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Welcome to our weekly Friday Check-in for August 8th, 2025 ✅
If you are new to Soul Care, WELCOME!! We are so glad you are here.
Here is your invitation to pause and become aware of God’s presence. Enter as best you can into some stillness and silence, as you take time to reflect and pray.
Let's begin with,
Page: An Invitation to Reflection
Read or listen to Mark 8:34-38 (MSG) three times:
Calling the crowd to join his disciples, he said, “Anyone who intends to come with me has to let me lead. You’re not in the driver’s seat; I am. Don’t run from suffering; embrace it. Follow me and I’ll show you how. Self-help is no help at all. Self-sacrifice is the way, my way, to saving yourself, your true self. What good would it do to get everything you want and lose you, the real you? What could you ever trade your soul for?
“If any of you are embarrassed over me and the way I’m leading you when you get around your fickle and unfocused friends, know that you’ll be an even greater embarrassment to the Son of Man when he arrives in all the splendor of God, his Father, with an army of the holy angels.” (MSG)
Spend a few minutes journaling in response to this passage:
- What stands out to you most? Is there a particular word or phrase?
- As you read through it a second time… ask God, “to what area of my life does that particular word or phrase connect?”
- And as you read a third time, be asking God, “Is there an invitation for me?” Is there a response of some kind that God is inviting you into?
Next up is,
Person: An Invitation to Connection
We are called to follow Jesus. Today’s reading provides a radical invitation to surrender the illusion of control and embrace a cruciform path of life, a path that seems like death to the world, but is actually life in the Spirit. This month we are also meditating on Matthew 13:31-33 and contemplating “smallness”, the theme of the August Semi-Silent Retreat. While the cost of discipleship is real, the kingdom Jesus ushers in is already growing in small, hidden, seemingly insignificant ways. The mustard seed and the yeast both transform their environments from within. That's powerful!
“Not all of us can do great things, but we can do small things with great love.”
- Mother Theresa
Jesus leads, not through domination but through yielding. And we follow not by grand gestures, but in small acts of trust, humility, and faithfulness. Let’s take some time to reflect on what might seem insignificant right now but could be deeply sacred... for example, an unnoticed act of kindness, a quiet moment of prayer, a recurring sense of longing...
- How might Jesus be leading you, in the small things?
- In your relationships, what small things mean a lot to you?
- What small thing can you do well today?
- In what ways are you being invited to follow Jesus more deeply, even when it feels small, unnoticed, or countercultural? Are there any fears or assumptions you might need to surrender to truly follow Him?
Plan: An Invitation to Intention
Perhaps a seemingly insignificant thing - but mighty - is the act of noticing your breath.
Maybe... just... breathe...Set a timer for 2 minutes and in silence, focus on your breathing.
Inhale: Lead me in your righteousness;
Exhale: Make your way straight before me.
When the timer is up, take a minute to notice how you feel. May this invitation bless you as you bring this time of prayer to close:
Breathe deep and know that you don’t have to fear what today may bring because you know the One who is making a way and can trust God to lead you through -Breath as Prayer by Jennifer Tucker
Amen!
Thanks for checking in today - Blessings!