I loved reading chapter 1 of The Emmanuel Promise for you. You can watch me read it to you over at YouTube HERE.

PRE-ORDER The Emmanuel Promise: Discover the Security of a Life Held by God wherever you find your books.

$11.39 and free shipping at Baker Publishing's own site HERE. At this price, you can be generous with your whole book group.

Pre-Order on Amazon here.

Then, get your pre-order gifts HERE, including 2 private podcasts.

This episode is DAY 1 of a private 7-Day podcast devotional called “Welcome Home,” a gift for anyone who pre-orders The Emmanuel Promise. 

Pre-order from Baker Publishing for $11.39 and free shipping here!

Pre-order from Amazon here

After pre-ordering, get your gifts and join the launch team here.

The Emmanuel Promise is an invitation to set down shame and recognize that your attachment story, your earliest relationship with your caregiver, may be what’s obstructing your relationship with God. Your caregivers were human. Limited. Living with their own broken and imperfect story. God’s love is lavish. He’s . Compassionate. Perfect. But, since our neural pathways for relationships were created in those first three years, our brains have to be rewired to Perfect Love.

In episode 63, I invite you fireside for a lectio divina 101 chat and together we answer Jesus' invitation in John 21:9-13 to "Come, have breakfast."

Show Notes:

*Have Summer come lead at your gathering: presenceproject.ea@gmail.com

*Want to find out more about All Soul's Atlanta? Click here.

*Philip Yancey's article, The Death of Reading is Threatening the Soul. Read it here.

*Summer's future book, The Emmanuel Promise has a chapter about lectio divina and free corresponding lectio divina videos throughout. Pre-Order Summer's upcoming April 2024 book, The Emmanuel Promise by clicking here.

This statement by my spiritual direction professor, Robert Woodcock, peaked my curiosity: “We sometimes forget that there are two people in this relationship, us and God. We forget that we are in a relationship with a Person with feelings and hopes and dreams for our life together.  Sometimes we are brave enough to ask God what He thinks but rarely are we brave enough to ask God how He feels.” 

With lectio divina, we slow down the Scripture so we can get to know God's heart.

Show Notes:

Interested in finding out more about getting a 2 year spiritual direction certificate? healingcare.org/direction

Want to listen to Jesus' heart through John? Start in the sister podcast, The Slow Word Movement, here.

Want to join a group doing this LIVE? Join Table of the Beloved, patreon.com/thepresenceproject

Pre-order Summer's book on looking at how we've shaped our image of God through the lens of our attachment wounds here.

We've become such a fast culture. Becoming good soil for the word takes an intentional step. Otherwise, our time in scripture feels more like coming up to the drive thru window for fast food.

When I hear people say they can't "do" contemplative exercises, I wonder if they're giving their body time to ground first.

Show notes:

Want to sign up for the Saturday morning mini-retreat? Click here.

Interested in finding more lectio divina videos over on YouTube? Click here.

1. Join the Presence Project newsletter list and receive a free mini-retreat on the weekends here.

2. Find the Renovare episode with Richard Foster I quoted from here.

3. Go from emotional overwhelm to building resiliency with this free 21 pg workbook curated by Summer.

4. Pre-order Summer's upcoming spring 2023 book with Baker Publishing, 

The Emmanuel Promise: Discovering the Security of a Life Held by God here.

Let's make getting away with God on retreat Monday-morning-practical. How do you plan? What do you put in your suitcase? At its most basic, planning a retreat is creating time for unscheduled abiding with God. Let's start small.

Lane Arnold, spiritual director and writing coach, has created resources for your retreat here.

1. Receive weekly mini-retreat newsletter by clicking here.
2. Free 9 page examen workbook with classic and creative practices for reflection
3. God's invitation scriptures: Isaiah 55:1-3, Song of Songs 2:13-15, Proverbs 9:4-5, Matthew 11:28-30 in The Message, Mark 1:17, Mark 6:31-32
4. Untamed Christian; Unleased Church by Terry Wardle
5. Join Table of the Beloved here for LIVE zooms and four years of teachings

Episode 57, show notes:

1. Download worksheet for creating your own tray here.

2. Sign up for a weekly mini-retreat slipped into your inbox by clicking here.

3. Huberman lab podcast episode:

Click here for The Science of Making and Breaking Habits: (Start at minute 24)

4. Presence Project Podcast:

A Beginner’s Guide to the Examen, click here.

