Overview

This topic invites you to explore the Quaker experience of spiritual transformation. Friends through the ages have believed that Spirit works to change us into women and men for whom the testimonies are more than ideas: that they actually become a way of daily life. The Light leads us experientially in becoming people who are peaceful, live simply, treat each person with dignity, and are more faithful. This transformative work comes not through our own efforts, but through the work of the Inner Teacher who leads, guides, and directs us.

Join the Spiritual Deepening mailing list to receive announcements about program updates.

Credits

Connie McPeak Green (LEYM) and Rex Sprouse (OVYM) – Content Collaborators
Anne Collins (SCYM), Sally Farneth (PhYM), Susan Hopkins (PacYM), and Erika Mittag (SCYM) — Materials for Children

Search Exercises

Browse Exercises

Grounding

Introduction to the Topic

Introduction

We Friends believe that the Inner Christ is at work molding us via every experience that comes our way.
View Introduction Exercise

Scripture

Ground your work in scripture. Quaker faith and practice can be compared and combined with a wide variety of other traditions such as Buddhism. But we will find our deepest and fullest reasonaces with the biblical Christian traditions that nurtured early Friends and with the Jewish traditions tha
View Scripture Exercise

Friendly Voices

Ground your work in the voices of Friends. Friends from George Fox to Bayard Rustin have written about Quaker faith and practice. What have Friends shared with us across the centuries?
View Friendly Voices Exercise

Videos and Podcasts

Learn from Friends near and far through video and podcasts. From informational histories, to instructional guides, to deep ministry, we can use these media to learn more and build community
View Videos and Podcasts Exercise

Queries and Questions for Worship Sharing and General Discussion

A query is a question for reflection. Queries can be used in worship sharing, discussions, or to prompt journaling or art activities.
View Queries and Questions for Worship Sharing and General Discussion Exercise

Practicing

Experiential Activities

Experiential Activities

Activities like yoga, labyrinths, and mandalas are designed to help focus and calm the mind and body. Explore what happens in your mind and your body when you try simple yoga poses or use a finger labyrinth.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Experiential Activities Exercise

Exploring turning over your life to be led by the Light, Seed, Christ working in you

In this activity, you will go through the process of choosing a daily spiritual practice and trying your practice for a period of time.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Exploring turning over your life to be led by the Light, Seed, Christ working in you Exercise

Walk in the Light

  • Duration: 15 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Walk in the Light Exercise

I Am an Acorn

Listen to or sing this song as you wonder about the meaning.
  • Duration: 15 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View I Am an Acorn Exercise

This Little Light of Mine

This lesson uses the book This Little Light of Mine, illustrated by E.B. Lewis to celebrate the special Light we all have inside us. We can make it shine in many different ways.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Preschool (ages 3-5)
View This Little Light of Mine Exercise

Forgiveness Garden

Explore the courage it takes to seek and share forgiveness by reading The Forgiveness Garden, by Lauren Thompson.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Forgiveness Garden Exercise

Gershon’s Monster

Explore what it means to make mistakes and ask for forgiveness by discussing the book Gershon’s Monster, by Eric Kimmel.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Elementary (ages 6-11)
View Gershon’s Monster Exercise

Enemy Pie

This lesson uses the book Enemy Pie by Derek Munson to explore finding commonality and making friends.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Elementary (ages 6-11)
View Enemy Pie Exercise

Allow the Light to Show You

In this spiritual practice, you will review your daily life and invite Spirit to illuminate, teach, heal, and guide you.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Allow the Light to Show You Exercise

Prayerful Listening

In this activity, you will invite a prayerful listener to witness and share your inward spiritual journey.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Prayerful Listening Exercise

Lives Transformed

In this activity, the Spiritual Deepening group members will come together to share their experiences after following daily spiritual practices for several weeks.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Lives Transformed Exercise

Sharing

Conversation Starters

Wondering About God

Use Wondering Questions to reflect on who and where God is.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Wondering About God Exercise

Inward Power

The Quaker understanding ... was guided by the Spirit directing us to the inward experience that is found in worship.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Inward Power Exercise

Places of Power

Take a tour of the places of power and beauty that are found on the earth and within each of us by reading and wondering about the book Places of Power by Michael DeMunn.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Places of Power Exercise

Meet Jesus

This lesson uses the book Meet Jesus: The Life and Lessons of a Beloved Teacher, by Lynn Tuttel Gunney, to share the life of Jesus as a wise teacher and the lessons we can learn from how he lived his life.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: Elementary (ages 6-11)
View Meet Jesus Exercise

The Good Seed

Create and share art that represents the "seed" that God sews in your heart.
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View The Good Seed Exercise

To Swim in The Life

Consider what it means to live in God's life and power through quotations and stories.
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View To Swim in The Life Exercise

Rhythms of the Inner Life

In this activity, Friends will reflect upon the rhythm and flow of the work of the Inward Teacher.
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Rhythms of the Inner Life Exercise

Painting the Light

Explore the spirituality of art and the art of spirituality.
  • Duration: 45 minutes
  • Age Range: All Ages
View Painting the Light Exercise

I come up in spirit through the flaming sword

Reflections on a passage from the Journal of George Fox which considers moments of Fox’s spiritual encounters with Truth.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View I come up in spirit through the flaming sword Exercise

Meeting for Worship as an Opportunity for Inward Transformation

An introduction to the experience of the young Samuel Bownas, who would become a faithful and effective traveling Quaker minister in the 18th century.
  • Duration: 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Meeting for Worship as an Opportunity for Inward Transformation Exercise

Transformed by the Light

Friends will read and reflect upon stories of people who have opened their lives to transformation by Divine Guidance, Christ Within, the Inward Light, and will consider their own willingness or resistance to obedience to the Inner Guide.
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Age Range: Middle School and Up
View Transformed by the Light Exercise

Opening to Transformation, Asking Hard Questions

Friends will reflect upon a lecture by a contemporary Quaker writer that challenges us to reclaim the experience of early Friends who were transformed by the Inward Light, Christ, the Seed, working in them.
  • Duration: 1 hour 30 minutes
  • Age Range: High School and Up
View Opening to Transformation, Asking Hard Questions Exercise

For Children

The Light, Seed, Christ Working In Us for Children

Readings for children that remind them that God is always with them to help them find their way.
View The Light, Seed, Christ Working In Us for Children Exercise
✕
Translate »