Sitting at the Feet of Christ

Here I sit at the foot of Christ, what do I see?  The world looks different from down here.  I am low and prostrate.  All others tower over me.  When I look at the world, I see it but always with cross in view.  Sitting here I am so close to my Beloved that I can kiss His feet.  His poor, bloody dusty feet.  As I look at the world from this vantage point I both see just how much He loves me and recognize I put Him there.  The blood from His wounds colors my vision.  I should see the world throughHis sacrificial love.  How can I say no while I see His yes?  How can I hate as I look past ultimate love?what do you see, sitting at the foot of the cross?

The Divine Spark Within

If I believe that God dwells in those around me, then I must believe that God dwells in me as well. I look for the divine in people and see it daily but I don't even look for it in myself.  I know my sins, I know the selfishness and cruelty in me.  I know I am jealous and impatient, but still it must be there.

If I sin and still believe the divine spark to be in me then it must be that way for everyone.  Sinners have God within them and the Godly have sin.  We are all this crazy mix of sin and divinity.  At times I think the Godly are those who know this and accept it while the sinner steadfastly refuses to believe either that they sin or that they have the divine spark.  Maybe this is our journey, to accept who we are and so not be as ruled by sin.  If we aacept this in ourselves then we can accept and love others.

Seeing Christ in Everyone, yes Everyone

I try really hard to see Christ in those around me and those who aren't.  I must admit it is pretty easy to love those who love me and to see Christ in those I like or understand.  I can even love the enemy far away, but loving the person who doesnt think like I do but who is close is impossible for me by myself.  I am going to need Gods help with that.

I have met a person whose ideas on God are so alien to my own.  He uses God as a club to beat others over the head.  He isn't the kind of person I would choose to be near or to talk to and that is wrong.  I prefer to talk to those who agree with me because that is comfortable, but he is the one I need to talk to.  He needs to see and understand the God of Love I know.  I need to pray for him.  God keeps throwing him in my path and I keep skirting him.  I need to stop that.  I tell others you know it is the will of God when it truly isn't your will, all else is suspect.

Discouraged

Tonight I am discouraged by those around me who call themselves followers of Christ but who allow their fear of others to lure them into hate and to dehumanize others while calling themselves Prolife.  How can I look at another person and say they are excluded from Gods love while I know what is in my own heart?

I am so tired of all the outrageous partisan things people are saying.  Have we all lost our minds?  Each and everyone of us is a child of God.  Even if I don't like someone and what they believe, if I lie and say things that are not true or exaggerated about them I am committing a sin and making my Beloved sad.  I must make truth, real truth, no matter how scary or painful my goal.

If I believe in God, in heaven, I should never be afraid to be as loving as He was.  He gave Himself for me, I have to be willing to do the same.  Sort of the opposite of the jihadist, willing to die in love, not willing to take another life, to love, truly love them.  To allow God to lead me in His love where He will.

Courageous Love

More and more I find myself called to a life of love.  Simply that.  To live every moment of my life as a conduit of the love of God.  I fall short of this ideal so many times in a single day I lose count.  Prayer is what I need, for myself so I can be changed into the image of the Beloved, for others, especially those around the world and here at home who advocate hate or fear.

We believe in God, we believe in Heaven, what do we fear other than change?  If we were already a nation built on Christian beliefs we would be a nation of radical love not a nation of selfishness and the world would be transformed.  We are not that nation, but we can get there with God.

Pray more than ever for our world.  If you don't pray start, if you do pray double the prayers you pray.  Be careful who you pray to, if your prayers are full of mistrust and hate you may not be praying to the Beloved.

What to I have the Courage to do for Christ

Would I even have the courage to die as a martyr for Christ?  Would I have the courage to suffer for Christ in a real and tangible way?  Do I have courage lose my home and incur ridicule for the Beloved?

 When I talk of being a martyr I am not talking about the kind of false martyrs we see today in the news who kill others.  I am talking about stepping out of my normal life in love and not worrying about my physical life.  The funny thing I might be willing to do that in an instant to save the life of someone else but the part where I lose things like my home and am ridiculed is harder for me.  Sustaining suffering for what I believe in is to me more noble than the instant sacrifice.  The long suffering for love that leads to sacrifice knowing no one will hold you up as a herois impossible without God for me.

Leaving Room for the Holy Spirit

For me, this is the best time of the day.  I try to turn down my inner voice and listen to the Holy Spirit.  If I am lucky whole thoughts will come to me unbidden and unplanned.  At other times a thought comes knocking on my skull and I have to sit down and write it out.  Quiet time is the way I prefer to start my day.  I end my day in structured prayer, reciting the Rosary or Devine Mercy.  Even then as I drift off if I am lucky again the Holy Spirit takes over and guides my dreams.  Making time and room in my life for Holy Spirit is a gift I give myself.  Without my life would hectic and full of worries.  Instead my day starts and ends in peace making the rest of the day blessed.

Where is God Leading me?

Advent is a journeying time.  We move from Ordinary time in to a time that is very focused on the coming of the infant Jesus into our lives.  It may not be a physical journey but it is a spiritual journey.  I think at times it is a journey that we actively persue a goal, getting read for the Christmas we want.  We prepare our hearts, say more prayers, go to daily Mass more often, that kind of thing

I think though if we let go and we simply sit still in the darkness and listen God will lead us on the journey He wants us to go on.  The way will simply open up for us, all we have to do is go.  It takes courage and humility to go on Gods path.  It usually isn't where we ever thought we wanted to go.  It isn't as showy and you may get many fewer public acknowledgements for it.  It may be something you didn't think you could do.

Luckily God is there to guide you and to give you the energy to do it.  He doesnt abandon us.  You may never know the fruits of your actions until the day you die.  But trust in God, the journey is a lot more exciting.

Chasing that Feeling

Sometimes I feel like I am chasing that feeling I had at the beginning when I first came to know God.  That feeling that He was so close at all times and I was filled with His love.  I literally lived in that love and the rest of the world had no meaning for me.

When I think back on it now it was a very selfish time in my life.  I prayed to get the good feelings and I felt that everyone was looking at me and could see how holy I was getting!  How silly I was.  I thought I was there but really these were just the first baby steps of my journey.  God was holding me up because I couldn't walk on my own.  I hadn't been sent on mission yet.

My relationship to God is different now.  It isn't chasing the next good feeling.  It is participating in a relationship.  I am more secure in my love for God.  I know He will never abandon me but I was a fraud I would abandon Him.  I don't worry about that now.  I guess it is the difference between falling in love with someone and loving someone.