5. Nightly Examen: a 7 1/2 minute recording.

Just push play. I’ll lead you through by clicking here.

I've been noticing that what I need through transition has a pattern. Tired? Feeling overwhelmed? Disoriented? I wonder if these stages will resonate with you.

Please subscribe and leave a review. This helps other people find this free resource.

If you'd like to have a full retreat based on this podcast episode, join Table of the Beloved at patreon.com/thepresenceproject. We'd love to have you!

If we take the time to Stand, Look, and Ask as God invites in Jeremiah 6:16, transition can be a place of powerful growth. There is often a great shifting in liminal spaces. As Madeleine L'Engle said, "It’s a good thing to have all the props pulled out from under us occasionally. It gives us some sense of what is rock under our feet and what is sand.” It's not comfortable, but it IS an opportunity.

Advent gives us time to remember that THIS is not the end of the story. This is not the end of your story or your child’s story, your marriage’s story, the church’s story, or our country’s story. Christ, our Beloved and our Victor, WILL return. Truthfully, it’s my favorite time of the church year. After all the hard news and the heaviness of the brokenness of our world, we get to turn our eyes upon Jesus, to gaze there, to Behold our God,

Join me for this 16-day audio Advent Journey to Behold our God and focus on the divinity of Christ through the scriptures and music of Handel's Messiah:

https://mailchi.mp/athirstforgod.com/messiahadvent

The neural pathways for relationship are developed in the first three years of a person's life. This affects even our relationship with God and is at the heart of attachment theory. Therapist Maggie Rhine, the head of the Healing Care Center, tells the story of her struggle to gain a secure attachment after having multiple surgeries as an infant. 

"Looking at our attachment stories is not dishonoring to our parents. So many of them did the best they could. It is not blameworthy, or shame-worthy, but it is grief-worthy and we've got to name it and bring it into the presence of God so we can heal." Maggie Rhine

Order Summer's book and learn more about how your attachment story has affected your relationship with God here: https://bakerbookhouse.com/products/5... or here: https://a.co/d/4g3xdRX

Find out more about the Healing Care Center where Maggie and other experts work, a place where you can do intensive work on your attachment story, here: https://www.thehealingcarecenter.org/

Bette Dickinson tells the story of how saying "yes" to enfleshing God's message of the Magnificat became one painting, then twenty-five, and then an entire Advent devotional. She also gives us an inside view on how her inner achiever was set free from striving so the Spirit could truly flow through her. 

Follow @bette_dickinson on instagram

This is an Advent devotional you will return to again and again:

https://www.amazon.com/Making-Room-Advent-Devotions-Season/dp/1514004836/ref=asc_df_1514004836/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=564690296844&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=3158106950605108191&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9010784&hvtargid=pla-1643843137891&psc=1

We have a complicated relationship with desire and longing. Yes, our every cry is welcomed, but do we even want it to come up for daylight? Sometimes desire can feel vulnerable. Other times sharing can be a delight. What happens when we begin to recognize God has a new calling for us? In this episode I invited Beth Booram to teach us to listen to the first seeds of a God-given dream.

You've heard the phrase, "name it to tame it?" When we name our emotions, the heaviness around our feelings suddenly lifts. In this episode, Alison L. Bradley and I talk through page 5 of the workbook I created for you outlining a four-step process to emotional resiliency. In it I give multiple tools to name, ground, metabolize and then come to a place of rest in the Presence of God. These steps are validated by contemporary neurobiology and the Biblical invitation to lament.

Get your free 21-page, "I'm Feeling...Choose your Own Adventure Workbook" here: https://mailchi.mp/9669bd96e860/feeling-choose-adventure 

Follow Alison L. Bradley on instagram @alisonlbradley and at her enneagram themed instagram site: @9ish_andiknowit

Some of these thoughts on resilience from Melody Ries have been breakthroughs for me. Here you can learn from my mom's spiritual director and her profound story. Neuroscience and Redemption. This conversation is full of gold.

God never tells someone they are too needy. He never rebukes or shushes them. God moves towards us in our need.

You can do this SIMPLE prayer practice as often as desired.

What if you knew that every cry was welcomed? What if you knew you didn't have to weigh your need or manage expectations, just come?

