Solitude
To enter into God’s dance of exuberant joy and fullness of life we must descend. This descent is a descent into the deepest reaches of our consciousness and our unconscious. It is really an ascent to God who dwells in the secret recesses of our hearts. It is simply growing into greater, expanded consciousness through prayer.
To pray to the Father in the inner sanctuary of our heart, with the clearest, purest consciousness of his abiding love, and our sincere desire to surrender totally to him by a reformed life of love towards others, we must get rid of any dispersion of inner attention. Love does not grow when we are scattered about in our thoughts, but rather when we are deeply focused and concentrated on the one we love.
—George Maloney,
Inward Stillness
True prayer is not found on the surface of our lives, but in the depths—where God waits in the hidden places of the heart. When we echo the psalmist’s cry, “Search me, O God, and know my heart,” we invite a holy descent into those inner chambers where truth dwells, often concealed by distraction, fear, or self-deception. Yet this descent is not a falling away from God, but a drawing closer to Him—a journey into the very sanctuary where He abides within us. As we surrender to this unveiling, God shows us not only our brokenness but also His desire to heal and reshape us through love.
This kind of prayer requires focus—not a scattered mind or hurried spirit, but a heart stilled and attentive to the One we love. In that quiet, as distractions fall away, love begins to grow. God’s searching is not harsh but tender, meant not to shame us but to set us free. When we allow Him to reveal what lies beneath the surface—our wounds, our motives, our hidden hopes—we are not left in the dark. We are led upward, into greater awareness of His abiding presence and into a life reformed by love. It is in this inward stillness that prayer becomes both revelation and transformation. —DH
—David Hoskins, Founder & Care Guide, Sanctuary Clinics