To be honest, I do still miss those feelings

Accepting God's Love

How often do I reject God's love for me or refuse to see what He has done for me?  Everyday.  I am so afraid that if I let Him fill me up that I would , I don't know what.  He does so much for me,and he can do exactly what I ask for in prayer, but it isn't how I imagined it, I don't recognize it as His gift to me.  I expect to not get what I want, even if I only ask for what I need.  Luckily God doesn't do what we expect.

I nene to relax and except that the God of the universe loves me and wants me to be filled with His love and with His light.  Maybe that is the journey I am on this Advent.  Advent is our journey into accepting Christ coming into our lives.  He comes to us literally as the child Jesus and into our hearts if we let Him.

Saying Yes to God

Mary said yes to God as did the Apostles.  Saying yes to God leads to an extraordinary life.  Want adventure?  Want a challenge?  Say yes to God, He will lead you to places you never imagined.he will put you with people you didn't think you would like that you will come to love.  He have you do things you didn't think we're possible.  All you have to do is say yes and to go where He leads you.  It may be a different country or a different part of town.  He may lead you to convert strangers or your own family.  It may be a life of hard labor or a life of hard prayer. Say yes, and start your adventure.

Getting in the Christmas Spirit

I am not feeling so great about this Christmas and the silly thing is that it is for the most childish reason.  This year for the first time, we are not exchanging gifts as a family.  We are going to adopt a family.

Part of me really resents this because really we should be giving all year long and not just showering a family at Christmas with things that make us feel better.  My Franciscan fraternity runs a food pantry and feeds the homeless as well.  I want to do more but my family is happy with once a year things.  where did I go wrong?

The other, childish part of me, wants presents under the tree for me.  What about me?  Me, me, me!  Isn't that what Christmas is about.  The silly thing is we gave gifts under $5 and I will still have presents, but not as many.  This is what makes me upset, why do I feel this way?  Why am I so selfish?

Advent Refugee

It struck me today that as I startmy Advent journey along the road to Christmas, that I should keep in mind the refugees seeking a safety and a new home away from war and fear, especially those from Syria.  I think of the Holy Family who were refugees in Egypt seeking refuge from Herod.  I am a refugee in a very small sense from the hatred and indifference in this world.

Oddly enough I think I will find refuge in helping those who seek refuge.

Am I a Christian?

  What does it mean to be a Christian?  Does it mean someone who reads the Bible or someone who lives it?  Of course it has to be both, you can't just live it you have to know what it says but you can't just read it either, it has to be lived.  If we know all it says and that has no impact on our lives what good is the "Good Book"?

  I need to ask myself every day have I lived the teachings of Jesus Christ fully today?  Every day my answer will be no, in some way today I took the easy way out.  Today I was cruel or lazy or worse, indifferent.  I know I will never get it right, I will never give myself as perfectly as He did.  I may make some grand gesture but even then my reasons for doing it wont be pure, or secretly I will be hoping the person I offer it to will decline my offer.

  On the face of it I do a better job of living the Gospel then I do in my heart.  In my heart I want to be seen as being a great Christian, someone other people admire.  I want people to see what I do.  I want people to be impressed with the books I have read the speakers I have listened to.  I want to be seen praying by those who would think better of me for it and not by those who would find it weird.

Practical Relativism isn't Prolife

  Chapters 122 and 123 of the Pope's latest encyclical are profound.  Everything has to be convenient for me.  I will volunteer but only when it is convenient, I will donate to a cause, only when I have money that I don't want for something else I don't need.  I don't want to be inconvenienced saving our planet so instead I will wait and hope someone else does it or they invent someway of doing it that won't mean driving less often.  In the meantime I will just not believe in it.

It is convenient for me to buy a $5 tee shirt so I won't care about the working conditions of the people halfway across the world.  I like cheap food so I won't care about how farmers are effected by GMO crops or how that chicken was treated.  We treat people and living creatures like objects everyday.  How can we be Pro-life if we do this?

Encountering Jesus and Mary

This past Saturday was the anniversary of the death of a man I greatly respected, Dr Ed Shirley, theologian and professor at St Edwards University.  Ed used to tell a story of encountering Jesus and Mary on the bus one day that I always had a hard time with.  Jesus and Mary were homeless people who shared their breakfast with Ed.  On Saturday I had a similar encounter.

I was at Our Lady of Guadalupe parish in Austin for our regular Secular Franciscan meeting and I was outside with another Secular Franciscan when a man came by in some distress.  I don't know for sure what was wrong and he may have been high or sick.  We were having Mass so I got him a bottle of water and left it for him.  He had laid down and looked like he was sleeping.  I thought about him during Mass and prayed for him.

After Mass I got him some food and put out by the water.  We were praying a Holy Hour and I offered my prayers for him but still felt the need to do something else.  I went outside and pryed near him.  I have done this before but never have I done this and felt such peace.  Normally a battle is set up with whatever daemons are around the person.  After a while someone else walked by and spoke to the man who got up looking refreshed and they talked about the food he had there.  I waited and as I went back inside a woman approached me saying she had a young girl with her who was homeless and pregnant and did I have any food for her as well.  I said yes and got her some.

Our holy hour wasn't done so I went back inside and felt such grace wash over me I cried.  God does come to us in those close to us.

Pope Francis's New Encyclical is wholly Pro-Life

I haven't finished reading it yet but I am far enough through that I wanted to start blogging about it.  I would encourage you to read it yourself and not to rely on what you hear in the media or even on what I write about it.  Parts of it are difficult to unstand so have a dictionary handy.

By far my favite part is paragraphs 63 through 100, the biblical reasoning behind what the Pope is saying.  It is so beautiful and yet reminds us that we are stewards of Gods creation and that God loves all He created.  We are also reminded that we are responsible for all our actions.  Mindless consumerism that hurts someone half way around the world is still our responsibility.

The Pope lays out the case for global warming but the part I like the best is that he says even we are not the total cause for this shift we are still obligated to all we can mitigate the problem.  The polar ice caps are melting and so are the glaciers, we can't deny that.  This will effect people around the world and so we are obligated to do what we can and we can not just sit back and hope that technology will save us.

Even if a technical solution is found we still can't keep going with our materialistic way of living.  We can't insist that people half way around the world work as slaves to give us cheap clothing and cat food.  God obligates us to care for those people as much as we do those in our won country.  That to be Pro-Life means to love and care for all people.

Contemplating Christ as a Mirror

Have you ever been given something to do like read something or teach something and then realize that it was a gift from God?  I had that this month.  I am leading formation this month for those seeking to become Secular Franciscans in our area and the topic was the writings of St Francis ans St Clare and the biographies of the two saints.  Most people will read something like the Little Flowers of St Francis or one of the biographies of him, very few people chose to read any of Clare's writings or the biographies of Clare.

