Right here at the threshold of Lent I want to get rid of the idea that it is up to me to convince God to love me. He is trying to convince ME to let him take over my heart and transform my desires and surrender myself entirely to his tender power.
“Give Me the joy of helping and transforming you. Surrender everything. Let yourself go. Tell Me often about your great longing. Do you think I could resist? That would be to misunderstand Me. If you are generous, how much more am I. You know the violent wind? The bird of prey? I too carry off. I am the Ravisher. Don’t struggle. And because you let yourself be taken captive, I’ll bring you into My secret garden among the flowers and fruit. You will wear the wedding ring on your finger. Your step will be in tune with Mine, and I’ll stoop down to your littleness so that we may talk together easily. How beautiful it will be like that My friend, My little soul.”
Jesus words to Gabrielle Bossis in He and I, page 60.
Sometimes we feel we’re slogging along in the spiritual life, trying to figure it out as we go along. First steps are important, and, perhaps, each day such first steps should be taken again….
“Our first lesson should be a realization of our incomplete and imperfect condition, and our first step should be toward Jesus, who is our consummation. In this search for Jesus, in this adherence to Jesus, in this continual and profound dependence upon Jesus, lie our life, our rest, our strength, and all our power of action. Never must we act except united with him, directed by him, and drawing life from him….”
Cardinal Pierre de Bérulle, founder and first general of the Congregation of the Oratory of Jesus Christ, quoted in The Whole Christ, by Emile Mersche, SJ
Shortly after her birth I met my new great-niece. She was just five weeks old and a bundle of joy for everyone around her. I saw clearly, however, as she cried out whenever she was in discomfort, how she was also a bundle of intense needs.
She cried when she was hungry. She wiggled and whimpered when she needed to be changed. She wailed when she was uncomfortable in the arms of someone other than her parents. The wired, tired cry told her parents that she was too tired to even settle down for sleep. With her little lungs she made it quite clear to everyone when she was in need.
I heard these words in my heart:
“You are just as helpless, and lovely, and loved as this tiny baby. She isn’t doing a single thing to ingratiate herself to anyone, other than to just be. Yet she is so endearing as she expresses what she needs and her parents jump to be there at her side, providing what she can’t provide for herself.”
“Accept your neediness and My Love….”
It takes a huge act of courage to tell someone we need something. We might be refused. We might be rejected. We might be ridiculed for what we can’t do ourselves. This dynamic, familiar to us all, looks one way as kids and another way when we are in the height of our adult years, and still another when we are in our senior years. To admit we can’t do something that is essential to a job we hold is risky. To admit we can no longer accomplish what is required for basic daily living may feel humiliating. To surrender what we really want to happen for ourselves or for another could feel like failure. Only the courageous are willing to be as honest as a baby about what they are undergoing, feeling, and needing.
One thing that will help you become the Child you are…
Tell God what you need, what you are experiencing, what’s happening to you and the way it makes you feel about your own worth, your past, your future….
Don’t be afraid to wail in the night. Be courageous and make your demands….
…and then listen….
In these moments of intense realness, you may find yourself coming face-to-face with a weakness or a wound that you are ready for the Holy Spirit to heal. There may be something that you realize you are ready to relinquish now. Perhaps you realize it isn’t as important as it was. The tears and wrenching regret may even be the space where you enter deeply into the fresh ground of your heart, prepared by Jesus for the seed of new life.
I cry out loudly to God, loudly I plead with God for mercy. I spill out all my complaints before him, and spell out my troubles in detail:
“As I sink in despair, my spirit ebbing away, you know how I’m feeling…” (Psalm 142 MSG)
He got into one of the boats, the one belonging to Simon, and asked him to put out a little way from the shore. Then he sat down and taught the crowds from the boat. When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, “Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.” Simon answered, “Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.” When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. So they signaled their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!” For he and all who were with him were amazed at the catch of fish that they had taken; and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.
Luke 5:1-11
Has your life—at least here and there—been so hectic that you couldn’t even think straight? We try to be intentional about reflectively moving through our day, but…sometimes…life happens.
