.for comfort in our pain.

haven't read much julian lately,

but opened to my bookmark yesterday:

"...the other is for comfort in our pain,

because He wants us to be aware

that the pain shall all be transformed

into honor and benefit

by virtue of His passion,

and that we be aware

that we do not suffer alone,

but with Him."

-revelations of divine love,

from chapter 28.

Julian.

"Because He wills that we believe that we experience Him

constantly (although we imagine it is but little)

 and by this belief He causes us evermore to gain grace, because

He wishes to be seen and He wishes to be sought,

He wishes to be awaited and He wishes to be trusted."

He wills that we believe that we experience Him constantly.

He wishes to be seen, to be sought, to be awaited,

He wishes to be trusted.

Love her and her understanding of God.

So much.

.the soul can do no more.

"...The constant seeking of the soul pleases God very much
     for the soul can do no more than seek, suffer, and trust...

 the clarity of finding is by His special grace when it is His will.

     The seeking with faith, hope, and love pleases our Lord,
     and the finding pleases the soul and fills it full of joy.

And thus was I taught for my own understanding that

seeking is as good as beholding 

during the time that He wishes to permit the soul to be in labor."

-Julian-my-favorite.

.of His simple loving.

I've had a total theologian crush on Julian of Norwich for a long time- I love every quote of hers I've seen but haven't read anything straight through. I'm finally diving into a devotional edition of her Revelations of Divine Love and I am loving it.

I've been praying lately to be more aware of God's love for me; and I've been less-consciously but very actively wrestling with rest, and how to find it. These readings are speaking to me so perfectly. I'm super grateful.

"I saw that He is to us everything that is good and comfortable for us.

He is our clothing which for love enwraps us,

holds us,

and all encloses us because of His tender love,

so that He may never leave us."

"...He showed a little thing,

the size of a hazelnut

in the palm of my hand

and it was round as a ball.

I looked at it with the eye of my understanding and thought: 'What can this be?'

And it was generally answered thus: 'It is all that is made.'

I marveled how it could continue,

because it seemed to me it could suddenly have sunk into nothingness because of its littleness.

And I was answered in my understanding:

'It continueth and always shall, because God loveth it;

and in this way everything hath its being by the love of God.'

In this little thing I saw three characteristics:

the first is that God made it,

the second is that God loves it,

the third, that God keeps it."

"For this is the reason why we are not fully at ease in heart and soul:

because here we seek rest in these things that are so little,

in which there is no rest,

and we recognize not our God who is all powerful, all wise, all good,

for He is the true rest."

"Also our Lord God showed

that it is full great pleasure to Him

that a pitiable soul come to Him nakedly and plainly and simply."

"For the goodness of God is the highest prayer, and it comes down to the lowest part of our need.

It vitalizes our soul

and brings it to life

and makes it grow in grace and virtue.

It is nearest us in nature

and readiest in grace

(for it is the same grace that the soul seeks and ever shall,

till we know our God truly who has us all in Himself enclosed)."

-from chapters 5 & 6