I decided that I would read her letters to St Agnes again, the really inspired me the first time I read them.  This time when I read them I decided to not skip the intros in each letter and to think about how Clare could write such nonsense at the start of her letters and then such beautiful things later.  I think the kinds of things Clare says about herself at the start of her letters, how bad and lowly I am but I would share that out loud with anyone!  I have to hide all that stuff, I can't own it, but she does.  Why do I hide who I am?  I think I even try to hide it from God by dazzling Him with doing things.

Clare asks Agnes to use Christ as her mirror.  I had done that in the past as an exercise to beat myself up.  I looked in the mirror and refused to see Christ in myself.  I pray every day to see Christ in those around me but I refused to see Him in myself.  How can I see Christ in the homeless or my coworker if I can't see him in myself?

So a couple days ago I did just that.  I sat down an gazed at the Beloved and looked for myself in His image.  It was hard, I had to both see that I am unworthy of His love and accept it at the sametime to see any of Him in me.  I know God loves me, and at times I have felt that love, but each time I handed that love back to Him saying, Oh Lord I am not Worthy.  I knew I couldn't earn His love and that I didn't have to but still because I could not love myself I couldn't accept the free unconditional gift of His love and see myself as a person who was worth loving.  Is it easy, no.  I have to continue to gaze in that mirror.

 The best part is I understand other people a bit better now.  The person who refuses to see Their own flaws doesn't do it because they love themselves so much but the exact opposite, they think they have to fight to cover all that up so they might trick others into loving them.   Also I get to share this with  our Franciscans in training, maybe I can convince some of them to try this exercise.  Try it yourself.

I can see now that God both knows and loves me.  He knows me better than I do and loves me much more than I do.  I have to accept both that I am imperfect and loved by God.

Christ as a Mirror - The Fourth Letter of St Clare to St Agnes

This is one of my favorite letters mostly because of the part about running with our Beloved and His embrace.  I took private vows at one point in my journey and renewed them every year and on the day I would read the Song of Songs.  I felt like I was truly the spouse of Christ on those days.

I also think that the contemplation of Christ as a mirror is one that is easier and more understandable to me, but Ina good way.  I think I got that contemplation wrong in the past.  I was holding up that mirroepr as a way to contrast myself with Him.  To chastise myself and berate myself.  I see now that isn't what Clare, a so loving mother was doing.  Clare is asking us to look in the mirror of Christ and see ourselves, honestly.  We should see that we are Christs brothers and sisters, there is a resemblance.  How can we see Christ in others if we can't see Him in ourselves?

The start of Clare's letters always seem strange to me.  We see Clare as a saint, almost someone unreal.  It is almost like a lie or a strange boast to write how imperfect she is.  We would never revel I our imperfections like she did.  But maybe because she sees her self honestly in the mirror of the Beloved. She knows herself and loves herself as she honestly is.  She knows she is saved by Him whom she adores, she isn't afraid of who she is.

Carrying Christ within us - St Clare's third letter to St Agnes

Wow!  What an idea, that we should spiritually carry the Beloved in our bodies at all times.  We take the Eucharist within us at least once a week, do we realize we are carrying the Lord within us?  What would it mean if we really contemplated the idea of carrying Christ within us at all times?  What would we have to change?

If we carry Christ within us we carry Him out to others in the world.  Can we be selfish or mean or just uncaring if we carry Christ with us?  To carry Christ within us would mean to carry Love with us at all times!  What Joy to carry love everywhere and to everyone!  We would have to look at each person the way the Beloved sees them, desiring always to be united with that person for eternity.

We would also have to look at ourselves with both love and honesty.  We would have to honestly see our faults and yet still love ourselves.  I that if we could honestly both see and love ourselves we could both honestly see and love those around us.  I think that looking at the world with Him would be to see the world as the thing He loving created and so not as something I would need to possess.

This will be my contemplation this week, but I think I will need to go to confession first.  The funny thing is I know He is already there, but I am the one not ready to recognize the fact.

Stay the Course - The Second Letter of St Clare to St Agnes

In reading the second letter of St Clare to St Agnes the theme that strikes me is to stay the course and don't let anyone dissuade you from that course.  The course is her life as a bride of Christ and living in poverty.  Agnes has given up a life in court and a chance to be married to the Emperor.  Instead she has chosen to live the life of the Poor Ladies of Assisi.

Clare tells her to walk this path of happiness tranquilly, joyfully, briskly, and cautiously. You can undstand the first three.  We are usually told to take whatever path we choose and run with it, but Clare also adds to walk that path with caution and to follow the Minister Generals advice over others.  Everyone these days tries, and back then as well, wants to tell us we don't need to do anything difficult to be a Christian.  There are those who say all you have to do is give your life to God and then live your life the way you want, all sins are forgiven.  If you have really given your life to God how can you lead your self centered life.  You life is Gods life now and if you are living for Him you can't just live your life your way.

Luckily for us, God's life is a life of love.  Clare Reminds us that this is a life contempt able to the world.  If your life is not contempt able to the world you maybe on the wrong path.  If you live a life of love, filled with Christ and not concerned with worldly things, the world will think you are a fool.  That is a good sign that you have chosen the path of happiness.

Clare ends her letter reminding us to spend time gazing on and contemplating Christ.  Without that it will be impossible for us to follow Him.  We will lose our way and the strength to continue.  Christ is both our guide and our strength.  He is literally the food for our journey.

Trusting in Christ - St Clare of Assisi's first letter to St Agnes of Prague

I am reviewing some of the writings of St Clare and St Francis this month because it is part of the formation of new Secular Franciscans and because as a Franciscan I need to from time to time.  Some of my favorite writings are the letters of St Clare to St Agnes.  They are so beautiful and full of truly passionate imagery.  From her letters you see that Clare was no repressed passionless nun, but a woman who's heart is full of love and passion for Christ.

In the first letter she explains to Agnes how she has chosen the better spouse.  She has given up the riches of Ceasar for the riches of Heaven.  This letter reminds me that detachment is not a giving up on the "good things" comfort, stability, self reliance, but a reliance on God.  If I rely on God, he will provide what I need and I don't need to worry about anything else.  The lack of worry then gives me freedom.  The lack of dependence on my self means that I can hold closer to God and respond quickly to what He asks of me.  The image of two fighters one clothed and one naked demonstrates this perfectly.  The naked hatred of the devil for us and all the worldly cares we clothes ourselves with hampers us in our fight with him.

