be like to bring more of it into the light. I’m already considering what pastors and churches I will recommend reading this book. This book will be an ongoing resource for me as I walk with pastors, church leaders and congregations as a spiritual director, and I think for many will receive this book as an enduring gift for the health and wholeness of the church.  

In Everything (including Coronavirus) Turn Towards Jesus

In everything (including Coronavirus) turn towards Jesus.

The Lord’s deep desire for us is that we receive his love. God is always looking upon each of us personally with a loving gaze, and we are invited to return his gaze and receive his love. So many things in our lives and in our world are broken (such as Coronavirus), not as God intends. But God is always at work, seeking redemption, bringing good out of evil. 

Jesus meets us right where we are. There is no need to be somewhere else in order to receive him. Often the first step in his redemption, in the midst of the brokenness and pain is that we turn towards Jesus and his love. Perhaps nothing in our situation has materially changed except we now notice his presence, experience his loving care. We are not alone. Jesus is right there with us and that changes everything. 

But where are we? Sometimes before we can know his presence with us we have to acknowledge the reality of where we are. We may be too busy reacting to or avoiding what we are facing that we can’t be present to the reality of our situation and to the Lord’s presence with us in that place. So where are you right now? What are you facing? What is your situation? 

Right now the Coronavirus may be a significant part of your situation. Are you sick? Are you afraid? Are you worried about your elderly parents? Has your kids’ school been closed? Is your job or your business at risk or your retirement plan evaporating? Are you separated from loved ones? Is your church canceling services or changing how it operates? Has your vacation been canceled or are you self quarantined in your house? Does it feel like the world is falling apart? Where are you?

As a spiritual director I want to encourage you. Here and now, right where you are, turn towards Jesus and welcome his loving presence. Let him meet you in the very place that you are. That’s the first step in what Jesus wants to do in your situation, whether that situation is Coronavirus or something else. And keep turning towards him. How will he care for you? What will he invite you to do in response? Where does he call you to love and serve? How will he involve you in his redemptive work in this world? Stay connected, always turning to him in whatever situation you are in.

Thank you, Asian American Christians!

When I cough in public no one pays any attention. But I have Asian American friends who experience people glaring at them when they cough. While the COVID-19 outbreak began in China, here in the US, I suspect people should probably be more concerned about a white guy like me than an Asian American. This racial stigmatizing is so terribly wrong and worthy of its own post. But this is not my primary point today. 

Today I want to say thank you to Asian American Christians who are leading the way to respond to this virus. In my sphere of life, the people I experience responding well, helping us be safer are primarily Christian Asian Americans.

At my church, a Korean American doctor is leading our response to COVID-19, to help keep others safe, and no, I couldn’t go to worship this week with my cough, and that was the right call. At my work, the Christian Chinese American founder of our company has us all working from home to keep others safe. And I watched a wonderful event held last night led by Daniel Chin, and a panel of primarily Asian American Christians in Seattle showing us the way for us to respond as Christians to COVID-19. 

So I want to say, Thank You! I will not glare at you. I will smile and be grateful for the good gifts God has given all of us in you. I see you. You are leading all of us, caring for all of us, helping us all be Christ-like and love our neighbors.
If you want to watch this helpful presentation by Daniel Chin and church leaders on the front lines in Seattle, here is the link. https://youtu.be/FuwBsHjOxgE

Does God Really Like Me? A book review

In my work as a spiritual director, I see a lot of dedicated, faithful Christians who believe that God loves them but struggle to experience God’s love in an affective way. Deep down they feel that God is disappointed in them, scolding, judging, frustrated. If that’s your experience, it’s hard to be deeply connected with God, to experience God’s love. And when I suggest that God delights in them, people are often taken aback, disoriented by considering this life-changing possibility. What if it were true that God likes you? What would that mean? How would that change your life?

In their book Does God Really Like Me? Discovering the God Who Wants to Be With Us, Cyd and Geoff Holsclaw challenge us again and again with the reality that God likes us, that God desires us, that God wants to be with us. Their goal is to get that message through to us on whatever level we need it. And the Holsclaws are able to speak to us on many levels, Geoff is a theologian, both are pastors, and Cyd is a life coach and spiritual director.

Some of us have theologies or ways of reading scripture that keep us from knowing that God likes us, that God desires to be present to us. To help us out, Cyd and Geoff have a huge focus on telling the big picture story of scripture in a way that highlights their point. From the creation and fall story in Genesis, through the story of Israel, through Jesus’s incarnation, life, death, and resurrection, through the early church and all the way through the new creation of the book of Revelation, they trace God’s desire for us, God’s delight in us, God’s presence with us.

