Surrendering into Silence: Quaker Prayer Cycles byDavid Johnson

Amazon.com: Customer reviews: Surrendering into Silence: Quaker Prayer Cycles




Start reading

Remove from Saved
Add to list

Download to app

Share

Surrendering into Silence: Quaker Prayer Cycles


By David Johnson
84 pages
2 hours

Included in your membership!
at no additional cost

Description

Quaker spirituality is at its core a contemplative practice which is based on the path taught and lived by Jesus. The traditional Quaker experience is that the Spirit of God communicates directly to each and every person, especially when we spend time in silence, and is experienced mainly as an Inward Light in the conscience. Further, as this Inward Light is followed, we are granted more light and greater purity of heart or holiness, and we become reborn inwardly as the Spirit of God (Christ) takes hold of our lives.

Many of the quotations in this work are deliberately sourced from the first Quakers, whose remarkable spiritual strength opened up a vision of true Christianity and changed the world around them. The language of the 1600s sounds foreign to our ears until it becomes familiar. Many words have had different meanings over the centuries, as is clear in the different wordings of the King James Version and Revised Standard Version translations of the Bible. Readers are urged to sit and feel for the underlying spiritual message of these written experiences of our Quaker ministers and elders as well as of the selected excerpts from the Scriptures.

The Quaker experience and understanding are that God is always ready to guide and lead us and goes before us, though we may be called upon to wait till we have been inwardly prepared. 'Way will open' in God's time rather than in our own time frame.

Surrendering into Silence: Quaker Prayer Cycles

byDavid Johnson

5 global ratings | 2 global reviews

From the United States

Brian

4.0 out of 5 stars Excellent Primer for Anyone

Reviewed in the United States on September 17, 2020

Verified Purchase

Much of this was a review to me, having been trained under the teachings of the late Thomas Keating, a Catholic. Surrendering into Silence is a Quaker version of Keating, who was one among three who began the movement of Centering Prayer and which became Contemplative Outreach LTD.

Here, Johnson, a Quaker from Australia, applies universal principles of the cycle recurring in the life of spiritual contemplation to the Quaker, or Society of Friends, or Religious Society of Friends, tradition. His use of citations from varied traditions, ancient and modern, amplifies his own comments.

While Johnson acknowledges the contemplative dimension is in varied spiritual paths, his book reads like a primer for Quakers. Still, the book would prove a valuable introduction to contemplative silence for anyone interested in exploring the process of such a way of prayerful silence and the psychology behind it as a means of purification and growing intimacy with the Divine - Johnson, in the way of Quakerism, does not seek to decide or define what the Divine would be for the reader.

Johnson points out, rightly, spiritual depth in a faith community is not possible apart from this contemplative silence. In the silence, as Johnson clarifies, we are welcomed below the usual chatter of mind and emotion so to be receptive to the Light.

And, again in the vein of Friends, receptivity to the Light in silence is done as part of a community, one not grounded on doctrinal or moral agreement, but on a shared vision in response to divine Grace. Hence, for Johnson, prayerfulness among others is as, if not more, important than alone. Indeed, he disallows any form of privatized worship, wherein one is not linked in agreement of spirit with others who share a like vision and life together.

2 people found this helpful

Helpful

Report abuse

From other countries

MikeF

5.0 out of 5 stars Much needed guide

Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 9, 2020

Verified Purchase

There is far too little published about the life of prayer from a specifically Quaker point of view; this brilliant and lucid little book will be of great value not only to Friends, but to all who are called to the contemplative way, from whichever tradition.

Report abuse

===

Book Review: Surrendering Into Silence: Quaker Prayer Cycles, by David Johnson

31 May, 2020

There is language which describes an experience.

Have you ever been to Florence? There are fountains and sculptures everywhere you look, stone castles and vineyards occupying the surrounding countryside, ornate churches, murals painted on unsuspecting walls….

Then there is language which foretells an experience and invites you to it.

You’ve never been to Florence? Would my previous description entice you to visit? (pandemics aside). I loved the artistry of Italian doors, even just into a pharmacy. The coffee is awesome. You should definitely go.

And again, there is language which makes sense of experiences; affirming and consolidating them.

Welcome back from your trip. Did you see the fountains? Oh, yes, and they were wonderful!

Johnson’s book uses the language of early Quakers and the Christian mystics to:

• describe his authentic experience of the life and patterns of prayer over time (Florence)
• describe the predictable motions of the prayer of silence over time, and invites us to experience it (You should go – it’s awesome)
• affirm and make sense of the experiences we have had, and point to next steps (…yeah, I saw that too)

If you feel offended by Christian language this book will be a challenge to you. Johnson makes no claim to the rightness of Christianity, and points to the universality of faith which lies beyond any system attempting to describe the process and guide people through. But Christianity is his language – also the language of early Friends – and he uses it unreservedly.

Surrendering into Silence is in alignment with other descriptions of the life of prayer. For example, Johnson’s description of the prayer cycle fits well with Rex Ambler’s process of Light Meditation which advises us to 1) Mind the Light, 2) Open to what it has to show you, 3) Wait for guidance, and 4) Submit to that guidance. Even more succinctly, the gospel of Thomas (logion 2) quotes Jesus as saying. “Those who seek should not stop seeking until they find; when they find they will be disturbed; when they are disturbed, they will marvel and will reign over all”

This book is a deceptively brief 55 pages. The structure is not readily apparent but eventually it becomes clear that he lays out the prayer cycle bit by bit; each bit being separated from the next by some “reflections” – carefully selected short quotes to let the concept just given connect with our own experience.

These reflections are to be read and re-read and savoured over time. This is not a book to be read from cover to cover.

Johnson describes the prayer cycle as a process of moving from an external busyness to an inward stillness, and identifies practices to become “…awakened to the possibilities of the spiritual life.” Initially, we experience rest and refreshment through a sense of effort… which gives way to a sense of being found rather than doing the searching ourselves. We begin to yield to the Light.

Next we are met with “eruptions from the subconscious”. We have sought, and found, and now it’s time to be disturbed. The disturbance and darkness we find can continue unabated for some time; Johnson says, “suffering is a real and essential part of the spiritual journey” and he observes that prolonged periods of darkness are normal. Monastics call this process “stripping”; being stripped of the unhelpful to prepare us for a more fruitful life. Extended darkness can be regarded, therefore, as making good progress; discomfort begets change. This is a place where psychology and spiritual practice overlap. The author’s advice is to step back and observe and wait to see what the Light is showing you. (Sounds a lot like Rex Ambler)

The cycle of prayer (daily practice, consolation and rest, disturbance, darkness, and transformation) is repeated over and over again, each iteration moving us further in the journey. Johnson encourages us to persevere. As we persist in the process of being transformed, we are prepared to be an instrument for a secret responsiveness, not necessarily of action, which Fox described as walking in the Light. In the author’s words. “As we become more aware, more attentive and more accepting, God can do more with us. We become co-workers with God.”

It is one thing to be passionate about what is good and to respond to the flawed world through practicing our values. It is another thing to be prepared by Spirit to be a Light-powered instrument of God moving in, and responding to, the world around us.

Johnson invites us to be there, and shows us a path for how to get there. If you want the quickie cheat sheet, the full cycle is well summarised and illustrated on pages 44 and 45.

You do need to work a bit to understand Johnson’s language of experience, invitation, affirmation and guidance, but it’s worth the effort.

Surrendering into Silence: Quaker Prayer Cycles, by David Johnson, Inner Light Books 2020.

Sheila Keane, New South Wales Regional Meeting