These last few days have been full of emotion for me; so much so that I feel a little drained, actually. Thankfully, the other missionaries have been very gracious and supportive during the multiple times I’ve cried over the course of this last week. I think they understand that part of me; that I just cannot contain some things.
Formation classes have been so amazing. I am learning so much, not only about my faith, but about myself as well. I’ve talked before about this being a year during which God reveals simple truths to me, and the last couple days have been no exception. We’ve been talking about St. Therese because she is the patroness of mission, and we’re getting ready to go to Mexico (sooner than later! It’s crazy how quick this trip is coming up!). St. Therese called herself the little flower because of how simple she was, and it is precisely her simplicity that attracts me to her. Here’s the simple truth about St. Therese: she LOVES God—unequivocally, irrevocably, passionately.
I am blown away by St. Therese, by the depth of her love for God. And while we were talking about this in formation, I was just overwhelmed with the feeling that I do not love God nearly enough. I love things about God, I love doing work for Him; but I somehow stop when it comes down to loving God the person, the Creator of the universe, the be all and end all. Where did that get lost?!? Without that central truth, there is nothing. I am so firmly convicted about the necessity to re-orient myself around love of God Himself; I think the “big work” that God is doing with me this year is re-capturing my heart, drawing it closer to His, and revealing more about Himself to me. My prayer is that I can get to a point this year when I can say, like St. Therese did, “let me neither look for nor find anyone but You and You alone. Let all creatures be as nothing to me and me as nothing to them. Let no earthly things disturb my peace. O Jesus, I ask only for peace—peace and above all love that is without measure or limits...To You, my Beloved, I offer myself so that You may fulfill in me Your holy Will without a single creature placing any obstacle in the way.”
We’ve also been doing more local outreach lately, which has been really awesome, but incredibly difficult at the same time. A couple days ago, Chris, Erik, Sean, Thomas and I went to help out a lady who lives about 10 minutes from us; we were clearing some of the trees from the front of her trailer and putting some framing on one of her windows. At first, it was your “typical” service project: there were really thorny trees that got stuck all over my clothing, it was freezing outside, Chris managed to spray cat poop all over me with the line trimmer. But then, Erik asked me to help hold up part of the framing for the window on the inside of the house, and I got to take a good, long look at how this woman lives. And it broke my heart.
I don’t understand how this lady can live the way she does. The roof of her trailer, which makes our double-wide look like a palace, is caving in; she has no shower, but instead uses a garden hose that she feeds through the window; her house is so badly insulated that ice is beginning to form on the inside. This house was one of the dirtiest houses I have ever seen. I looked at the window we were framing and felt so defeated; I wanted to buy her a whole new trailer. I was completely overwhelmed by how alone and hopeless this lady is. How many people in her life have forgotten about her? Where is her family? How long has she lived like this? What can I possibly do to help her?
I am having a hard time accepting the fact that all I can do is be Christ to this woman in small ways; that doing something as small as framing a window, as long as it’s done with love, can make a huge impact in her life. I just want her to see her dignity restored, the dignity that she was created with as a daughter of God. Please keep her in your prayers, and pray that I can understand more fully what it means to be a servant.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Saturday, November 15, 2008
The Heart of Mission
“For Zion’s sake I will not be silent, for Jerusalem’s sake I will not be quiet, until her vindication shines forth like the dawn and her victory like a burning torch” (Isaiah 62:1).
I’ve been reflecting these last couple days about what it means to have a missionary heart, and praying about how I’m being called to live that out. I was reading Mission of the Redeemer today during holy hour and was reminded that “it is only in faith that the church’s mission can be understood and only in faith that it finds its basis.” Christ, and relationship with Him, must inform our desire to go out and be witnesses to the world. We may witness that relationship with Christ in different ways—through listening to someone’s troubles, or offering them some food and a blanket, or standing up and giving a testimony—but above all else, our focus and our source of strength is the Lord. It is for this reason, because we are joyful in the Lord, because He has redeemed us, because His grace and mercy and love are constantly showered down on us, because we are His beloved, that we are convicted in our hearts to go out and share His love with others.
I’ve been really absorbed with thoughts of the mission trip to Mexico lately; I am getting so ready and excited to go! Granted, I’m a little nervous about what it will look like to actually be there and experiencing foreign mission work, but I’ve wanted to do something like this for quite awhile. And I can’t wait! Please keep all of us in your prayers as we get ready for this trip; we are all working hard to get the word out and gain support, in the form of prayer and financial donations. And above all else, pray that our hearts will continue to be formed with the spirit of mission!
“All were created through him; all were created for him. He is before all else that is. In him everything continues in being.”
St. Paul, pray for us!
I’ve been reflecting these last couple days about what it means to have a missionary heart, and praying about how I’m being called to live that out. I was reading Mission of the Redeemer today during holy hour and was reminded that “it is only in faith that the church’s mission can be understood and only in faith that it finds its basis.” Christ, and relationship with Him, must inform our desire to go out and be witnesses to the world. We may witness that relationship with Christ in different ways—through listening to someone’s troubles, or offering them some food and a blanket, or standing up and giving a testimony—but above all else, our focus and our source of strength is the Lord. It is for this reason, because we are joyful in the Lord, because He has redeemed us, because His grace and mercy and love are constantly showered down on us, because we are His beloved, that we are convicted in our hearts to go out and share His love with others.
I’ve been really absorbed with thoughts of the mission trip to Mexico lately; I am getting so ready and excited to go! Granted, I’m a little nervous about what it will look like to actually be there and experiencing foreign mission work, but I’ve wanted to do something like this for quite awhile. And I can’t wait! Please keep all of us in your prayers as we get ready for this trip; we are all working hard to get the word out and gain support, in the form of prayer and financial donations. And above all else, pray that our hearts will continue to be formed with the spirit of mission!
