A good word for these hot days. Ann Voskamp reflects on this verse from 1 Corinthians here: “When you’re finding it hard to be patient.” Get a cold drink and thank God for it and read her post for today.
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Revisiting old posts (4)
Many days I look through my old journal–which is mostly a quote journal–to find something to inspire me (or you). Today I did the same with my old posts here, looking for Amy Carmichael. Here’s one: Looking out the window.
First, we must cry out
Here’s a comforting take on the story of the road to Emmaus by Fr. David May from Madonna House:
The Gospel is the story of the two disciples on the road to Emmaus. They are discussing the events of the Lord’s passion and death when suddenly Jesus comes up and joins them on the way. They take him for a stranger and are astonished that he seems unaware of what has happened.
Have you ever had that experience? When it seems that Jesus Christ is the only one who doesn’t know what is happening down here!
“What things?” he asks. “What things?!”
In his wisdom, the Lord wants to draw out of his disciples all the pain and sorrow they are carrying. It seems that the Lord has more respect and understanding of our human nature than we do ourselves.
He knows our grief; he understands all our suffering. But he also knows that first we must speak our pain to him. First, we must cry out.
For how will we be able to hear what he has to offer until we do so? And he has far more to offer us than mere sympathy for our plight.
Fr. David goes on to speak of what Jesus offers to these disciples in pain, and what He offers as well to us:
He offers them more than sympathy because as the Risen Lord, he can offer them a hope they had not dared to imagine. He offers them a victory that comes only through suffering and death: Resurrection from the dead.
He will surely come:
In an instant, in the twinkling of an eye, the Lord can reveal himself, and after that, everything is transformed. In a second, at the breaking of the bread, he is recognizable to his disciples in Emmaus. And then he vanishes from sight!
This, too, is part of his mystery, of his unfathomable ways.
Keeping Him company
Following up on yesterday’s post, here is another quote from St. Paul of the Cross along the same lines:
I will try with all my strength to follow the footsteps of Jesus. If I am afflicted, abandoned, desolate, I will keep him company in the Garden. If I am despised and injured, I will keep him company in the Praetorium. If I am depressed and afflicted in the agonies of suffering, I will keep him company faithfully on the Mount, and in a generous spirit I will keep him company on the Cross with a lance in my heart.
Fill in the blanks for yourself: “If I’m _________, I will keep him company in the __________________” He is looking for you to be with Him during these days . . .
What is your suffering?
What is your suffering? Whatever it is, whatever its cause (including your own personal weaknesses), it can be joined to the sufferings of Christ this week. St. Paul of the Cross was a big advocate of this. Don’t let your personal sufferings separate you from Christ this week. Dealing with your tendencies to irritability or depression or anger is a real suffering. Let it draw you to Christ this week.
Paul connects all sufferings with the Passion, not only pain and distress but everything we do not naturally like. To make this connection, Paul looked at the different sufferings that Jesus not only endured, but accepted during his Passion: inner anguish, terrible fear and depression, abandonment by his friends, betrayal, deprivation of his freedom, injustice, lies told about him, excommunication, rejection by authority, especially by religious authority, bodily pain, utter fatigue, misunderstanding, helplessness, a sense of failure, the feeling of being abandoned by his Father, and finally death itself. (Spiritual Direction According to St. Paul of the Cross)
New every morning (repost)
Feeling a need for something from Amy Carmichael, so I browsed through my posts of hers, and I thought I would “re-share” this one with you: New every morning. Have a blessed day!
The grace of weakness
Lent is progressing. Already some of you are feeling discouraged, like you’re not living up to what you intended to do for Lent. You know, it’s really okay to feel weak and helpless, to feel that you’re never making any progress. In fact, that may be the best thing that ever happens to you. Fr. Dajzer writes: “Your weakness, inability, and helplessness will become a crack through which the grace of faith will squeeze into your heart.” Lent, as I’ve written before, is not really about getting “stronger”. Well, it is about getting stronger, but not in the world’s sense of the word. Our strength is in our weakness. “The might of God needs the weakness of man.” Consider this from Fr. Dajzer:
God, getting closer to man, weakens him. He does just the opposite of what we would expect.
You may believe that it is you who are approaching Him and that under those conditions you should become increasingly stronger and increasingly able to get along by yourself. However, it is He who is coming closer to you and His approach makes you weaker, physically, mentally or spiritually. He does this in order to dwell in you with His might, since it is your weakness that makes room for His might. When you are weak, you cannot trust in yourself, you cannot believe in yourself and then the opportunity comes for you to turn to Him and to desire to rely on Him. So often you shield yourself against this greatest grace, the grace of weakness, but St. Paul has already written: “for power is made perfect in weakness. I will rather boast most gladly of my weaknesses, in order that the power of Christ may dwell with me . . . for when I am weak, then I am strong” (2 Cor 12.9-10).
Don’t put everything away yet!
You can still celebrate Christmas for a few more days! Read this post from last January: “God loves to light little lights”
Days in Ordinary Time
Have a wonderful and blessed ordinary day! Seriously, think about what an “ordinary day” means as a Christian. An ordinary day means incredible things: that we are loved unconditionally and without measure by a God who will never fail us and loved us to death. Don’t let the glory get lost under the ho-hum.
Jesus, what made you so little? Love. (Thérèse)
Witnesses to Hope 