Happy Healthy Holy—The Shape of My Heart

The Beautiful Soul Review

Luke 10:27 NIV
Love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength and with all your mind; and, Love your neighbor as yourself.

Soul Care is not , it’s

“You don’t have a soul. You are a soul.” —George Mcdonald

“We are not human beings having a spiritual experience, we are spiritual beings having a human experience.” —Pierre Teilhard

Mark 8:34-36 NIV
Then he called the crowd to him along with his disciples and said: Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it. What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

We are when we don’t know our current .

Intentional Spiritual Formation requires and the of our .

is born with a problem.

Jeremiah 17:9 NLT
The human heart is the most deceitful of all things, and desperately wicked. Who really knows how bad it is?

Psalm 14:2-3 NIV
The Lord looks down from heaven on all mankind to see if there are any who understand, any who seek God. All have turned away, all have become corrupt; there is no one who does good, not even one.

without a are worthless.

Ezekiel 36:26-27 NIV
I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.

Hosea 7:13-14 NIV
Woe to them, because they have strayed from me! Destruction to them, because they have rebelled against me! I long to redeem them but they speak about me falsely. They do not cry out to me from their hearts but wail on their beds.

We don’t need a , we need a of our heart.

Mark 8:34 NIV

Whoever wants to be my disciple must deny themselves and take up their cross and follow me. For whoever wants to save their life will lose it, but whoever loses their life for me and for the gospel will save it.  What good is it for someone to gain the whole world, yet forfeit their soul? Or what can anyone give in exchange for their soul?

1—Deny

Self- is not self-.

2—Take Up Your

“Being dead to self is the condition where the mere fact that I do not get what I want does not surprise or offend me and has no control over me.” —Dallas Willard

3—Follow

Practices for a Renovated Heart:

Mark 1:36-39 NIV
Very early in the morning, while it was still dark, Jesus got up, left the house and went off to a solitary place, where he prayed. Simon and his companions went to look for him, and when they found him, they exclaimed: “Everyone is looking for you!” Jesus replied, “Let us go somewhere else—to the nearby villages—so I can preach there also. That is why I have come.” So he traveled throughout Galilee, preaching in their synagogues and driving out demons.

“Dying to self also means dying to everyone else.” —Desert Fathers and Mothers

 “It is in solitude that this compassionate solidarity grows. In solitude we realize that nothing human is alien to us, that the roots of all conflict, war, injustice, cruelty, hatred, jealousy, and envy are deeply anchored in our own heart. In solitude our heart of stone can be turned into a heart of flesh, a rebellious heart into a contrite heart, and a closed heart into a heart that can open itself to all suffering people in a gesture of solidarity.”

—Henri Nouwen

1 Kings 19:11-13 NIV
The Lord said, “Go out and stand on the mountain in the presence of the Lord, for the Lord is about to pass by.” Then a great and powerful wind tore the mountains apart and shattered the rocks before the Lord, but the Lord was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake, but the Lord was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake came a fire, but the Lord was not in the fire. And after the fire came a gentle whisper. 13 When Elijah heard it, he pulled his cloak over his face and went out and stood at the mouth of the cave. Then a voice said to him, “What are you doing here, Elijah?”

“The invitation to solitude and silence is an invitation from God’s very heart into the depths of our being… it is a journey, a quest really, for something we have been longing for all our lives.” —Ruth Haley Barton

You cannot if you won’t stop .

Prayer of Examen—

Rest

Review

• • • What were some of the high points/mountain tops?
    • What were some of the low moments/valleys?
    • Do you remember how you felt in the morning and in the evening?
    • Were there any issues or problems that you struggled with?
    • Where did I discover the gift of joy?
    • Where did I experience sorrow and grief?
    • Where or how did I give and receive love?

Repent

How have I not loved God with my whole heart?

Request

• • • What are the invitations of the Spirit?

“Inviting God into the past—even the recent past—is a way to “find God in all things.” —Glenn and Holly Packiam

“The surest source of destruction to men is to obey themselves.” —John Calvin

S. 

O. 

S.