This Formless Love
Katie Harmon-McLaughlin of Walnut Creek, CA, USA
And you shall be my people, and I will be your God. -Jeremiah 30:22
My prayers have been of seeing, feeling, recording, and sharpening my senses to the divine indwelling everywhere. God’s presence in everything;
dawn’s shifting gleam through the trees
the taste of bold, black coffee
gentle murmur of passing cars through open windows
the dog lying on the floor, keeping warm my cold toes.
If I just take time to see, God becomes evident everywhere in image and sound.
Yet none of these are God in totality, always only a piece of an unfathomable whole.
The question now is
how to see God
in the dark of my own being
in wordlessness
how to enter
that hidden space within.
The abyss I have evaded is calling me to grow deeper with the One who is beyond every image and form even while filling them.
This formless love abiding in the unexplored depths of soul is the origin of every future form that will ever be. The God of future forms cannot be discovered until attachment to these forms is released.
Deeper, deeper, deeper you call me into a place I do not know, cannot see, and have no words to describe.
It is here, stripped of every image
that I tremble and ache and hope and yearn
and pray for the courage to enter,
for the grace to rest in
this formless love.
Prayer Phrase
I surrender into your love.
Spiritual Practice
Centering Prayer
Set a timer for 20 minutes. (If that feels like too much at first, choose a time that will be comfortable for you as a starting place, committing to expand that time in future prayer.) Allow the rhythm of your breath to draw you deeper and deeper into silence. As you breathe, claim one sacred word (Christ, peace, grace, trust, etc.) emerging in you as an anchor to return you to the intention of your prayer when your thoughts begin to wander. Gently release the thoughts and images that come, making space for presence to the One who is with you here and now. Release, return, “be vulnerable to divine grace” (Doctrine and Covenants 163:10b).
Today’s Prayer for Peace
Engage in a daily practice of praying for peace in our world. Click here to read today’s prayer and be part of this practice of peace.