This is the focus of today's Presence Project Podcast episode.

Want to dive deeper with us?

bio.site/summerjoygross

In this podcast episode, Summer invites us to think about our inner critic in another way. Maybe our inner critic is a part of us who needs the love and compassion of God. Also included is a prayer exercise to invite our inner critic out of the darkness of shame and into the Light of God's healing.

How do we become aware and discerning with the toxic thoughts which have become the fbackground noise of our life? They are stealing our joy. They are robbing us of courageous creativity. They are demanding perfection. It's time to take back stolen ground by befriending our inner critic. Surprised by this invitation? Listen in.

bio.site/summerjoygross

Sarah Herring, Spiritual director, therapist and former Dean of Students at Simpson, teaches us a beautiful, grace-filled way to reflect on your day and pray the Examen. This is so rich, friends.

Find a beautiful video by Sarah and free 9 pg Examen workbook for a gentle reflection on your day on bio.site/summerjoygross.

We reflect to gather the manna from the day.

We reflect to abide with our Abba, the Gardener.

Want to know more?

Listen to A Beginner's Guide to the Examen here: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/a-beginners-guide-to-the-examen/id1462343703?i=1000578677170

• Attachment theory and the many obstacles to a life immersed in the Trinity's Love
• Honest conversation about detaching to attach in our marriages
• Understanding our attachment story and style in order to heal and live out of knowing you are God's beloved.
• The simple, but profound spiritual practices which have been a gift for Terry
• Experience Terry Wardle lead you into Jesus' Presence through Safe Place

Pre-order The Emmanuel Promise: Discovering the Security of a Life Held by God 

with Baker for 11.49! HERE

on Amazon HERE

or wherever you get your books.

Check out Healing Care Ministries amazing offerings HERE

Terry Wardle has written a treasure trove of incredible books including Identity Matters

and one of my favorites, Every Breath We Take, a book every Presence Project Listener will LOVE.

He also has a weekly podcast called Slingstones: Listen here.

St. Ignatius invited his followers to reflect over their day and ask God where He was at work. 

A beginner's guide as well as an examen recording so you can just "push play" and I'll lead you through.

Interested in learning more about the Presence Project? Start here: https://bio.site/summerjoygross

We want to blame, shame, control, or escape the hard, but maybe if we linger and get curious, it can be the gateway to transformation.

In this episode, a surprising twist on the flowing River of Life from one of our members became the invitation we needed to be compassionate with slow growth.

**Want more joy in your life? We're learning to deepen our joy with these three practices from the free Joy and Resilience workbook here: https://mailchi.mp/athirstforgod.com/joy

Part 2 in a conversation with Nicole Zasowski, author of What if it's Wonderful? 

She shares her story of infertility and then we talk about how we can experience joy when there's an underlying story of suffering. She teaches us how the simple genius practice of savoring can rewire our brain.

Then, finally, she leads us in a practice where we ask the question, "Where is God in the midst of our sorrow and where is He in the midst of our celebration?"

Why is staying joy-full so dang hard? The answer WILL surprise you and of course, it's revealed in brain science.

This is the first of two podcast episodes with Nicole Zasowski, author of What if It's Wonderful?: Release Your Fears, Choose Joy, & Find the Courage to Celebrate.

August’s theme over here on The Presence Project is Joy and Resilience.

Why is it that we so easily forget the tables God has set in the wilderness? Instead of staying in a place of celebration after the abundance of connection or the kindness of answered prayer, we shift right back into lack. Our brains slide to scarcity like a car out of alignment.

Deepen your understanding of your brain's capacity for joy here: https://mailchi.mp/athirstforgod.com/joy

How do we live the unforced rhythms of grace? We say "yes" to the spaciousness of God's good limits and "no" to a life of hustle and hurry.

Don't miss this conversation with Ashley Hales or an invitation to walk through Lent with her:  Walking at a Human Pace. aahales.com/shop/walking

Encounter the Good Shepherd with this Ignatian Contemplation.

Are you wanting more? Join the Presence Project and get a mini-retreat based on contemplative spiritual practices here: https://mailchi.mp/athirstforgod.com/mini-retreat

Before we burst into this new year armed with color-coded goal charts and shouldering the weight of a personal-reno project, let’s be gentle with ourselves. 

