Finding Your Sacred Self: Prayers, Poems and Pastoral Helps

By Ian M Kilgour

Do you feel overwhelmed by the external pressures of too much information, too many conflicting voices and too much media noise? You are not alone. These influences invade our personal space and erode our sense of inner peace and well-being.

This book will help you discover your inner sacred self. The breathing exercises, poems, prayers and reflections offered by Ian Kilgour will re-connect you with the Divine Presence, the source of your life and all that is.

Praise for Finding Your Sacred Self:
“Ian Kilgour draws from a deep well of mystical wisdom. He writes with the practical expertise of someone who has honed their pastoral craft over many years. The prayers and advice have been road tested, making them imminently useful and usable.

The book has been written as a companion guide for the spiritual journey of becoming human. In a gentle manner, Kilgour invites his readers into the contemplative ways of Solitude, Stillness, Silence, and Simplicity. His reflections integrate theology, biblical reflection, contemplative practice and pastoral counsel. The book also includes a tool-kit of prayers and other pastoral helps for a wide range of situations.

This book is for anyone who is interested in deepening their contemplative prayer life. It is also for those in ministry and other pastoral professions, who are looking for practical tools to enhance their pastoral practice. Every church foyer should have one of these on display!”

Rev Dr Jordan Redding
Presbyterian Minister in Tāmaki Makaurau Auckland

• Language: English
• Publisher: Philip Garside
• Release date: Nov 16, 2023
• ISBN: 9781991027672

Ian M Kilgour

Ian Kilgour is a Salvation Army officer and Christian minister with wide experience in pastoral care and the deeply human issues we all struggle with. Although now retired, he remains actively involved in church, chaplaincy, community and social justice work.After a serious health event that caused him to face his own mortality, he gathered together the reflections that comprise this book—a work in which he was encouraged and assisted by the people of his home congregation, St. Heliers Presbyterian Church in Auckland.Ian believes that everyone has the capacity to find meaning in life, to deepen their spirituality, and to become all they can be. He has an inclusive understanding of life in which everything and everyone is interconnected and of immense value.Ian dedicates this publication to those whom he has had the privilege of laying to rest.

Book preview

Finding Your Sacred Self

Prayers, poems and pastoral helps

Ian M Kilgour

Table of Contents

Title

Introduction

Ways to use the name ‘God’

Types of meditation and contemplation

Part One

Making space for meditation and contemplation

A ‘Prayer of Preparation’

The Way of Solitude

Reflection

A practice in ‘Solitude’

Personal Findings

Windows of Insight

The Way of Stillness

Reflection

A practice in ‘Stillness’

Personal Findings

Windows of Insight

The Way of Silence

Reflection

A practice in ‘silence’

Personal Findings

Windows of Insight

The Way of Simplicity

Reflection

A practice in ‘Simplicity’

Personal Findings

Windows of Insight

Reflecting on the benefits of solitude, stillness, silence and simplicity

Part Two

Pastoral Helps

Pastoral Help 1 — ‘Peace be still’

Pastoral Help 2 — ‘I have faith & trust’

Pastoral Help 3 — ‘An invitation to come’

Pastoral Help 4 — ‘A walk in nature’

Windows of Insight

Pastoral Help 5 — ‘The Water of Life’

Reflection

Pastoral Help 6 — ‘The Bread of Life’

Reflection

Pastoral Help 7 — ‘Resting in God’

Reflection

Pastoral Help 8 — ‘Be still in God’

Be still and know that I am God

Be still and know that I am

Be still and know

Be still

Be

Additional Notes:

Pastoral Help 9 — ‘Divine abidings’

The four divine abidings & meditations

Pastoral Help 10 — ‘Belonging in Oneness’

Reflection

A practice to affirm Belonging and Oneness:

Windows of Insight

Pastoral Help 11 — ‘Interactive Scripture reading’

Reflection

The method of meditation using ‘reflective reading’

Example 1: ‘Choosing the better part’

A practice on ‘choosing the better part’:

Example 2: ‘Coping with the fevers of life’

A practice to cope with the fevers of life:

Example 3: ‘On board with Jesus’

A practice of ‘being on-board with Jesus.’

Windows of insight

Concluding comment

Pastoral Help 12 — ‘A meditation using music’

Benediction

About the Author

Also by Ian M Kilgour

Copyright

Introduction

I have prepared this booklet following a lifetime of pastoral care and visiting with people coping with stress, anxiety and panic attacks. An unstable world, the impacts of rapid change, technology, social media, artificial intelligence, polarised social and political discourse, have all resulted in more mental, emotional and spiritual distress and negative effects on the mental health and well-being of people. More particularly, older people have become very vulnerable to the confusions occasioned by these developments.

Visiting older persons has been one of the great joys of my life. How often I have come away feeling I was the one visited and cared for after listening to their life stories and experiences, in spite of enormous challenges, hardships and sadnesses. We’d often conclude our time together with a scripture reading and prayer, but was this sufficient when the person was struggling with complex issues and needs that required significantly more guidance and help?

One such incident inspired this booklet. While visiting a 91-year-old I shared one of my pastoral helps to assist her to better cope with anxiety. As I explained the exercise her daughter asked if she could write down the suggested steps. At that moment I resolved to write down such exercises so they could be referred to and be more widely available.

It’s one thing to know what’s needed, which usually the person already knows, but it’s quite another matter to share the ‘how’ of doing what’s needed. As we get older it is not always possible to maintain our social involvements or attend church and share in the life of our communities of interest, from which we’ve received regular help and encouragement. So, somehow, we need to tap into our own inner resources to compensate for this loss. In any event there can be no substitute for being responsible for our own well-being and spiritual life. We all need to develop our own personal ways of how to access and enjoy the relationship with ‘divine transcendence’ accessed through our knowledge and experience of Jesus Christ.

What follows is a distillation of all I’ve read over many years. I’m not gifted with much original thinking, so I’m greatly indebted to countless writers, thinkers and poets whose writings I have assimilated on these subjects. I have credited the passages I know the source of. You’ll notice some sections are called ‘Windows of Insight.’ These contributions, from known authorities or poets, help us to delve deeper into the