I love the sort of poems embedded in the letter describing the Beloved and how He loves us and cares for us, they are like passionate love letters of any you g girl for her love.  We can love Christ that way.  We don't have to love Him in some detached distant, Oh yes, I love the Lord kind of way.  We can love Him deeply and passionately, and loves us in the same way.

I will continue to review the rest of the letters in the next week or so.  You can read all the letters at the link below.

http://www.franciscanfriarstor.com/archive/stfrancis/St_Clare_of_Assisi/stf_st_clare_of_assisi_writings.htm#The%20second%20Letter%20to%20the%20Blessed%20Agnes%20of%20Prague%C2%A0

Matt 28: 11-20 - Just How it Continues to Be

Starting with verse 11, chapter 28 of Matthew's Gospel talks about what happened when the guards found Jesus's body was gone.  The funny thing is that if the Chief Priests really felt completely sure that Jesus's body had been stolen would they have responded as they did?  I think they would have laughed at the guards and told them to away.  I think they doubted what they had done and feared it would be found out that they had killed the son of God.  They were so afraid they paid the soldiers to lie.

The same thing I think happens today.  Those who most fear that there is a God and that they have denied Him are the most outspoken that He isn't real.  Fear makes us do stupid and regrettable things. Those who mearly doubt but keep an open mind and seek are not the ones we need to worry about.  We should pray for those who fear there is Lord and calm their fears by showing them what a loving God He is.

"When they saw Him, they worshipped, but they doubted", this is us.  We can see Him, if we look, but even when we see, we doubt.  Doubt is not our enemy.  Doubt keeps us looking and seeking the Lord.  I think many of us, if we truly knew the Beloved was there in every moment we would grow bored with it, just like we do in our human relationships.  Having doubt doesn't keep the Lord from commissioning us either.  Just because you doubt sometimes doesn't mean that you have not been commissioned by God to proclaim the Gospel.

Why does God do that?  Why send out those who doubt?  I think most of us think that Saints didn't doubt. But if you read their own writings and the fantasy that is often written later, you find they did doubt.  Saints are humble, doubt comes with humility or humility comes with doubt, I think.  Those who are arrogant think they know everything, even God.  They make God in their own image and use that against other people.  Be happy you doubt, and seek the Lord always.

John Chapter 21.- Gods Love

This is by far my favorite Easter story.  As an addict I really identify with those who have fallen and how hard it is to seek forgiveness because of shame.  Peter so loves the Lord and is so happy at seeing Him that the joy and love over comes the shame.  Still once Jesus starts to question him it must have been painful.

Seeking forgiveness is painful at times, and I think that the more hurtful the sin the more shame is associated with it and the more painful it is to seek forgiveness and restoration, but when you do receive forgiveness the greater the relief.  If it wasn't that way, if it wasn't so difficult, I doubt the relief would be as deep and fulfilling.

The Lord doesn't just forgive Peter though, He forgives Peter and also gives him a job to do, leading the whole church.  God is often that was.  When we return to Him, He forgives us wholeheartedly and then sends us on a mission.  We all have a mission, we are all called to live our faith and to spread it.  Those who have been forgiven much are great ambassadors for God.  They know the Love of God, they have experienced that love.

We can only profess the Love of God if we know that love and live that love.  Belief in God is only the starting place, you have to love God and know He loves you to bring anyone else to God.  God is love, to know God you must know His love, you have to know His forgiveness.  If we don't spread the faith out of that love, we will fail.

1 John 5:1-6 Loving God, His Children, and His Commandments

How can keeping God's commandments show love for all His children?  This only works if we keep those commandments out of love and not legal observance and if we keep them all.  The two greatest are to love God with everything we have and to love our neighbor as ourselves andes Jesus loved us.   There are times when we as Christians forget this and go for the more legalistic view.  Legalistically keeping the Sabath and holding it over others is not loving so is it really keeping His commandments?  

If we start by loving God, getting to know Him, spending time with Him, having a relationship with Him, we should come to love all His creation.  By loving His creation without whole hearts we will want to keep His commandments out of love for God and His creation and it will not be burdensome.   

If we try to keep His commandments without coming to know and to love Him it will be a great burdon to keep them, because we will not love His creation.  This is the key, we do not obey God out of fear of punishment, but out of Love.  Our God is Love.  This is the only way that it is possible without becoming bitter and angry. 

 Those who keep the God's commandments out of fear or legalistically and not out of love will see those laws as slavery, keep them from what they want to really do out of spite.  When we see God's love and know God's love for us and love Him in return sin loses its glamour.  We want to love God and all He created with same love we are given.

Mary, why are you weeping?

Mary Magdalen was the first one to see the risen Christ, except maybe His mother.  How devoted was Mary!  The deciples are sitting in a room with door locked but Mary is at the tomb, crying.  She doesn't understand Gods will, she thinks that not only have they crucified the Beloved but now they have stolen His body.  She goes from following the Teacher and having so much meaning in her life to having it all taken away, or so she thinks.

The reality of the situation is so completely different, but she doesn't know, only God knows.  She thinks that she has lost everything, but I reality she has gained eternal life.  She thinks she has lost the Beloved, but in reality, He will never leave her again.  The angels ask her, Mary, why are you crying?  They know the will of God, and there are clues for her to see, but in her sadness she can't see them.  It  isn't until she turns around and see the Lord that she has any idea that things aren't what she thought they were.  Even seeing the Lord she has no clue how good things really are.

How often does this happen in our lives?  We lose a job, a house, a loved one and we think the world has come to an end.  We become ill or get hurt and our life changes and curse our bad luck.  But we don't know God's will for us.  We don't know what He will accomplish through us because of "bad luck" in our lives.  I have had cancer and lost people in my life to suicide.  I had a miscarrage that devastated me.  I became an addict.  All of these things were tragedies but they made me who I am.  They lead me back to God eventually with a much deeper faith and a fuller life.  I still wish those things didn't happen for the most part, but I see they made me less self centered and more compassionate.  We, like Job, can not fathom what God had done and is doing.  We have to have faith that in the end we will see God and then we will know.

Easter!

Oh happy day!  Our Lord and Savior is risen!  For most of the world Easter was over on Sunday, but for us it is still Easter, we have a whole 8 days of Easter and then more than a month of the Easter season.  During this season we should immerse ourselves in what Easter really means for us.

We need this time to be reminded of all that happened, to contemplate the events between Easter and Pentacost.  Take time during this season to contemplate each of the events that happen between the rising of the Beloved and Pentacost.  Meditate on them and what they mean to you.

