MADAME GUYON (1648-1717)
NOTHING WAS more
easy to me now than to practice prayer. Hours passed away like moments, while I
could hardly do anything else but pray. The fervency of my love allowed me no
intermission….So strong, almost insatiable, was my desire for communion with
God that I arose at four o’clock to pray.
These are not words one would have
expected to hear from the young woman who grew up to become the saintly mystic
we now as Madame Guyon. Born into the pleasure-seeking class in France during
the reign of Louis XIV, Mademoiselle de La Mothe (Jeanne Marie Bourvieres) possessed
unusual beauty. As her mother lavished upon her clothes, jewelry and the things
of the world. Jeanne read romance novels and spent hours looking at herself in
the mirror. When she as 15, the La Mothe
family moved near Paris where Jeanne continued to climb the social ladder.
Amid the social whirl of Paris,
Jeanne married M. Jacques Guyon, a wealthy invalid 23 year her senior. The
marriage was unhappy from the beginning, and thus Madame Guyon began to finally
seek her true happiness in God. She was rewarded with a deep sense of God’s salvation
and presence, and after a mystical experience while walking the river Seine,
she wrote,
"From this day, this hour, if it be possible, I will be wholly
the Lord’s. The world shall have no portion in me." In the years that followed, trouble mounted
for Madame Guyon. She went through what St. John of the Cross called the "dark
night of the soul," her husband and young son died, a severe case of small
pox left her face disfigured, and she was persecuted and imprisoned in the
Bastille by the clergy for what they believed to be her heretical religious
views.
Through all this, Jeanne Guyon prayed with Job. "The Lord gave and
the Lord hath taken away. Blessed be his name." He contribution to
devotional literature was prodigious during those years. The poems, hymns and
books she authored have touched thousands down to the present day, including
Watchman Nee, Francois Fenelon, Hudson Taylor and John Wesley. The shallow
social butterfly had become a woman of great spiritual substance by the time
she died in 1717.
Guyon outlined her method of
praying
Scripture in her book.
Experiencing
the Depths of Jesus Christ, also known as A Short and Very Easy Method Prayer. She recommended the practice of reading the
Bible very slowly, tasting and digesting each verse, a line at a time, moving
on only after extracting the essence of the passage. The result of this practice: "The Lord’s
chief desire is to reveal himself to you and, in order for him to do that, he
gives you abundant grace. The Lord gives you the experience of enjoying his
presence. He touches you, and his touch is so delightful that, more than ever,
you are drawn inwardly to him."
Janet
Irene Thomas
Playwright/Screen
Writer/Director
Published
Author/Gospel Lyricist &Producer
FOUNDER/CEO
Bible Stories Theatre of
Fine & Performing Arts