In the scattered moments, in the topsy-turvy schedules, in the frustration at not being able to be in three places at once, grace happens.
That’s what today’s gospel is about. Most of the time we focus on Peter’s experience when we hear this story. Jesus, however, is showing us all how he intervenes in our not-so-super days and calls us to something deeper.
When things aren’t going as well as we’d want… (Peter fished all night and had nothing to show for all his work.)
Jesus shows up and asks if he can slip into our life precisely in the area that isn’t going well. (Jesus got into Peter’s boat and started teaching the crowds along the shore. I’m sure Peter was tired and perhaps wasn’t exactly delighted that he couldn’t finish cleaning the nets and go home to sleep.)
Then Jesus asks us to do something that we can’t do on our own… (In the fishing industry in Biblical times, fishing nets were made of flax or linen. Most fishing was done at night so that fish would not see and swim around the nets. Peter knew very well that fishing in the day wasn’t going to work since the fish would see the nets.)
We surrender to Jesus and set aside what we know or desire and do as we are asked…. (“Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.”)
Jesus shows us that he is the one who brings about fruitfulness in ministry. We are only co-workers. He is the one in charge. He knows what he is doing. We can trust him. (When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break.)
Amazement at what is clearly not our doing, leads to humility and trust… (They filled both boats, so that they began to sink. But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, “Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!”)
Jesus takes us deeper, opening up a call to more amazing things if we throw our lot in with him… (Then Jesus said to Simon, “Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.” When they had brought their boats to shore, they left everything and followed him.)
This pattern is repeated throughout the Gospels. He tells his apostles to feed the crowd of 5000 themselves, the disciples are unable to heal the boy possessed by a demon, the apostles run away when the soldiers and Judas enter the Garden of Olives, Peter betrays Jesus….
This pattern is a beautiful lens through which to understand the way in which Jesus enters into the difficult passages of your life and shows you the amazing things that he wants to do with you.
We can admit we need help and ask for it. And trust. And be at peace.
Image Credit Raphael, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Praying with this Passage of Scripture
Lectio Divina is a way of listening to God as he speaks in his Word. It is a practice of communicating with God through Scripture and attending to God’s presence and what he wishes to tell us. In this slow and prayerful reading of the Word of God, we allow ourselves to be transformed by the Spirit who forms us into the image of Christ. There are four movements in Lectio Divina: Read (lectio), Meditate (meditation), Pray (oratio), Contemplate (contemplation).
Begin by finding a still space to pray. Breathe deeply and become quieter within. Abandon any agenda, worries or thoughts you bring to this prayer and entrust these things to the merciful care of God. Ask for the grace to be receptive to what God will speak to you through this Scripture reading. Grant me, Jesus Divine Master, to be able to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God and your unfathomable riches. Grant that your word penetrate my soul; guide my steps, and brighten my way till the day dawns and darkness dissipates, you who live and reign forever and ever Amen.
Read (lectio) Begin by slowly and meditatively reading your Scripture passage out loud. Listen for a particular word or phrase that speaks to you at this moment and sit with it for a time.
Pray (oratio) Read the text a third time. Listen for what God is saying to you. Speak heart to heart with God. Notice the feelings that this conversation with God raises up within you. Share with God what you notice about your response to this conversation. You may wish to return to repeating the phrase quietly and gently, allowing it to permeate you more and more deeply.
Contemplate (contemplatio) Read the text a final time. Now be still and rest in God’s embrace. Ask God to give you a gift to take with you from this prayer. You might ask God if he is inviting you to do some action, for instance, make some change in your thoughts, attitudes or reactions, in the way you speak or how you treat others. Thank God for this gift and invitation as you conclude your prayer.
He began to teach them many things in parables, and in his teaching he said to them: “Listen! A sower went out to sow. And as he sowed, some seed fell on the path, and the birds came and ate it up. Other seed fell on rocky ground, where it did not have much soil, and it sprang up quickly, since it had no depth of soil. And when the sun rose, it was scorched; and since it had no root, it withered away. Other seed fell among thorns, and the thorns grew up and choked it, and it yielded no grain. Other seed fell into good soil and brought forth grain, growing up and increasing and yielding thirty and sixty and a hundredfold.” And he said, “Let anyone with ears to hear listen!”
