Discernment

From Henri Nouwen:

“Discernment is a spiritual understanding and an experiential knowledge of how God is active in daily life that is acquired through disciplined spiritual practice… The great movement of the spiritual life is from a deaf, non-hearing life to a life of listening… Living a spiritually mature life requires listening to God’s voice within and among us… When we are truly listening, we come to know that God is speaking to us, pointing the way, showing the direction… Discernment reveals new priorities, directions, and gifts from God. We come to realize that what previously seemed so important for our lives, loses its power over us… To our surprise, we even may experience a strange inner freedom to follow a new call or direction as previous concerns move into the background of our consciousness. We begin to see the beauty of the small and hidden life that Jesus lived in Nazareth. Most rewarding of all is the discovery that as we pray more each day, God’s will—that is, God’s concrete ways of loving us and our world—gradually is made known to us.”