My favorite story is when Peter and the Disciples are fishing and find Jesus on the shore.  The love shown by Peter and Jesus in their meeting overwhelms me.  This is truly what love looks like.  Even though Peter was embarrassed by what he had done, he runs back to God.  Peter knows he needs the Lord.  Jesus does berate Peter or demand an explanation, he simply askes Peter, do you love me?  Peter denied Jesus three times so Jesus asks Peter three times do you love me.  When you love the Lord, He gives a mission.  Peter was to lead the lead the church but if you run to the Lord and tell Him you love Him, He will send you on a mission as well.

If you love the Lord, He has a job for you.  It maybe leading the church that is your home if you have a family or He may be calling you to the priesthood or religious life or something else.  Please pray during this season and ask God what it is that He wants you to do for Him.  Open your heart to do things that are uncomfortable or scary.  Don't be afraid!  He loves you and wants what is best for you, he would never ask you to do something without giving you the tools to do it.  Take that leap of faith.

Holy Saturday - Waiting

Of all the days of Holy Week, this is the one that I find the hardest to contemplate.  I know to a much smaller degree about suffering and watching someone you love suffer, so I have some small comprehension of Good Friday.  Not only that but I can sit with my Beloved on Holy Thursday and Good Friday, I can walk the Way of the Cross.  Holy Saturday is different, this is the day He wasn't here.  Our Lord was with the dead.  It seems so lonely.

I imagine the Apostles, still traumatized by the day before, many of them unhappy with how they had behaved, missing Our Lord.  Unlike me they didn't know tomorrow would be a day of joy.  They must have wondered, Jesus had mentioned things, hints.  Did they dare to hope at all?  Our Beloved Mother must have been with them, did she know?  I imagine this was a day of mourning.

We all spend today preparing for tomorrow.  This is a day of bunnies and pastel colors.  We cook and get ready to wear our new Easter clothes.  We should take some time today to remember a day where Our Lord was in hell and there was no Eucharist anywhere.  We were physically alone again.  We had had the God of the universe here with us but we killed Him, we got what we wanted.  No one to remind us that we should do better.  No one to show us that love isn't all hearts and good feelings but pain and suffering too.  Today is the day the world was empty.

There are many people in this world who want Holy Saturday to be everyday.  They want a world without God, claiming it would be a better place.  It would be a place where we would act better just because we wanted to.  A place somehow with out all the things we have now.  I think like Holy Saturday, it would be empty and full of mourning.  The thing I do know though is that no matter what there would still be an Easter Sunday.

The Hour of Grace

The hour of grace is here.  Our Beloved is on the cross, arms stretched wide to hold the whole world. Blood and water gushes out for us, to baptise us in His mercy.  Our Lord literally washes us clean with his blood.  He gives Himself to us and for us.  His only cry as he suffers is for us, for Our Father to forgive us.  We should sit retched at the foot of the cross and thank Him for showing us how to love.  Love is something to held and hoarded for ourselves, love is to be poured out.  We are to be poured out.

Friday Morning

Here I sit in front of the tabernacle.  My day and the Beloved's day are so different.  I have to make cakes today for the Easter bake sale, He is waiting to go before Pilot.  I think I have done such a good thing, I waited here last night for a whole hour and a half last night and now I am here again this morning, He was beaten last night and not allowed to sleep.

Today I am worried I won't have enough time to do things around the house I need to do.  He will have the skin whipped off His body.  I will take a nap before coming back to the church, He will be led through the streets, bleeding and dying.  I will read a book and feel superior for having given Him so much of my day off, at least a couple of hours, He will die for me to save me from eternal damnation.

That is the difference between us.  I do nothing and think I am superior, He does it all and asks for so little.  What more can I do for Him, and how can I do it so as not to draw attention to myself?  Am I doing all this for show?  I do the easy stuff, the stuff others can see way too often.  His hands, feet, and side are pierced for me, what can I give Him?  What can I do for Him?  He suffered for me, why should I shrink from being inconvenienced for Him?

The Gift

Tonight we commemorate the second greatest gift that Our Lord gave us, the gift of staying with us.  The greatest gift I'd the gift of salvation, but I think the second greatest gift is His presence in our churches.

We can come to Him at anytime and lay our burdens at His feet.  He is there for us just to look at and talk to, and adore.  He also comes to us and joins with us when we receive Him.  If we allow it, he will transform us with His gift.

I will never forget the first Holy Thursday Mass I attended.  We never went to these celebrations as a family growing up.  The first time I saw the tabernacle empty and the alter bare, it was a violent act to me.  I cried so hard.  He was taken from me.  At that time we didn't set up an adoration area, it was just empty.  Have you ever gone into a church and the light wasn't lit?  It feels empty, the Beloved is missing.

That night I had a small idea of how it must have felt for the Apostles.  Of course, I knew how it turned out so it wasn't so bad, but still it hurt.  Now we don't have to be without Him, He is in a little side area tonight.  We should sit with Him.  Remember, the one who suffered all those years ago, who went through all we are about to recall, is sitting there.  In a different spot than usual but it is still the one who was whipped, stripped, abused, tortured.  He heard our cries to crucify Him then and he hears it now.  He hears it as the Passion is read and in how we live.

Sit with Him tonight and do not fall a sleep as the Apostles did.  Stay awake and visit with Him.  Say the rosary do the stations but also just sit and talk to Him and listen, and think of the Gift He left for us.

And so it Begins

Ever since I returned to my faith I have taken at least Good Friday off and sometimes the whole week of Holy Week.  I want to have the time to enter into and walk with the Beloved on this journey.  I want to stay with Him and meditate on what is going on.

I walk the way of sorrow with Him by myself so I can really meditate on each step.  I want to be near Him and share His suffering.  To just sit there with Him is a comfort.  A few years ago I was in Rome for Holy Week, there are thousands of small churches in Rome, from Holy Thursday until the Easter Vigil there are people in the churches waiting with Our Lord.  It was so beautiful.

 How often do we take time out of our busy lives to just sit with God?  Talk about fasting!  Fasting from food is the normal way we fast, and that is great, but why not also fast from being busy.  We spend so much time running around getting ready for Easter by cleaning house and cooking but how about preparing for Easter by prayer.

Don't run home tonight after Holy Thursday Mass.  Stay, at least an hour with Our Savior.  He is about to undergo the supreme trial and give His life to save yours, stay with Him, tell Him in your own words how much you love Him.  Don't run home and turn on the TV or play with you phone.  Stay with Him who loves you above all others.  Thank Him for all He has done for you, then sit silently and wait for Him to say something to you.

