Saturday, July 11, 2009

The Continuous Persistence

God shows no partiality in His love for us or where He meets us and greets us. We, however, are partial to how we allow God to meet, greet and love us. Many times in the course of our life, our options are taken away. No! That is wrong, many times we surrender our options, and give God only one choice as to where He is to meet and greet us.

Free will is such an awe-full gift. It is full of awe and is full of wonder, full of mystery. Free will, like all gifts, carries with it great responsibility. I will always have to keep before me, "Will what I am doing challenge God to re-calculate?”

From all of this, I feel we can now use GPS as shorthand for God’s-Persistent-Safety net. How comforting that is to know. There is a persistent safety net that is always there to catch us when we fall. There is a persistent safety net there to catch us when our ego-driven decisions cause us to stray and stumble. God’s-Persistent-Safety net is called GRACE. It is the prodigal love of a Prodigal Father God who is always ready and never tired of “re-calculating.”

God's love for us is personal, passionate and persistent. It is always offered to us, not where would like to be, where we think we ought to be, but is offered where we are now and in the moment we can be reached. God’s-Persistent-Safety net reaches each one of us in all of the circumstances of our human journey -- in relationships with other human beings in an imperfect world.

Do not be hopeless. Be hope-full. The world IS being transformed. As Mama Cass Elliott sang so many years ago, "There is a new world coming, coming in peace, coming in joy, coming in love."

This new creation is coming, it is happening right now. And, our faith tells us we are part of the creation of this new world. We are co-creators with God of a new world, a new creation which is guaranteed by the resurrection. What we have to do is use our x-ray eye of faith, the optimistic eye of faith, to see beyond the obvious to the hidden goodness. In other words, to the God hidden, revealed and always ready to re-calculate. This is the God of the Good News we must proclaim!

We must take on the responsibility, especially now, of reminding ourselves and others of the inherent good that is all creation. The seen and unseen. As it has been said before, we do not need so much to be informed as to be reminded again and again of who we are and who it is that is on our side.

"If God is for us, then who can be against us?"
"With God all things are possible."

We must remember our Good Shepherd will lead from dark valleys. We must be people of memory, constantly reminding ourselves of the fact we are linked forever, and without cost to us, to God's-Persistent-Safety net. We need this reminder so we can be assured and reassured in spite of all the evidence to the contrary. We must be a people of hope, proclaiming not only by our words but our actions, what we have experienced. We must be a people who by our very demeanor are choosing to live life and live it to the fullest.

"The glory of God is a human person fully alive." [St. Irenaeus]

Alive and responding to all that is. Alive and responding to all that is calling for -- no demanding -- a response. A response born of faith stronger than fear, breaking through the darkness. Proclaiming for all to hear, "Lord, it is good for us to be here --right now."

A dreamer's journey continues…

No comments:

Post a Comment