Let’s sit down on the seam of the year and remember who and Whose we are. 

Want to read along?

Find the transcript at SummerJoyGross.com

The way a shepherd tends the bummer lambs who have been abandoned by their mothers deepen our view of our Shepherd. This is your invitation

In the Presence Project, we're focusing on the character of God through the scriptures and music of Handel's Messiah this Advent. In the end of a hard year, I'm regaining my equilibrium through worship. Join me?

https://mailchi.mp/athirstforgod.com/messiahadvent

Music from the MIT concert choir found here:

 http://hebb.mit.edu/FreeMusic/MIT_Music/Handel/

Join the 16 day Advent Journey here.

Maybe you're like me and you feel the darkness pressing in this year. This Advent I want to spend all of my time gazing on the light of Christ.

Captivated. Worshipping.

Together, let's become captivated by our Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace.

Handel's Messiah along with these quiet devotionals are just what we need after 2020 to bring our gaze back to our Prince of Peace.

The insecure anxious attached hope to get an "A" in Lent to try to be more worthy for God. They're afraid they have to clean themselves up before God wants to be in their presence.

The insecure avoidant attached like to keep things more intellectual, reading about someone else's Lent. If they have sin in their lives, they think they have to go at it alone.

The truth is that the Holy Spirit wants to be the One in charge of inviting us to new areas of increased freedom. He wants us to come to Him to become unbound. We were never meant to do this alone. 

...............................................

PRE-ORDER The Emmanuel Promise: Discover the Security of a Life Held by God

From Baker Publishing for $11.39 HERE

From Amazon HERE

Receive a mini-retreat right to your inbox based on podcast episodes by signing up HERE. I call it the Slow Weekend Starter Kit. 

And here’s my embarrassing truth: Gratitude has always felt a little like a box to check off, more duty than delight. For years, I’ve checked off the box faithfully knowing it was vital for mental, spiritual, and emotional health, but honestly, it felt a bit like taking vitamins.

But interactive gratitude, the first stage in Immanuel Journaling, has surprised me with its power. It’s been like discovering a key I didn’t know existed to enter into deeper delight with God. A key to a door to mutual delight. Did you read or watch Secret Garden by Frances Hodgson Burnett as a kid? Think discovering the key under hanging vines of low expectations and turning it in a rusty old lock that didn’t appear promising but opening the door to security, the loveliest walled safety, to a profusion of beauty, to ongoing revelation.

And could anything be more important than joy and delight in a time period perforated with a steady influx of grief and anxiety? Who couldn’t handle more delight in 2020? 

Through the structure of Immanuel Journaling, God metabolized emotion with us so it didn’t have time to metastasize into trauma. 

Our emotions are just messengers that there’s something underneath that’s trying to get our attention. They are an invitation to listen to the tender places of our heart. And God loves listening with us. 

Summerjoygross.com

patreon.com/thepresenceproject

A Pentecost gift for you. See how your fear shifts when Jesus walks through your closed doors.

K. J. Ramsey and Summer Gross talk life with COVID19, grief, and the brain science of anxiety, giving practical tips for our journey back to awareness of our Prince of Peace.

Finally, Summer leads us through an Ignatian style scripture practice where we can walk into the gospel story of Jesus blessing the children. 

Truth is, sometimes connecting with God in the middle of chaos and anxiety can be near impossible. Anxiety disconnects our prefrontal cortex, making it difficult for us to be rational and relational.  During times like this, the world feels off-kilter. We feel off-kilter.

Today I’m going to walk us through an Ignatian scripture exercise of Mark 4:35-40 using holy imagination and the senses. Why? The senses ground our anxiety and then heighten our ability to focus.

How the story of the transfiguration of Jesus is the key to our transformation.

There are two invitations when we’re walking through pain: to lament + to Worship. To pour out our lament with an empathetic listener and also to lift our eyes to the throne, fix our eyes on Jesus, and find our story within his larger story.

But in spiritual matchmaking there’s a different law at play, we cannot conjure up desire in our own strength. It also says that we can’t formula our way to relationship. We can’t perform our way to wonder and mystery. And that wisdom is not a currency to count before fellow church members nor is information the path to a deep rooted love. It can be a part of the path, learning the topography, learning the facts on the ground.