Detachment

We hear the word detachment all the time in the spiritual life.  To be detached is to not be owned by anything but God.  The moment I think that I am truly detached something comes up to show I may not be attached to the things I was but am now attached to something different.  I work to be detached from material things only to find I am now attached to praise for the things I do, or getting to the church first in the morning.  Oh how attached I am to the little number that says how many page views I have had.

For a long time this really bothered me, the idea that I traded one attachment for another.  I think I just gave up.  Then what happened is slowly, over time all the old attachments came back.  I think the attachment to material goods is the most distancing of all the attachments.  I have to spend money and there for time on acquiring what is new and I waste energy envying other people.  I get cut off.  I have all the old attachments as well.  I have had to go back and work at detachment.  Really I am working at reattaching my self to the Beloved and to him alone.  The more I sit with my Savior the less I need other things, and the happier I am.

This time I am really trying to not look at other people and what they are doing.  Sometimes I think we substitute doing for detachment.  I must be detached look at all I am doing!  If everyone would just do all I am doing everything would be great.  Blah, blah, blah....  Then the resentment starts.  If you ever find yourself resenting other people for not doing whatever it is you are doing, Stop!  Look at what and why you are doing what you are doing.  Most likely you are attached to something, good feelings, praise, whatever and are not really doing it for the Glory of God.

It amazing, when we do things for the wrong reasons anger or jealousy are the result.  If we do it for God and not ourselves peace is the result.  We aren't doing something wrong when we do it for the wrong reason we just need to learn to detach.  Prayer is the only remedy for the lack of detachment.  Only in prayer will we find peace.

Called to a life of knowing God

We all have the same calling.  We are all called to a mystical union with Christ.  We are all called to to a deep personal life in Christ.  We are after all, part of His body.  Every single person should work to develop this relationship with their creator so that He can also be our mentor, or Wonderful Counselor.  Simple wrote prayer is a great place to start but we need to move closer than that.  Imagine if your closest relationship was built only on reading poetry to each other.  Would you really know each other?

God of course already knows us and we can know of God from the Bible but we miss getting to know Him personally if we don't dialog with Him.  I miss it when my life gets busy and I cut out my prayer time.  Just sitting with Him quietly not talking.  Of course, what happens then, is that something happens and I run back to Him for help.  It isn't so much even an event happens or a trajedy but that life's stresses build up and have to lay them at His feet.  If I spend time everyday with Him that doesn't happen, I don't get stressed out.

I know too that when I spend more time with my Beloved I am a better person.  I am more connected to the love of God an I share that love better.  I am a more calm and centered person, less judgemental so I am a better representative of what a Christian should be.  I can not do it on my own. I need Him, always.

Prayer and meditation

The one thing I would like to give anyone I meet is the gift of prayer.  Not simply reciting wrote prayers, talking to and listening to God.  Sitting with God with an open heart and mind and letting Him lead you where He wants you to go.

I think the saddest life is the unexamined life where you never get to know yourself.  God will help you see yourself through prayer and meditation.  Learning to quiet your mind and just listen is a skill that has to be developed.  It is well worth the time it takes.  I fits and flashes God has shown me a lot about who I am.  Most of all He has shown me how I am loved.  Only a loving parent will correct you, others just walk away.

It takes time to learn to clear your mind so you can listen.  Start slowly.  Set aside time in a quiet place where you are comfortable and won't be distracted.  I would suggest having a book like Thomas Mertons New Seeds of Contemplation and a blank journal.  Read a short section from the book and then in journal restate what was said and then write how what was said applies to you and your life.  Then sit quietly for a time ask God to speak to you and try to quiet your mind.  To help you not think about things think about your breathing.  Have a word in mind, a quiet peaceful word, like Jesus that you can say to yourself if your mind wanders to bring yourself back.  At first it won't work and you will get frustrated so keep this time short at first.  As you go on though it will get easier.  Your mind will still wonder but in a different way.  Let your thoughts just unfold and watch them.

Another way to get started is to read a Bible passage instead of another book and put yourself in the story.  Really watch and listen and smell the world around you.  Think about the people in the passage and see what happens.  Write down your observations.  Again don't let yourself get distracted but do let thing unfold as they do.  Later think about what you saw and what God may have been trying to tell you.

One thing to keep in mind is that God is talking to you and really what he says to you is about you.  God will not tell you how other people need to act in these meditations.

Justice is Pro-Life

I have always felt that how you treat living people is part of being Pro-Life.  That you can't be pro-life and no pay someone a living wage or not treat them justly.  I think the events of this last year in places like Ferguson have proved that.  You wonder why a young man heading to college would react the way he did to being pulled questioned by a policeman.  Now that we know that people have had their lives ruined by simple things like traffic violations I think I understand more.

The injustice of a system that charges fines to make money for a town and where the fines are not on a sliding scale based on income is not pro-life.  When lives are ruined, jobs lost, homes lost, jail time given, for traffic fines and jay walking the people of a town come to fear the police.  People who fear the police are going to make bad decisions I. A time of stress that could cost their lives or the lives of the policeman.  Both lives count.  On a different level, simply not killing someone is not rejecting their life.  Not allowing abortion or euthanasia is not what it takes to live a pro-life life.

Respecting life means just that.  Respect life from conception to grave and we won't have to worry so much about the other things.  Making sure that people can provide for themselves and helping them when they can't is Prolife.  Being fair and just to everyone, no matter their skin color, and especially to the poor, is Prolife.

I recently had a tail light go out and got a warning for it.  I heard on the radio the story of a woman in Ferguson who had the same problem.  Her life was torn apart by having a tail light out.  I got a warning for the tail light, expired inspection and not having my insurance cards available.  She got a ticket for her tail light being out in each small town she drove through on her way to work.  She is a working Mom and can't afford the multiple tickets for each city and can't take off work to beg for mercy.  The tickets cost her a job trying to get mercy that she didn't receive and so she had a warrant out for her arrest.  For a tail light and a lack of mercy.

Injustice causes revolutions as we have seen recently in Middle East.  Many of the Western Young people who have their homes to fight have from areas do great unemployment and injustice.  Those young people most likely go to their deaths and go to cause death for others, they bear full responsibility for their actions, most of their neighbors don't take this path.  But do the people who refuse to hire them because of their last name or where they live bear some responsibility.  Maybe not legally, but about in God's eyes?

Think of the number of lives lost to slavery in our own country.  The lives lost in capturing human beings, those lost in the middle passage, those lost to cruelty here.  Add to that the cost in lives to undo that injustice, those lost in the Civil War and the lives lost due to the racism engendered by that horror even today.  My guess is the answer is in the millions and only known in total by God.

