Dusting for the Fingerprints of God
How Spiritual Direction Can Change Your Life
What does your story look like when you allow God to guide the narrative?
What happens when you stop relying on your own strength and begin trusting the infinite grace of a God who never fails?
Jesus offers us this quiet, persistent invitation:
“Here I am! I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in and eat with that person, and they with me.”
— Revelation 3:20 (NIV)
Spiritual direction is one way of opening the door.
It is a sacred practice of slowing down, listening deeply, and learning to recognize God’s presence woven into the ordinary moments of your life.
What Is Spiritual Direction?
Spiritual direction has been described in many meaningful ways:
“Recognizing God’s amazing work in us and among us in the ordinariness of human existence.” — Margaret Guenther
“The practice of holy presence and the gift of shared wisdom… to help us awaken as we journey so that we can recognize the sacred within.” — Rev. Dr. Barbara A. Holmes
“A relationship between two people for which the foundation is trust—trust first in the Spirit of God.” — Therese Taylor-Stinson
“A means of God to open the path to the inward teaching of the Holy Spirit.” — Richard Foster
At its heart, spiritual direction is about dusting for the fingerprints of God—learning to notice the subtle ways God is already moving, guiding, healing, and inviting you into deeper relationship.
It is a prayerful conversation with a trained spiritual companion in which you reflect on your experiences, emotions, desires, and questions. Together, you learn to discern how the Holy Spirit is speaking and where God may be leading you next.
What Spiritual Direction Is Not
Spiritual direction is not counseling, not life coaching, and not problem-solving. It is not about fixing your life or offering advice.
As Jen Kloss describes it:
“We insist that something is already happening, and God is already doing a good, beautiful, and holy (even if hard) work in the lives of those who come for direction. The director’s role is simply to help the directee notice God’s work accurately and respond to it vigorously, joyfully, and habitually.”
The spiritual director is not the expert in your life—God is.
The director simply offers presence, spaciousness, and holy listening so you can notice what God is already revealing.
My Philosophy of Spiritual Direction
Every spiritual director has a way of proceeding shaped by their experiences, training, and faith. Mine is grounded in love.
Ignatian spirituality is beautifully simple: it centers on God’s love and invites us to respond in love. I hold John 3:16 at the center of my theology and practice my faith through three movements:
Loving God.
Loving myself.
Loving others.
This framework shapes my understanding of both Ignatian spirituality and Black women’s spirituality, two streams that flow together because they share the same sacred foundation.
For me, love takes the form of holy listening.
One of the deepest expressions of love is listening—listening for God, listening to another person, listening to the movements of the soul. As one writer puts it, “Listening is a central element in spiritual direction, the required foundational skill.”
When we listen well, we make room for God.
An Invitation to Listen
Spiritual direction is not about having every question answered. As Henri Nouwen reminds us:
“To receive spiritual direction is to recognize that God does not solve our problems or answer all our questions but leads us closer to the mystery of our existence where all questions cease.”
And this is why I love the image of dusting for the fingerprints of God.
God’s fingerprints are already present—on your story, your decisions, your wounds, your hopes, and the places where you are learning to trust again. Spiritual direction simply helps you notice what has been true all along: God has been with you, is with you now, and will be with you in what comes next.
If you are longing for a sacred space to reflect, rest, and discern God’s invitations, perhaps this is your moment to explore spiritual direction.