Read the full book review on Englewood Review of Books

Forgiven

Lord, I come to you in need of mercy

Your forgiveness

My sin is heavy upon me

A weight I cannot bear

But you see through my sin

and look at me with great compassion and love

And now you speak words of forgiveness to me

Words that release me, unbind me

My heart leaps for joy

Miraculous mercy

Gratuitous grace

Fantastic freedom

I want to forgive everyone

Blessing springs up everywhere

You overwhelm me with your love

There is nothing I can say or do except to love you.

© Dale Gish 2020. All Rights Reserved.

This prayer was inspired by the Spiritual Exercises of Ignatius of Loyola. If you are interested in praying the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius with me starting in September, please contact me.

Book Review: When Faith Becomes Sight

I recently reviewed the book When Faith Becomes Sight by Beth and David Booram for the Englewood Review of Books. An excerpt is below. You can read the full review here.

---

If you have ever had a spiritual director, you know that you typically see your spiritual director once per month. During your meetings, your director listens to you, prays with you, and helps you look for God’s presence and work in your life. But in spiritual direction, the focus is not on the director sharing their wealth of wisdom and understanding. Instead, a good spiritual director may speak very little in a session which helps keep the focus on God and on the relationship between the directee and God.

However, sometimes you wish you could go to your spiritual director and just listen, soaking up all their spiritual wisdom and knowledge. If you booked a spiritual direction session with Beth or David Booram I doubt you would be granted this comprehensive wisdom download, but fortunately, they have written a book that you can read their collected spiritual wisdom… When Faith Becomes Sight: Opening Your Eyes To God’s Presence All Around You.

Both Beth and David have been spiritual directors for more than a decade and disciples of Jesus for many years. They are founders of Fall Creek Abbey, an urban retreat house, and spiritual direction center in Indianapolis Indiana. There they offer spiritual direction, train spiritual directors, offer retreats and supervision for spiritual directors. So the Boorams have a lot of wisdom to share, and we are the beneficiaries.

When Faith Becomes Sight accomplishes a lot in its 218 pages. Think of it as part prayer manual, part spiritual direction textbook, part psychology informed self-discovery workbook, and part contemplative prayer survey. Beth and David masterfully weave together personal stories, spiritual direction session narratives, guided scripture meditations, quotes from spiritual direction masters, and reflection questions to form an engaging book that draws the reader deeper into reflection on God’s work and the terrain of the reader’s own spiritual journey.

One of the things I loved most about this book was the active God that it portrays and assumes. Many Christians today are functional Deists, who don’t experience an active God who initiates relationship and is alive and at work in their lives, not so with Beth and Dave Booram. Their first chapter begins with an exploration of God encountering Moses through the burning bush. While we may not be Moses, we are invited to live our lives on the lookout for the same God who puts “shimmering attractions” in our lives that if we respond to, lead us deeper into connection with God.

Because our God is active and involved in our lives, the Boorams invite us to overcome “our inner agnostic,” respond to God’s presence and be drawn closer to God. Spiritual direction, then, becomes a place to notice and reflect on the work of God in our lives, which further requires self-exploration as we come to know the terrain of our spiritual lives.

Read the rest of the review here.

Prayer: Spirit of God Come Upon Me

Spirit of God

Come upon me

Breath of God

Anoint me for good news

That I may join with you 

In my poverty 

As you

Bless the poor

Free the prisoners

Make blind eyes see

Release the burdens of the oppressed

And manifest the jubilee of your kingdom

I can only go where you lead me

Your humble vessel

Filled with your love

Only sustained by you

© Dale Gish 2020. All Rights Reserved.

Do You Have Prodigal Sibling Syndrome?

In the story of the prodigal son in Luke 15, the older brother is as lost as the younger brother. He doesn’t leave home and squander his inheritance. Instead, he stays at home and builds up resentments against his father, ultimately squandering that relationship. His father says “I am always with you and everything I have is yours,” but the older son says, “I work like a slave for you and you’ve never given me anything.”

The older son has developed what I call prodigal sibling syndrome, an ailment that is more common than you might think. This condition is one where little by little we begin to be disappointed with God, angry with God, where often unacknowledged resentments build-up to the point that our relationship with God suffers.

It’s easy to be a newborn Christian when everything is fresh and you are overcome with the wonder of such an amazing God. But in the long run, life can be hard, loved ones die, relationships get broken, churches fail, the world is a mess, and life doesn’t work out the way we had hoped.  As we experience these painful things, consciously or more often unconsciously we ask these questions, “Where was God? Why did God let this happen? Why didn’t God intervene?” These questions naturally arise when we experience death, pain, loss, betrayal, and failure.

