Michael Palandro
Michael Palandro is a retired Vineyard Pastor and Novitiate member of The Order of the Common Life

Michael is serving our community through stewarding the work of Lectio Divina. Michael has completed doctoral studies focusing on the origins and development of lectio divina. He helps individuals and communities lean into the work of lectio divina through Lectio4Life.

Lectio4Life is designed to inspire people to prioritize the personal reading of Scripture and adopt lectio divinia as a preferred approach to engaging Scripture

Lectio Divina
A Transformational Model * : Michael Palandro

 

“Lectio divina is a prayerful and meditative reading of Scripture employed to facilitate a transformative intimacy with God.” **

 

Lectio divina is a holistic, relational, and conversational process designed to facilitate a meaningful and transformative encounter with God through the Scripture.

 

READY (Invocatio) Create a conversational space. Acknowledge God – his lordship, friendship, & presence. Surrender preoccupations. Invite the Spirit to make you attentive to the text, perceptive of its significance, responsive to the invitation, and receptive to being captivated and apprehended by God and his truth.

 

READ (Lectio) Read a brief passage of Scripture several times in a translation that resonates with you. What captures your attention intellectually or emotionally? What seems potentially meaningful to you?

 

REFLECT (Meditatio) Engage with the mind and emotions. Consider what you see and hear and why it is important. Pay attention to biblical connections, memories, and feelings that arise. What seems personally significant for you, and why? What is God’s invitation to you? Is it an offering or a request?

 

RESPOND (Oratio) What do you want to say to God in response to what you are hearing? Respond from the heart – express your desires, feelings, and convictions. Pray: “Impart in my life what you have revealed in your word. “

 

RECEIVE (Contemplatio) Allow yourself to be captivated by the truth and beauty that is being revealed of God and his Word. Freely express your gratitude for his presence, love, and empowering grace. Review Write down some things that were important to you from the encounter with God and the text.

 

RESOLVE (Operatio) Resolve to live into what you have learned and experienced. Pray that this encounter will deepen your union with God, transform you more into his likeness, and free you to partner with the Spirit as he works in your world. Ask God to grace you to read him in your day just as you read him through the Scripture - that you will be attentive, perceptive, responsive, and receptive of his presence and activity in your day

 

* Adapted by Michael Palandro from M. Robert Mulholland, Jr., Invitation to a Journey, Ruth Haley-Barton, Sacred Rhythms, and Charles Bello, Prayer as a Place.

**Adapted from Wilhoit and Howard, Discovering Lectio Divina: Bringing Scripture into ordinary Life, (IVP Books, 2012), 19.

Copyright © 2020 by Michael Palandro All rights reserved

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