To begin to prepare my weekly meditations, I read all the lessons through, listening for words or phrases that speak to me in some way. Frequently, one particular word or phrase will become the title, and I sit with it, waiting to see what comes from that, where my meditation leads me. Sometimes it may be a theme or thread that I perceive running through the lessons that inspires me, or maybe how the scriptures relate to the collect for the day.

Today I was struck by the phrase of Abraham’s servant: “speaking in my heart.” Here he is, far away from home, in a strange land, obligated to find a suitable wife for his master’s son. How will he recognize the right woman, the one “whom the Lord has appointed.” Where to start? What to do first? He prepares himself for the task by “speaking in [his] heart;” in other words, he turns to God in prayer.

When some dilemma of life stares us in the face, we might take a lesson from Abraham’s servant—start with prayer, asking God for help, for discernment. If and when we do, we may find to our surprise and delight that our prayer is answered right before our eyes, as his was. More often, however, we find God answers our prayers in much more subtle ways, ways that take having the eyes of our hearts open to see God’s hands at work in our lives, having the ears of our hearts open to hear God’s life-giving word pointing the way ahead. Such openness comes only from spending time “speaking in [our] heart” with God day by day, allowing God’s grace to transform our spiritual senses, to enable us to recognize God’s presence in our lives.

“Speaking in my heart” may be manifested in different ways at different times. Perhaps praise and thanksgiving rises up in our hearts, or a need to intercede for others; maybe a contrite heart inspires confession, or, as in Abraham’s servant’s case, we have a specific petition filling our hearts. Maybe “speaking in my heart” will involve mediating on scripture, journaling with insights received, or simply sitting in contemplation. Singing, dancing, creating works of art, working with dreams can be ways of “speaking in my heart.” There’s no limit to the ways we can experience God’s presence when we intentionally open ourselves by “speaking in [our] heart.”