Mark 4:1-20
When I was newer to the pilgrimage of the spiritual life, I heard mainly one verse of this passage: the good soil. I wanted to be good soil and I wanted the seed to bring forth a hundredfold! Or more!
Now in my midlife, I realize that all these various “soils” make up my soul. There are parts of my heart and my mind that I know very well. I have to admit, also, that there are other parts that are completely unknown to me. And in between there are vast expanses of my self-knowledge that are a confusing mixture of openness and resistance, longing and fear, clarity and confusion.
God loves all of my story with all of its glory and all of its messiness.
The spiritual life, it could be said, is the work of grace by which God turns the unknown resistant parts of our soul into known, open, and vulnerable spaces that we offer to him, the interior world where the Word can take root and transform us from the inside out. We are this moving frontier between what we know of ourselves and what we shall become, through the lifting up and purification of what is still unknown.
These days, I am most grateful for the ways in which Jesus reveals to me the hardness of the rocks that prevent his Word from taking root and thriving for his glory. I am relieved when he shows me the attitudes and behaviors that choke off the possibilities of living in the life of the Trinity in its fullness. I am sorry that I have kept the Lord waiting so long as I chased after things that I thought would fill my soul, or at least my time. My heart longs to create a new solitude to keep my soul off the rocky pathway and sheltered in his Shepherd’s arms.
The hope that we can achieve complete self-knowledge once and for all, and be completely available to God’s grace, now and forever, is a fiction. Everyday we are growing and changing and responding to what is developing around us. Where one day we are open, on the next, if a wound has been touched, we may close down defensively. All we can do is entrust ourselves to Jesus, desiring to be good soil that is responsive to the gift of his Word as best we can, and work gently to remove the stones and thorns and to shelter ourselves in his love.
Lectio Divina is a way of listening to God as he speaks in his Word. It is a practice of communicating with God through Scripture and attending to God’s presence and what he wishes to tell us. In this slow and prayerful reading of the Word of God, we allow ourselves to be transformed by the Spirit who forms us into the image of Christ. There are four movements in Lectio Divina: Read (lectio), Meditate (meditation), Pray (oratio), Contemplate (contemplation).
Begin by finding a still space to pray. Breathe deeply and become quieter within. Abandon any agenda, worries or thoughts you bring to this prayer and entrust these things to the merciful care of God. Ask for the grace to be receptive to what God will speak to you through this Scripture reading. Grant me, Jesus Divine Master, to be able to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God and your unfathomable riches. Grant that your word penetrate my soul; guide my steps, and brighten my way till the day dawns and darkness dissipates, you who live and reign forever and ever Amen.
Read (lectio) Begin by slowly and meditatively reading your Scripture passage out loud. Listen for a particular word or phrase that speaks to you at this moment and sit with it for a time.
Pray (oratio) Read the text a third time. Listen for what God is saying to you. Speak heart to heart with God. Notice the feelings that this conversation with God raises up within you. Share with God what you notice about your response to this conversation. You may wish to return to repeating the phrase quietly and gently, allowing it to permeate you more and more deeply.
Contemplate (contemplatio) Read the text a final time. Now be still and rest in God’s embrace. Ask God to give you a gift to take with you from this prayer. You might ask God if he is inviting you to do some action, for instance, make some change in your thoughts, attitudes or reactions, in the way you speak or how you treat others. Thank God for this gift and invitation as you conclude your prayer.
“Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel; for he has come to his people and set them free. He has raised up for us a mighty Savior, born of the house of his servant David….
You, my child, shall be called the prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his way, to give his people knowledge of salvation by the forgiveness of their sins. In the tender compassion of our God the dawn from on high shall break upon us, to shine on those who dwell in darkness and the shadow of death, and to guide our feet into the way of peace.”
