Spiritual Practices Part 7

July 27, 2026

I have a friend in one of my floor classes at the gym who takes her physical exercise very seriously. Glory rarely misses class, and she is a great encourager of everyone around her. Because my space in class is next to hers, we talk regularly, and over the years we have come to know each other well.

Her down-to-earth stories, her warmth, and her easy way with people make her a very special person to me. Our paths would probably never have crossed without the gym. But I am grateful they did, because Glory has become a light on my path.

Glory is a faithful person. She takes her spiritual life even more seriously than she takes her workouts. Sometimes, between Zumba movements, we briefly share thoughts about God and our lives. Recently, in the middle of class, I asked her, “Glory, what has God been telling you today?”

Without hesitation she answered, “God hasn’t been telling me anything today—I have been telling God!” “Oh wow,” I said. “What have you been telling God?”

She answered, “I have been telling God, ‘Thank you, thank you, thank you for all that I am given.’ I talk to God all day long, and today I have been telling God all day long how grateful I am for everything. Everything I saw, everything I did, everyone I talked to—whatever I was grateful for, I gave thanks.”

Her answer stopped me.

There we were, in the ordinary setting of a gym class, moving from one exercise to the next, and suddenly Glory reminded me that prayer is not always asking and listening—it can be a running conversation about whatever is in our heart. Talking with the Divine can happen in any way at anytime—while we are walking, working, cooking, exercising, speaking, getting dressed, listening, noticing, giving thanks, and in everything we do.

Glory’s words brought to mind the spiritual practice known as Practicing the Presence of God. This practice was written about by Brother Lawrence, a 17th-century French Carmelite monk. He worked in the kitchen of the monastery. His beloved little book, The Practice of the Presence of God, is not a book in the usual sense, but a collection of his conversations, letters, sayings, and spiritual insights gathered by Father Joseph de Beaufort.

The book is a living testimony to the possibility of maintaining a constant, joyful, and intimate conversation with God in the midst of ordinary life—even in its most routine and mundane moments. Brother Lawrence wrote:

“That we need only to recognize God intimately present with us, to address ourselves to Him every moment, that we may beg His assistance for knowing His will in things doubtful, and for rightly performing those which we plainly see He requires of us, offering them to Him before we do them, and giving Him thanks when we have done.”

This is what Glory was doing.

She was not waiting for a chapel, a quiet room, a retreat, or a perfect spiritual mood. She was practicing the Presence of God in the middle of her day. She was turning ordinary moments into prayer. She was letting gratitude become her conversation with the Divine.

And I believe that this is one of the deepest spiritual practices of all: to remember that God is not somewhere else. God is not waiting for us only in sacred buildings, solemn rituals, or rare moments of transcendence. God is here—in the gym, in the kitchen, in the car, in the grocery store, in our conversations, in our breath, in our bodies, in the next ordinary thing we do.

Glory reminds me that gratitude is not merely a feeling. It is a way of seeing. It is a spiritual discipline. It is an opening of the heart that says, “This moment, too, is a gift.”

Every day, just by her presence, Glory reminds me that God is right here, right now, waiting to be noticed, waiting to be thanked, waiting to be included in the conversation of our lives.

And right now, as I consciously bring God into my reflecting and writing, I feel the blessing of that Presence.

Spiritual Practice

Try talking with God now. Whatever you are doing. 

Inquiry

What has been your closest moment with God today?

Prayer

Dear God,

For Glory and the light she gives me, I am so grateful.

Amen