Brother Lawrence is known for his book, “The Practice of the Presence of God.” This classic focuses on how to pray unceasingly with God throughout the day — even during times of work and suffering.
This year is the 325th anniversary of his death. Different sources say he was born anywhere from 1610 to 1614 and died in 1691.
He was born Nicolas Herman to peasant parents in Hériménil in the region of Lorraine, France. To escape poverty he joined the army, which guaranteed him meals and a small stipend.
At the age of 18 he had a spiritual conversion that changed his life. One day in the winter he gazed at a barren tree stripped of its leaves and fruit, but waiting for another season of growth. He compared himself to the tree. He was seemingly dead but God had life waiting for him. He understood for the first time the extent of God’s grace and the sovereignty of divine providence. At that moment, he said, the leafless tree “first flashed in upon my soul the face of God.” His love for God never ceased.
Thirty Years’ War
He fought in the Thirty Years’ War (1618–1648). After an injury left him crippled and in chronic pain, he quit the army. He worked briefly as a valet. According to his own words, he was a “great awkward fellow who broke everything.”
Believing he was not good at doing anything and as a form of self-punishment, he entered the Discalced Carmelite Priory, a monastic brotherhood, in Paris. Here he eventually became a lay brother. He took the name of Brother Lawrence of the Resurrection.
He spent most of his time working in the priory’s kitchen. He never advanced beyond being the cook, but he developed the spiritual gift of constant communion with God, which he called the “practice of the presence of God.”
To Brother Lawrence, the status of the task was not important but the motivation behind it.
“We can do little things for God,” he said. “I turn the cake that is frying on the pan for love of Him, and that done, if there is nothing else to call me, I prostrate myself in worship before Him, who has given me grace to work. … It is enough for me to pick up but a straw from the ground for the love of God.”
He developed a reputation for experiencing profound peace and visitors came to him for spiritual guidance. He passed on to them wisdom in conversations and in letters. By 1666, Cardinal de Noailles, Archbishop of Paris, had learned about Brother Lawrence’s unusual insight. He sent his investigator, Father Joseph de Beaufort, to interview Brother Lawrence who granted four interviews in which he described his way of life.
After Brother Lawrence’s death, his fellow monks found several pages of maxims or sayings, the only written material he had left. These, with the conversations and 16 letters, represent Brother Lawrence’s teachings.
In 1691 he died peacefully within days of writing his last letter. Joseph de Beaufort compiled his work in 1692 under the original title “Spiritual Maxims.”
“The Practice of the Presence of God” has greatly influenced generations of Christians, both Catholics and Protestants alike.
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