Luke 1:67-79
Let me begin by sharing with you one of my pet peeves: the jingle—Jesus is the reason for the season. Jesus is not the reason for the season. Jesus is the reason for everything. Jesus is the center of all things and of all time, and through him we are brought into communion with God for all eternity.
It is absolutely too small for Jesus to simply be the reason for the Christmas season, as if we were trying really hard to keep the Christmas celebrations focused on their real meaning.
We need to keep reminding ourselves that Jesus is the reason for the season only when we don’t live centered around him as our ultimate reason for existence at every moment of the year. If we did, Christmas would be an intensification of the glory we give Christ every day of the year.
Zechariah had spent nine long months waiting for his son’s birth. They were nine silent months since the day he had been struck dumb by the Angel Gabriel when he wanted to know how he could be sure that what was promised him would actually come to pass. He had nine whole months to reflect on what the angel had said to him about his son: Many will rejoice at his birth…. He will be great in the sight of the Lord…. He will be filled with the holy Spirit…. He will go before the Lord in the spirit of power of Elijah to prepare a people fit for the Lord….
Day after silent day, the aged priest pondered the scriptures and the words of the angel spoken to him that day in the Temple. The silence whispered through his soul and ever so gradually he came to see that his whole life revolved around the Messiah. His fatherhood, a gift bestowed when he was an old man, was geared toward preparing for the Messiah. His child’s entire life would be dedicated to making way for the one who was promised to Israel.
When his lips were opened after the birth of his son, Zechariah burst forth in a canticle that proclaimed that Jesus was the reason for his child’s whole life. Jesus is the daybreak from on high who has visited his people and brought them redemption. He is the light that has shone in our darkness where we walk in the shadow of death, and through his life, death, resurrection, and ascension he has guided our feet into the path of peace. “And you, child, will be called prophet of the Most High, for you will go before the Lord to prepare his ways.”
Jesus is not the reason for the Christmas season. Zechariah shows us that Jesus is the reason for everything. The day after Christmas the world will get bored, Christmas songs will vanish from the radio, and retail stores will turn over quickly to the next commercial feast day. But you, do not forget that Jesus is the reason for your very life, the purpose of your existence, and he offers you the promise of eternal glory, every moment of every day, next year and every year after that.
With Zechariah cry out all year: “Blessed be the Lord, the God of Israel, for he has visited and brought redemption to his people.”
Image: The child Jesus and John the Baptist; Bartolomé Esteban Murillo, Public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
Praying with this Passage of Scripture
Lectio Divina is a way of listening to God as he speaks in his Word. It is a practice of communicating with God through Scripture and attending to God’s presence and what he wishes to tell us. In this slow and prayerful reading of the Word of God, we allow ourselves to be transformed by the Spirit who forms us into the image of Christ. There are four movements in Lectio Divina: Read (lectio), Meditate (meditation), Pray (oratio), Contemplate (contemplation).
Begin by finding a still space to pray. Breathe deeply and become quieter within. Abandon any agenda, worries or thoughts you bring to this prayer and entrust these things to the merciful care of God. Ask for the grace to be receptive to what God will speak to you through this Scripture reading. Grant me, Jesus Divine Master, to be able to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God and your unfathomable riches. Grant that your word penetrate my soul; guide my steps, and brighten my way till the day dawns and darkness dissipates, you who live and reign forever and ever Amen.
Read (lectio) Begin by slowly and meditatively reading your Scripture passage out loud. Listen for a particular word or phrase that speaks to you at this moment and sit with it for a time.
Pray (oratio) Read the text a third time. Listen for what God is saying to you. Speak heart to heart with God. Notice the feelings that this conversation with God raises up within you. Share with God what you notice about your response to this conversation. You may wish to return to repeating the phrase quietly and gently, allowing it to permeate you more and more deeply.
Contemplate (contemplatio) Read the text a final time. Now be still and rest in God’s embrace. Ask God to give you a gift to take with you from this prayer. You might ask God if he is inviting you to do some action, for instance, make some change in your thoughts, attitudes or reactions, in the way you speak or how you treat others. Thank God for this gift and invitation as you conclude your prayer.
Touching the Sunrise 