You Can Breathe Life
Retreat to a quiet and calm place. Get comfortable, either on the floor or in a chair. Empty your hands and rest them, palms facing up, in your lap. Then, with your eyes closed, breathe deeply and peacefully, in and out. Draw your attention inward, and gently relax your heart and your mind.
As you breathe, consecrate your thoughts and emotions to God.
Lord, I receive You. I consecrate my mind, heart, and body to you now. Quiet me and open my heart. I surrender my every concern to you. I trust you. Lead me now.
Relax in this posture of peacefulness and openness, attentive to God's presence and direction.
Lord, I consecrate to you my imagination. Help me hear you. Help me see your face.
Next, ask Holy Spirit to help you turn toward him. How have you experienced him in your life? How have you personally been aware of his presence?
Holy Spirit, draw me to you. Heighten my attention now. Show me you. Reveal to me our relationship. Open the eyes and ears of my heart. I want to know you.
Stay here, listening with your heart for Holy Spirit's guidance for at least 10 minutes. Don't rush. Breathe deeply and easily. Perhaps keep your eyes closed. Eventually, you might want to get out your journal and write out your experience interacting with him now.
Holy Spirit, I love that you’re with me…
When you are ready, ask Holy Spirit to help you linger over the following verses in Genesis, Job, Psalms, and Ezekiel — asking him to speak to you about them.
"The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life." (Elihu, in Job 33:4).
The Spirit of God has made me, and the breath of the Almighty gives me life.
* * *
"Then the Lord God formed a man from the dust of the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living being" (Genesis 2:7).
You formed me, Lord, with your breath. Holy Spirit, your life is in me.
* * *
"When you send your Spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth" (Psalm 104:30).
Holy Spirit, you renew everything. How do you want to renew me now?
* * *
"Son of man, can these bones live?'
"Then he said to me, `Prophesy to the breath; prophesy, son of man, and say to it, 'This is what the Sovereign Lord says: Come, breath, from the four winds and breathe into these slain, that they may live.' So I prophesied as he commanded me, and breath entered them; they came to life and stood up on their feet—a vast army" (Ezekiel 37:3, 9-10).
Holy Spirit, breathe new life into me. In what way am I dry bones? What parts of my heart do you want to revitalize? In what specific ways do I need your breath of life in me now? Show me your face. Like Ezekiel, whom you prompted to act, how do you now invite me to respond with action?
Breathe deeply. Keep your eyes closed for a few moments as you listen carefully and attentively to Holy Spirit's whisper in your heart. Write down what you hear him speak to you. Linger here with him as long as you can.
Amen.