And sure, we can chase desire like a couple in marriage counseling positioning ourselves in the flow of first things, but we can’t perform our way into connection. We can’t tick off a to-do list and create communion. 

God is not a destination or a list of truths to dominate. God is a Person.

Aundi Kolber talks with me about attachment styles, a new view for anxiety, and looking at spiritual practices through a trauma-informed lens. What happens when spiritual practices like silence trigger you? You Try Softer.

We’re headed into the holiday season, a season of feasts but also of family stress.

We’re all aware that joy rarely stands alone. We can be all over the  emotional map even on Christmas morning. The older I get, the more I realize we are complex, a daily mixture of pain and joy. The question is, can we invite Jesus to walk with us in our complexities. Can we sift through the fog of our internal narratives and find Him in the nativity? There is often so much joy to be found but we can be run over by stress, by to do lists, and triggers, and we miss it all. But here’s the question: Can we stay awake to the Presence of Jesus?

Preorder THE EMMANUEL PROMISE: Discover the Security of a Life Held by God

Neuroscience. Attachment theory. The stories that shape our image of God AND the spiritual practices that invite us to experience His tender love to build attachment. 

Just $11.39. Arrives April 30th

Writer 

Summer Gross @revsummerjoy on Instagram

The Presence Project on Patreon for monthly groups and online retreats

The Presence Project on Facebook

http://www.summerjoygross.com

Jodi Grubbs @jodi.grubbs on Instagram

Live Slowly: A Gentle Invitation to Exhale ALSO on April 30th

Julianne Clayton: @juleclayton on Instagram

Listen to the Remind{h}er podcast here.

Bette Dickinson @bette_dickinson on Instagram

https://www.bettedickinson.com/

https://www.bettedickinson.com/all-art

Kris Camealy: @kriscamealy on Instagram

https://www.kriscamealy.com/

An illustration of her sweet mixed media makings

Kris’ podcast: Refine Retreat, the podcast

Maeve Gerboth: @maeve_gerboth on Instagram

Explore spiritual direction with Maeve.

Books and Resources:

Kate Bowler On Being with Krista Tippett: On Having a Body

https://onbeing.org/programs/kate-bowler-on-being-in-a-body/

Celtic Benedictions with J. Philip Newell

Jamie Winship: Fearless Living

Tanner Olson: Walking a Little Slower 

David Benner: Soulful Spirituality

John O’Donohue: Bless the Place Between Us 

Get Summer’s free resource to move through tangled emotions here.

Psalm 78 confronts us with how easy it is to speak against God and ask, “Can God set a table in the wilderness?” On the hard days we struggle to remember. It’s human. But, what if we kept a journal, like Ann Voskamp’s 1000 gifts, and on the hard days, we perused the pages and found the goodness of God printed in our own handwriting? Or what if we used a holiday primed for this, Thanksgiving, to speak the stories of gratitude into each other’s lives, to pass the goodness of God from one generation to another just like we do the mashed potatoes. This simple ritual, three kernels of corn, is our own family’s way of doing just that.

"Sometimes we get a glimpse of a soul and we want to take off our shoes.

Whether it’s looking into the eyes of the checkout clerk surprised someone truly wants to know how she’s doing or a spiritual directee who lets me see the pain underneath her socially accepted story. Like all of us, she’s become adept at holding up a whole bevy of masks. Every time she walks into our chapel for direction, she takes a while to settle, going through an awkward song and dance performing for my approval before becoming quiet and receptive to the Spirit.

What she doesn’t know is that underneath, when the Holy Spirit broods over her vulnerable story, she’s stunning. & the wrinkles and scars point to a story as deep as her words.

And then as she closes her eyes childlike, holding her face up to the light of God’s Presence I too am warmed by her light."

Read the transcript here.

Join the Presence Project here

and on Facebook here. 

How centering prayer teaches our brains to release compulsive thoughts into the hands of God.

Hurry clamps down on creativity.

Hurry makes decision-making nearly impossible.

Hurry leaves us weary.

Hurry divides our focus.

And usually, Hurry is driven by anxiety. 

Overwork. Overfunctioning. Overscheduling. They’re rarely if ever driven by joy or trust. And if we follow the train back far enough, we find they’re created by fear. Fear we’ll miss something. Fear we’ll be rejected. Fear we’re not caring enough. Fear Fear Fear.