Real Humility

God is teaching me humility.  I have been reading great works on humility and agreeing, yes that is humility and patting myself on the back for apparently gaining in humility with no outward evidence.    So, God sends me dreams and shows my lack of humility.  He gives me dreams of people questioning what I am doing for Him and have been doing for Him with great pride.  Instead of listening to these people I get defensive and stalk off vowing to make them pay.  Not very humble.  The people questioning me are clergy and I look down on those who don't accept what the clergy says.  I need to make a change in myself.  If this is like it has been in the past God will continue to send me these dreams until I learn at least some humility and then there will be a real live test that I must pass.

Humility

"The value of our activity depends almost entirely on the humility to accept ourselves as we are" - Thomas Merton.  Thomas Merton then goes on to say that we don't value what we can do well and always look to do things we really are suited to do.  This is me.  I always dream of the heroic thing I want to do instead of doing the ordinary good I can do and by doing that fail to do either.

The rest of creation gives praise to God in simply being, in part because a dog doesn't despise being a dog and want to be a penguin.  God made us the way we are to do what we are called to do.  The things we can't do, we are not called to do.  The courage comes from accepting that and from knowing the difference between what I am called to do and what I don't want to do.

Humble before the Lord

I sit here and I know that I am not humble before the Lord because I bring my lack of humility out in the world, in here in the church.  I revel in other people's lack of compassion and mercy and pat myself on the back.  I am literally the Pharisee who stood in front of the alter of the Lord and said thank you Lord for not making me like them.

I know what He did for us and how little I do for Him.  When the Host is raised at Mass it is an indictment of how little I do for Him.  I intend to do more, always.  I plan on all the wonderful heroic things I will do for God and in my mind, because I plan to do them, I have done them.  I plan on attending this meeting or that rally and really getting involved but at the last minute, I don't do it, I am too tired, I have to work late.  If I do actually do something I planned, I long to be caught doing it.    I hope someone will ask what I did last night so I can tell them.

I do this and then I look down on another person because they don't do the few things I actually do.  For all I know they may do what I do and more but still I judge them.  More likely they don't do the things I intend to do but don't do, so I judge them.

Lord help me!  Enlighten my mind and show me my faults, you who have none.

Taking time for God

i was going to call this post making time for God but that makes it seem like a chore, some other thing to add to the whole list of things you have to do this Advent season.  Right now my work is particularly hectic, we are trying to finish the fiscal year and change our computer system.  If I didn't start each day here in the Sanctuary of our church, gazing on the Beloved, just sitting with Him, I would be a tight little bundle of nerves at work.  I know that for sure because the last two days I had to be at work early and skipped my morning prayer time.

Take the time, don't fit it in.  Take time for quiet gazing on the Lord, listening to Him in silence.  Take the time for yourself.  Grow closer to God in this season of watching and waiting for Him.  Don't try to fit in a few hurried Rosaries or novenas, you can do that at other times.  Don't squeeze the One who came to save us, the Prince of Peace into you life, build your life around the Wonderful Councilor.

Jesus Loves me, this I know

It's a simple children's song and so very true, but I know I am beloved of God by so many things in my life.  He takes care of me.  I think that faith really has to start from the truth that God loves us.Becuase He loves us does not mean that nothing bad will happen, but that it will all work for the ultimate good of getting us and as many others as possible into heaven.

The bad things that have happened in my life have increased my ability to sympathize with other people and to love them even when others don't.  I know what poverty is and I know what it's like to do without basic things that others take for granted.  I know what it's like to choose between food and toilet paper.  This helps me to help others, to me this is God/'s love.  He makes my life more full by letting me love other people.

Living Simply

Such an easy thing to say and yet so hard to do today.  What does it mean to love a simple life?  I think that it means to have only what we need and no more, but how much do we really need?  I need a reliable car but do I need a big red one with all the bells and whistles?  I need clothes of a certain kind for work, but how many, and do I have to have the latest style?  And does it do good to live simply if I long for more?

At times trying to live simply gives me great peace.  I have what I need and when I go to a store I don't want what is there.  I don't feel deprived I feel content.  These are usually times when I am praying more and spending time with the Beloved and doing His bidding.  There are times when I truly need something.  When I don't have enough warm clothes that fit me I feel deprived.  I think I start to not be content with what I have in general.  Then there are times when I get caught with p in the world and when I am worried.  Then I feel I have nothing and want everything.  I buy into the culture of things.

I get out of balance and all the "stuff" in the world will not fill me up.  I buy too much and eat too much and I am not satisfied.  Only by drawing closer to God can I regain the balance in my life.  Only then can can I live the simple life and have it give me joy.  People get it so wrong.  They try to live simply without God and it either becomes a burden or they use it as a boast.  They tell others all the time how much better their life is because they are doing I right and everyone else has to do it their way.  My way of living simply will most likely not work for you, you are different and need to find what works for you, just do it with God at the center.

The Commands of God

At the beginning of his ministry St Francis is told by God to go rebuild His church.  Francis had been the son of a cloth merchant, he wasn't a builder. Francis took Gods message literally and rebuilt churches ar first, and he wasn't a scholar or an orator or anyway "qualified" to reform the Church.  So why did God choose Him for the task, because Francis was still the best one for the job.

God may not talk to us in the way He did to Francis, but He does call us to do His work.  He may not call you to do what you want to do and what makes you comfortable but you still have to respond with a yes.  You may want glory and he may need you to clean toilets.  You may want to sit back and not do anything scary or dangerous but He may want you to risk all.  Either way, the answer has to be yes, just look at what He did for you.