Our Lord God has infinite mercy on us.  None of lives a life that would allow our salvation based on oor own merits, we all need his mercy to save our lives.  We should show that same mercy to others.  The justice of God would have us all condemned to Hell if He didn't love us and have mercy on us.  He demands that we treat each other with the same love and mercy.

Relationship

Oh my Lord, I want to rest in You always.  I want to simply be with You and You in me, in my heart at all times, showing me what you will is and how to love.  You have made me unafraid.  I no longer fear the world, what it thinks, if it approves of me.  I know you love me and don't care what I wear or how new my car is.  You care how I treat people.  You care.

I hate, Oh Lord when I get so busy with things in the world that I don't take time to think about You and to visit You in the Tabernacle.  I miss You.  I know You are everywhere but when I don't take the time to sit with You, I feel disconnected from You.  I know You are there but I need to spend time with You, contemplating Your word and listening to You.

Faith

When I first came back to my faith I felt God literally beside me at all times.  He was so close.  I felt ashamed at times because I didn't so much have faith as I knew God was was there.  He spoke to me in so many ways.  It was exciting and I felt so special, it was dizzying.  I literally could not wait to pray to see what would happen, what I would discover, how I would feel.  I guess this is a bit like what it's like when you fall in love.  I was zealous for God at this time and would put myself in crazy situations without a care.  I felt Gods love and wanted everyone to feel that love, especially those who were feeling so unloved.  I knew Gods love was eternal and stronger than any human love.  His is a love that burns away the scabs that we accumulate in life.  I was like growing a whole new skin, alive and tingly, not hard and deadened.  I was open finally to love.

As time went on I got so used to being able to reach out to God and find Him there that I reached out less and less and got caught up more and more in the world.  We still occasionally danced together in prayer but less and less often.  At times I would panic and work really hard at my prayer life to regain that feeling of closeness and have some success.  I see now that I wanted less to get to know myself better and grow in my relationship to God and more that I liked that feeling of being special and different, and honestly somehow better than everyone else.  God had chosen me, I should be special right?

Now it harder, I know  He is there but we no longer dance in prayer.  I have to learn to love Him and not the feelings.  I have to grow in faith and not seek to be special.  I have to do the hard work of being one of his children.  He chooses each of us everyone is called, we have to follow.

Lent and Charity

If you live you your whole without any real want, if you have food to eat, a bed, warmth, clothes, and medical care how can you truly love the poor and desire to help them?  You need to experience what it means to want something to know what it is like for you brothers to want.  Lent can give us very small glimpse into want.

When we fast from real things, not just chocolate and soda, but heat or food.  We learn a bit what it's like to not have those things.  Of course seeing we can just break our fast from heat or food we don't really know what that is like.  We won't know what it's like to see our children do without th, but at least in our bodies we can feel the cold and the hunger.  This is one of the things Lent can give us if we allow it.  Depriving ourselves from comforts makes us appreciate what we have and can make us sympathetic towards those who have those things.

It isn't too late to add something to our Lent.  Fast from comfort, even if is just on Fridays.  Sleep on the couch and fast from a warm bed.  Look at what you normally spend for food in a day, cut it in half, and see what that's like and give the savings to charity.  If you are really adventurous, on a Saturday morning find a food pantry and stand in line with everyone else and eat what they eat for breakfast, give what you normally spend, or more, to the food pantry.  A group here in Austin called Mobile Loaves and Fishes has a Holy Week retreat each year where you spend 3 days living, eating, and sleeping on the streets of Austin.  The retreat ends on Holy Thursday.  It's a great way to enter into Easter.  I would say that the charity I received out on the streets was the the most profound I ever experienced.  Christ gave us himself, can't we give more?

My morning prayer

Thank you Dear Lord for loving me today and everyday.  Thank you for saving my life.  Thank you for showing me possibilities and how being brave is easier than I thought.  Thank you for turning my life from a place of unremitting darkness to place of light and love.  Thank you for opening my eyes to the people around me, letting me see that they are just like me with the same fears and worries.  Thank you for opening my my heart to them.  Thank you Dear Lord for teaching me to love.  I don't love as well as You love but maybe someday I will get closer to that ideal.  Especially Lord thank you for opening my heart to those it is hard to love and so are most in need of love.  Dear my one wish is that my heart would more open to love, that I would both love and and have the courage to do all the things in the world that needed to bring more love into the world.  Amen.

Love

God loves me and that has all kinds of implications for my life.  God doesn't just love the me He thinks He knows, He loves the me that even I don't know.  He truly loves me and He loves everyone. If someone loves you like that you naturally love them and try to please them.  If I could love as the Beloved loves I would love all He created with the same love He has for them, but my love, like my knowledge of myself is hindered by sin.

Even so, I should let His love fill me to over flowing so I can in a small way, love all His creation.  I am afraid to let His love fill me.  His love is a light and I am afraid to look at myself and truly know myself.  The sins I commit knowingly and through my actions are bad enough but the sins I commit by not doing, not seeing, not hearing, not caring, are easy for me to over look and so remain in the shadows.  Am I so fragile?  Why do I hold on to resentments, hatred, prejudice, do I think they make me strong?  I think to let go of these things I would have to recognize I have them in the first place.

Maybe if I let His love fill me from end to end I would be more bold.  I have felt His all pervading love before.  It was sublime and painful.  Afterwards I wondered why it didn't stay, why He withdrew, but now I think I was the one who couldn't stand it and so pulled away.  Opening up to love takes courage, I think.  If I open myself to His love and let it pour through me to others, I have to open myself up to others, and to myself.

Not as God thinks

I have been thinking a lot about Lent and Easter.  I understand the joy of Easter in human terms.  It's like a great party trick, first our Savior was dead and now he isn't.  We had lost Him due to others people's evil deeds but God won out and we have Him back and as a bonus we have Him back forever.

Thinking about it now I am beginning to see it differently, somewhat.  The whole thing is a great act of Love.  He came to us out of Love and He died for us out of Love.  God the Father loved us so much He sent His Son to live with us and to die for us.  He didn't send His Son to die for is unwillingly.  Jesus is not our whipping boy, He died for us willingly.  He went with His eyes open knowing how he would have to suffer, but he did it gladly to save us.  He didn't die because of that others did, but He suffered and died for what I have done and will do.  He is infinite, so He can love us each completely.  He loves us each intimately, He knows us each deeply and completely and loves us deeply and completely, unlike anyone in the world.