“All were created through him; all were created for him. He is before all else that is. In him everything continues in being.”
St. Paul, pray for us!
Saturday, November 1, 2008
The Word is Alive
Sometimes it’s the simplest things in life we forget about. But when God shows you that simple thing in a new light, it can make a huge difference in your walk to Him. God has really been re-revealing some things to me over the past couple days; things that are so essential to our faith, but so often get lost in the shuffle of other things. I am continually amazed by how God keeps renewing my faith and challenging me to grow.
This week has been a blessing; not only did we finally get a chance to get back into our regular routine of having formation on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, but we had Fr. J here with us as well to lead formation for us. We spent the first two days talking about 1 and 2 Thessalonians (which, in case you were wondering, were the first two letters Paul wrote). What I love about Fr. J is his ability to break open Scripture in just about any way; we not only talked about the development of Paul’s theology and canonicity, but about how to “pray without ceasing” (living prayer through your work) and what it means to “stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught.” I am so excited about this Biblical formation, because I feel like it’s an area of my faith that I am the least comfortable with, but the one in which I want to grow the most.
On the third day we talked about the Synod that just finished up in Rome about “The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church.” And here’s where the revelation moment happened. Pope Benedict talked about the Bible as “an inheritance, a testament handed over to readers so that they can put into practice in their own lives the history of salvation witnessed in the text [...] the people cannot exist without the Book, because it is in it that they find their reason for living, their vocation and their identity [...] The Word that leaves the mouth of God, witnessed in the Scriptures, returns to Him in the shape of prayerful response, of a living answer, of an answer of love.”
For whatever reason that day, the word “testament” leapt off the page at me, and I really started thinking about what that means. I feel like “testament” is one of those words I use all the time, but never really think about the reason behind why I’m using it; I mean, we talk about the Bible in terms of the Old Testament and the New Testament, and we know that one part doesn’t talk about Jesus and the other part does, but why the word “testament?” Well, it turns out that testament means, “a covenant between God and the human race; tangible proof; an expression of conviction.”
Wait...what?!
THE BIBLE IS PROOF THAT GOD EXISTS!!!!!
Wow! (OK, remember I said in the beginning this was going to be about a simple thing; not an earth-shattering revelation, but one that blew me out of the water nonetheless.) I mean, when I really let that fact sink in—that the Bible is not only the “covenant between God and the human race” and “tangible proof,” but also “an expression of conviction”—I began to realize how really exciting Scripture is! This is where it happens! This is how God speaks to us! This is where, like Pope Benedict said, people “find their reason for living, their vocation and their identity!”
It was in what may seem like another “duh moment”—but which was in all actuality more of a “mustard seed moment”—that God moved a mountain within my heart. I do not think I will ever look at Scripture in the same way again. Apart from all the other knowledge I will gain about the Bible this year, all the ways we’ll talk and think about Scripture, this first acknowledgment of what testament means in my life will inform how I live and think and live out my faith. And hopefully I can make my life a testament that points back to Him.
This week has been a blessing; not only did we finally get a chance to get back into our regular routine of having formation on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, but we had Fr. J here with us as well to lead formation for us. We spent the first two days talking about 1 and 2 Thessalonians (which, in case you were wondering, were the first two letters Paul wrote). What I love about Fr. J is his ability to break open Scripture in just about any way; we not only talked about the development of Paul’s theology and canonicity, but about how to “pray without ceasing” (living prayer through your work) and what it means to “stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught.” I am so excited about this Biblical formation, because I feel like it’s an area of my faith that I am the least comfortable with, but the one in which I want to grow the most.
On the third day we talked about the Synod that just finished up in Rome about “The Word of God in the Life and Mission of the Church.” And here’s where the revelation moment happened. Pope Benedict talked about the Bible as “an inheritance, a testament handed over to readers so that they can put into practice in their own lives the history of salvation witnessed in the text [...] the people cannot exist without the Book, because it is in it that they find their reason for living, their vocation and their identity [...] The Word that leaves the mouth of God, witnessed in the Scriptures, returns to Him in the shape of prayerful response, of a living answer, of an answer of love.”
For whatever reason that day, the word “testament” leapt off the page at me, and I really started thinking about what that means. I feel like “testament” is one of those words I use all the time, but never really think about the reason behind why I’m using it; I mean, we talk about the Bible in terms of the Old Testament and the New Testament, and we know that one part doesn’t talk about Jesus and the other part does, but why the word “testament?” Well, it turns out that testament means, “a covenant between God and the human race; tangible proof; an expression of conviction.”
Wait...what?!
THE BIBLE IS PROOF THAT GOD EXISTS!!!!!
Wow! (OK, remember I said in the beginning this was going to be about a simple thing; not an earth-shattering revelation, but one that blew me out of the water nonetheless.) I mean, when I really let that fact sink in—that the Bible is not only the “covenant between God and the human race” and “tangible proof,” but also “an expression of conviction”—I began to realize how really exciting Scripture is! This is where it happens! This is how God speaks to us! This is where, like Pope Benedict said, people “find their reason for living, their vocation and their identity!”
It was in what may seem like another “duh moment”—but which was in all actuality more of a “mustard seed moment”—that God moved a mountain within my heart. I do not think I will ever look at Scripture in the same way again. Apart from all the other knowledge I will gain about the Bible this year, all the ways we’ll talk and think about Scripture, this first acknowledgment of what testament means in my life will inform how I live and think and live out my faith. And hopefully I can make my life a testament that points back to Him.
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