However, many of us believe that asking these questions is a betrayal of God, an act of ingratitude, and a rejection of God’s goodness. And because we don’t think we have permission to engage these questions, we avoid them altogether or dismiss them with our intellect, where they remain, nevertheless in our souls, forming a barrier of resentment that separates us from God. We are now well on the way to developing prodigal sibling syndrome.

Often we aren’t aware that we have developed prodigal sibling syndrome because we haven’t allowed ourselves to even engage the questions or be honest about these deep matters of our soul. We may continue to worship and pray and serve, but find our hearts are less and less engaged and our passion fading. We may suffer for years with prodigal sibling syndrome, as we become more and more disconnected from relationship with God. 

Pastors and ministry leaders may suffer from this ailment at a higher rate as their underlying pain or loss or disillusionment can come directly from wounds they receive in their ministry, but no one is immune. 

What are some of the symptoms of prodigal sibling syndrome? 

• Feelings of resentment towards God, whether conscious or unconscious

• Feeling distant from or disconnected from God

• Not experiencing love or care from God

• Doubting God’s goodness or power

• Lack of trust in God

• A sense of guardedness towards God.

• Ongoing anger towards God.

• Inability to recognize God at work

• Inability to sense God’s leading

• Just going through the motions spiritually

• Loss of passion in faith

• Lack of joy and thanksgiving

As a spiritual director, I regularly encounter people who suffer from this condition, sometimes in mild ways, other times in ways that significantly block their spiritual life. Often these are highly faithful people who have been church members, ministry leaders, or pastors for years. It is unfortunate that these people who have given their lives to Jesus and loved and served so faithfully find themselves disconnected from the One who loves them so much. 

But fortunately, In Luke 15, the father takes the initiative and seeks out the older brother to engage him in his resentments. And similarly, God comes to those of us with prodigal sibling syndrome. God’s desire is for restoration and healing and often the first step is for us to be honest with God about how we feel, about what is going on. God knows that the first step is for us to be honest with God about what is going on because God desires truth in our inward being (PS 51:6). 

God invites the older brother to name overtly what has been poisoning their relationship, “I work like a slave for you and you’ve never given me anything.” Of course, it isn’t actually true that the father has given him nothing because everything the father has is his and the father is always with him. But the older brother speaks the “truth” of how he feels, and that fact that he can name this “truth” to the father is the first step towards the restoration of relationship. 

And so God invites those of us with prodigal sibling syndrome to tell him directly our hurt, our disappointment, our anger, our resentment. This often seems counter-intuitive and we may feel like it is wrong or sinful to do. But God is patient, kind, and longs for restoration for us, and so God welcomes our hard words as a step towards truth, relationship, and love. And God responds with words of compassion and love, “I am always with you and everything I have is yours.”

The person with prodigal sibling syndrome may then enter a season of wrestling with God, unclogging the relationship, and working this out with the Lord. But in this process, God is at work healing and restoring and God speaks words of love, of care, or presence. As the blockage is dismantled, the person is now able to see more and more who God really is and experience God’s love and grace in a personal way. It doesn’t take away the hard realities of life and the suffering, but they discover that truly God has always been there with them and begin experiencing the rich gift that God gives, that everything God has is theirs. 

Often it is useful to meet with a spiritual director in this process as it can be difficult and it is helpful to have someone to talk this through with, someone who is not afraid of those disappointments, the anger, and resentments and can encourage this process. A spiritual director can also hold the truth of God’s goodness, grace, and love, even when the person is facing into these hard things.  

Always remember, God’s love for the prodigal’s sibling is just as great as God’s love for the prodigal. And God is glad to run to the prodigal’s sibling with a restoring embrace. Everyone is invited to this celebration, to the fullness of the kingdom, to the fullness of God’s love.

© Dale Gish 2020. All Rights Reserved.

With Great Delight, Holy Spirit

With Great Delight

Before I say come, you are already there

But you welcome my invitation

With great anticipation, you flow into me

Into your dwelling place, wonderfully made

The home you designed when you knit me together

When you formed me in my mother’s womb

With great delight, you race through my body

Muscle by muscle, cell by cell

Flutter through heart, sparkle eyes

Captivate  ears, filling to fullness

Dancing pinwheels of delight in my soul

Holy fire, igniting love

Blazing embers, dancing flames

Holding  hardened places close with gentle comfort

Flow living water, becoming desert streams

Hope springing up, fresh new shoots, rising in my soul

Holy Spirit you find such delight

rejoicing, celebrating, leaping for joy within me

Yes, Spirit

I will join you in this celebration

© Dale Gish 2019. All Rights Reserved.