Holy Thursday and Good Friday are not tragic, they were necessary.  God doesnt do things like this unless it is necessary.  Without those days of suffering would we love Him so much?  Was it necessary for Him to suffer to prove to us how much He loves us?  We don't love Him as much as He deserves.

The Way of the Cross - Who am I?

In meditating on the Way of the Cross today, I thought about all the people who were there and who am I in that crowd.  You have the crowd itself, noisy, enjoying the spectacle, yelling and not thinking.  When am I these people?  I am them when I go along with the crowd, when I don't really think about what is going on I don't think about what I am doing to those who are effected.  When I am racist or prejudice, I am part of the crowd jeering at Christ.  I am not thinking, just going along with everyone else.  I am not loving at that moment and I dont even realize it.  I am enjoying myself, feeling smug and happy I am not the person being whipped.  I am part of the crowd when I gossip.  I don't know why the person I see is being whipped but I am glad it isn't me and I encourage those around me to focus on the one whipped so they don't turn and see me.  When I am part of the crowd no one can pick me out, I can act and no one can point to me and say it her, she did it, I am invisible.

When am I a Roman Soldier?  When I don't care about anyone but myself.  I have a job to do and it has to be done, I don't care how it effects you.  I can hide behind following orders.  At work this is when I say I am just following policy.  I could listen to you and have sympathy for you but I am tired and I just want to get my job done.  I am a Roman Soldier when I lash out at someone, especially physically.  I just want to get this done, I don't want to listen to you!  I want to get home so I cut you off in traffic.  I want you to go to bed so I don't spank you for asking questions.

When am I Simon?  When I do what I know I should do, but only reluctantly.  When I don't ask if I can help but wait until you can't do without me.  I am one of the women of Jerusalem when I cry over the death of some one killed but don't do look at the reasons behind it.  I can cry over those killed by the death penalty but I don't see the racism behind it and work to Ed that then I am a woman of Jerusalem.

I am Joseph and Nicodemus when I hide my faith around those who do not believe.  When I don't speak up and I do give witness.  I am the Pharasees when care more about the rules than I do for people.  When I pride myself on my observances and forget to do good works.

When I walk the way of the cross, I see myself everywhere except in the person of Christ and his mother.  I am all of them at times.  I am the reason He carries the Cross and because I continue to be those people, He continues to carry that Cross for me.  He continues to love me and I continue to add weight to his cross.  He keeps saving me and I keep killing Him.

Suffering

When I look at how Christ suffered and how some of the Saints suffered, I realize I don't take suffering very well.  When I suffer I get mad or feel sorry for myself, it's all about me.  Many of the Saints rejoiced at suffering, it was something they shared with Christ.  Christ suffered for the people who were causing his suffering.  He loved the people who hurt Him.  When he saw Peter on the shore did Christ act all angry?  Did he give Peter the silent treatment?  No, He forgave Peter.

I wish I could think of the people hurting me while they are hurting me.  I could ask them if they are okay, are they hurting?  I find that is usually the case.  They are tired or upset over something and just take it out on me.  If they weren't they would say what they have to say in better way.  I doubt they know the impact of their words and really they don't know my life so usually their judgements reflect their own lives more than mine.

If only Christ would grant me the gift of remembering this when I am tired, or hungry, or scared so I wouldn't judge others, or at least give me gift of keeping my mouth shut.  If I think someone isn't giving enough time I usually find out they are taking care of a sick parent, or helpingin other ways I don't see.  If I think they should give more money I usually find they have financial constraints I know nothing about.

Debra Lord, grant me the grace to think of others while I am hurting and only of myself while I am judging.

Temptation

A couple of nights ago I was tempted in a dream.  The dream was hyper-real, I thought I was really there and not dreaming.  I was tempted to a great sin but at the end I was able to lean on God and just resist.  I woke up from that dream with a lot of shame for being so tempted.  I felt like I had already committed the sin and I worried what it meant if I hadn't resisted.

Now, from the reading this Sunday, I see that being tempted isn't a sin, giving in to sin is.  I often have dreams like this, it's like God is teaching me a lesson.  In this case I was tempted but I turned to Him and was able to resist the sin that was attracting me.

As we move toward following Christ we will be tempted.  The devil will tempted us and if we resist he will tell us just being tempted is as good as sinning so we might as well give in.  Now I am for warned.  I know I can resist with Gods help.  I think the nature of sin isn't so much the sin itself but that it distracts us from God and our purpose in life.  It draws us into ourselves and takes our eye of loving God and His creation.  Sometimes the devil does this through negative emotions, hate, anger, jealousy, sometimes through pleasure.  The devil tries to trap us in ourselves, making us ineffective for building up the kingdom.

We building up the Kingdom of God through community.  Community insulates us from the working of the devil.  Eve is tempted by herself, and Jesus goes out to the desert by himself to draw the devil to temp him.  Community can be a source of sin for us too if we are not in the right frame of mind.  If we not in a loving frame of mind all the people in the world around us can not draw us into community, we have separated ourselves from that community.  The funny thing is that when we worry about what other people are doing in our community and not what we are doing is when we separate ourselves from that community.    When we worry only about our own behavior is when we can be open to living in community with others.

Like a grain of wheat we must die to bear fruit

When I say die,I don't mean in the way that extremist do.  When I say die I mean to ourselves.  We have to let who we are die and let God transform us into what he wants us to be.  This is scary, we want to be who we are, but so does God, but God wants us to be who we really are, who he created us to be.

Dying to ourselves and our scared, selfish, lonely desires is hard.  It's like letting God strip us of our skin, our outer shell that has grown hard.  He knows that under all that hard is the real free self that is all pink and new, but we know our old hard self and are afraid of the new self.  If I know that the self I am is a failure because I don't try, am too afraid to try, I can tell myself that if I only tried I would be someone great.  I am comfortable in that feeling that I fail only because I won't try.  God wants me to strip off that old self of not trying, not doing His word only believing in it.  If I try, I may still fail.

If I truly believe in God I have to believe that even in my failure something good will come from it.  If I am not called to reach a lot of people maybe by doing what he asks I will reach one  person and if that person is saved then I have born fruit, but also maybe by trying I will inspire others to try and they will say I can at least do better than that.  The thing is that God calls us to try and until the day we die we will never really know the results of what we do but still I have to believe that by trying we benefit.

By trying we get to know ourselves better.  We learn to be more compassionate because we know how hard it is to push out past who we thought we were and we know how hard that will be for others.  We may lose our fear, or at least some of it, but we have to pray for that.  We can't do this alone, we have to lean on God or we will fail and we will grow in fear.  Pray, often.