• Home
  • About
    • Our team
    • Find a Spiritual Director
  • Services
    • Classes
    • Retreats
    • Certificate Programs
    • Workshops & Presentations
  • Areas of Focus
    • Spiritual Formation
      • Certificate in Spiritual Direction
      • Contemplative Journey: A Year in the Christian Spiritual Disciplines
    • Ministerial Support
    • Body Spirituality and Wellness
  • Events
  • Blog
  • Course Catalog
    • Art and Spirituality
    • Benedictine Spirituality, Part 1
    • Benedictine Spirituality, Part 2
    • Contemplative Prayer Practices
    • Communal Spirituality
    • Cultivating Creativity: Art as a Contemplative Practice
    • Held and Loved: On Parenting with God
    • Sacred Dust: Exploring the Relationship between the Body and Faith
    • Silence and Solitude
    • Simplicity: Making Room for God
    • Spirituality of the Body
    • Transformation through Scripture
  • Contact
  • Home »
  • About »
    • Our team »
    • Find a Spiritual Director »
  • Services »
    • Classes »
    • Retreats »
    • Certificate Programs »
    • Workshops & Presentations »
  • Areas of Focus »
    • Spiritual Formation »
      • Certificate in Spiritual Direction »
      • Contemplative Journey: A Year in the Christian Spiritual Disciplines »
    • Ministerial Support »
    • Body Spirituality and Wellness »
  • Events »
  • Blog »
  • Course Catalog »
    • Art and Spirituality »
    • Benedictine Spirituality, Part 1 »
    • Benedictine Spirituality, Part 2 »
    • Contemplative Prayer Practices »
    • Communal Spirituality »
    • Cultivating Creativity: Art as a Contemplative Practice »
    • Held and Loved: On Parenting with God »
    • Sacred Dust: Exploring the Relationship between the Body and Faith »
    • Silence and Solitude »
    • Simplicity: Making Room for God »
    • Spirituality of the Body »
    • Transformation through Scripture »
  • Contact »
 
 
Selah: Center for Spiritual Formation

Center for Spiritual Formation

  • Recent Posts

    • Peace, by Kelli Randolph
    • Spiritual Nourishment
    • Graces Remembered
    • 30-Day Silent Retreat, Part 2 
    • Silent Retreat, Part I
  • Archives

    • December 2022
    • November 2022
    • September 2022
    • May 2022
    • April 2022
    • October 2021
    • May 2021
    • April 2021
    • March 2021
    • February 2021
    • November 2020
    • August 2020
    • July 2020
    • May 2020
    • March 2020
    • December 2019
    • October 2019
    • August 2019
    • July 2019
    • June 2019
    • April 2019
    • March 2019
    • February 2019
    • January 2019
    • December 2018
    • November 2018
    • October 2018
    • September 2018
    • August 2018
    • July 2018
    • June 2018
    • May 2018
    • April 2018
    • March 2018
    • February 2018
    • January 2018
    • December 2017
    • November 2017
    • October 2017
    • September 2017
    • August 2017
    • July 2017
    • June 2017
    • May 2017
    • April 2017
    • March 2017
    • February 2017
    • August 2016
    • July 2016
    • June 2016
    • May 2016
    • April 2016
    • March 2016
    • February 2016
    • January 2016
    • December 2015
    • November 2015
    • October 2015
    • September 2015
    • August 2015
    • July 2015
    • April 2015
  • Categories

    • Body Spirituality and Wellness
    • Course Previews
    • Millennial Spirituality
    • Spiritual Formation
    • Spirituality of Aging
    • TPW
    • Uncategorized

Spiritual Support

Sign up to receive our newsletter

We promise to keep your email safe

Facebook Twitter LinkedIn

The Eternal Present Moment: My Journey to Selah by Derek Cummins

Posted by Jackie Halstead | November 13, 2020

A friend of mine said to me the other day, “space and time are not fundamental to human experience”. I suppose he’s right — in our redeemed, yet still fallen state we must suffer the perception of space and time in a way that God does not; that we were not originally created as icons of Himself to do. This is probably why we torture ourselves with thoughts of the past and anxieties about the future. We were not meant to experience the past and the future apart from the present. C.S. Lewis stated it beautifully:

“…the Present is the point at which time touches eternity. Of the present moment, and of it only, humans have an experience analogous to the experience which [God] has of reality as a whole; in it alone freedom and actuality are offered them. He would therefore have them continually concerned either with eternity or with the Present–either meditating on their eternal union with, or separation from, Himself, or else obeying the present voice of conscience, bearing the present cross, receiving the present grace, giving thanks for the present pleasure.”

Every moment is the present moment for God. It stands to reason that, in the truest sense of reality, the same goes for you and me. I’ll cut to the chase before we get too deep into quantum weirdness . . . 

All of our decisions and actions are linked, not with distance in between, but in an organic, symbiotic, overlapping fashion where they form a kaleidoscopic lens of beauty that is called our life story. I have had very few individual moments where I was fully present to the present. One such moment was during my master’s program at Lipscomb University in 2013. I had entered theology school still a neophyte in my Christian walk and figured, “well, might as well go all-in”. Generally speaking, every class in which I sat turned my mind into a prison. Historical theology had me ruminating on all of the conflicting theological traditions, wondering whether the gates of Hell had prevailed or not and to what degree. The study of eschatology made me anxious. I was starving to death at the buffet because my analysis paralysis left me incapable of deciding what to feast upon. Then I had “Spiritual Formation & Guidance” with Dr. Jackie Halstead. 

While I was searching for truth, this class gave me life. Learning to be vulnerable, to engage in the classical spiritual disciplines, to read the saints, to sit in silence and love solitude . . . this is what I had always hoped life in Christ would look like. As Christians, we’re pretty good at quoting the past and speculating about the future; but, to live a life in the Spirit that communes with the past and lives the future now is a Grace that we can only enjoy when we drop the mind into the heart and become aglow with the divine energies (as the Orthodox say). Every experience in class and on retreat left me radically different than I was prior. For once, I was not concerned with tearing everything apart but rather metabolizing it as it came. Discernment became my disposition. I was living with that kaleidoscopic lens front and center and I knew only one thing: this had to be my life from now on, and indeed already was. 

Six years later, or so, I found myself enrolled in the Spiritual Direction Certificate program with Selah. This again was something into which I effortlessly drifted as I was completely present to that particular moment of discovery. In a way, it was a continuation of that initial experience in Jackie’s class back in grad school. I could have questioned whether or not it was happenstance that this institute was founded and I happened to have a connection to it; however, that never really came to my mind. I only recognized, in some mystical way, that this was always a part of my journey, even before it came to pass in space and time. Had I tried to plan for it or find it, I would have missed it. Had I sat wondering what would become of my future as someone feeling called to this ministry of spiritual direction, I would have missed all of the little Graces that led me here. 

What I’m hoping to share with you is this: forget everything that is not now. Be fully awake to the present Graces gifted to you by the One who loves you. Only then can you participate in the fullness of life. Only then when you taste and see that the Lord is good past, present, future, eternally now. If you’re wondering whether Selah’s Spiritual Direction certification is a program you should pursue, as maybe you are contemplating as you read this, stop wondering and start resting in attentive prayer to the present moment. This present moment is an eternal one. And the Eternal One will guide you as, in fact, He already has and is.  

This entry was posted in Uncategorized. Bookmark the permalink.
← Previous Post Next Post →
  • Home
  • About Selah
  • Services
  • Areas of Focus
    • Contemplative Journey: A Year in the Christian Spiritual Disciplines
  • Contact Selah
  • Donate

© 2015. Selah: Center for Spiritual Foundation. All rights reserved.

WordPress website theme design and installation by the MightyLittleWebShop.com