An Ignatian Contemplation Retreat
Moment 2.
Encountering God in the Wonder of Creating
Living in God
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Prayer: What do you desire from God today?
Seeking Grace for Today
To experience the wonder of the reality of God’s ongoing creative love for me and the world.
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ENCOUNTERING GOD
God presence and action is creative and ongoing in the world and in us, moment by moment. God communicates indirectly to us through creation, Scriptures and within our daily encounters.
” For ‘In him we live and move and have our being’.”
(Acts 17:28)
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GARDEN OF GOD (Gen 2: 4-6,8a,9)
The Garden of Eden. This is the story of the heavens and the earth at their creation. When the Lord God made the earth and the heavens— there was no field shrub on earth and no grass of the field had sprouted, for the Lord God had sent no rain upon the earth and there was no man to till the ground, but a stream was welling up out of the earth and watering all the surface of the ground— The Lord God planted a garden in Eden, in the east. Out of the ground the Lord God made grow every tree that was delightful to look at and good for food, with the tree of life in the middle of the garden and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.
Place yourself in the Garden
Imagine what the garden looked like?
What action is going on? Ex: Imagine the stream welling up out of the earth.
With your mind’s eye see how God was working as he gathered all of the waters.
Walk through the garden. Whom do you encounter?
Use your senses to see, touch, smell, hear and taste the beauty of what the garden has for you.
Notice your feelings, images words. Note them down.
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THE MAKING OF ME (GEN 1:26)
“Then God said: Let us make human beings in our image, after our likeness. Let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, the birds of the air, the tame animals, all the wild animals, and all the creatures that crawl on the earth.”
Imagine being here overhearing God speaking about creating a person.
What images come up for you?
THE BREATH OF GOD (GEN 2:7)
“Then the Lord God formed the man of dust from the ground and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life, and the man became a living creature.”
Be there now as God is forming you, breathing into you your life from His SPIRIT. How does God’s breath feel?
As you breathe in and out of the air, God created, how does it feel? warm? cool? How does it make you feel?
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GOD’S GIFTs (Genesis 1:29-31)
God also said:
See, I give you every seed-bearing plant on all the earth and every tree that has seed-bearing fruit on it to be your food; 30 and to all the wild animals, all the birds of the air, and all the living creatures that crawl on the earth, I give all the green plants for food. And so it happened.
God looked at everything he had made and found it very good. Evening came, and morning followed—the sixth day.
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Imagine God speaking to your " I give all of this to you"
What comes up for you when you hear God whisper to you this?
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GOD RESTS (Gen 2: 1-3)
“Thus the heavens and the earth and all their array were completed. On the seventh day, God completed the work he had been doing; he rested on the seventh day from all the work he had undertaken. God blessed the seventh day and made it holy because on it he rested from all the work he had done in creation.”
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Picture yourself right there with God. What images and feelings come up for you about how God felt that 7th day?
Where have I seen this awesome glory revealed in my life and the larger world?
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LET’S REST WITH GOD TODAY
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David’s Response to God’s Creation (Ps 8)
O Lord, our Lord, how awesome is your name through all the earth!
I will sing of your majesty above the heavens 3 with the mouths of babes and infants. When I see your heavens, the work of your fingers, the moon and stars that you set in place— What is the man that you are mindful of him, and a son of man that you care for him? Yet you have made him little less than a god, crowned him with glory and honor. You have given him rule over the works of your hands, put all things at his feet: All sheep and oxen, even the beasts of the field, The birds of the air, the fish of the sea, and whatever swims the paths of the seas.
O Lord, our Lord, how awesome is your name through all the earth!
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What words of David speaks for your heart?
What feelings spring forth in you as you read these words?
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