Peace and Contentment

We are no longer alone if we allow ourselves to be guided by the Holy Spirit.  Our life unfolds in response to Him.  As we dispossess ourselves, our being is possessed by God: the void is filled.  God who is welcome, light, and warmth, transforms us, bestowing on us something of his radiance.  Those who are possessed by God resemble the burning log, which, St. John of the Cross tells us, little by little becomes white-hot.  Nourished by the fire of the Spirit, our life becomes fire.  Is not this the fire of which Jesus spoke when he said, "I have come to cast fire on the earth, and what would I but that it be kindled"? -- from The Ways of the Spirit: The Spirituality of Cardinal Suenens.

 

Mary, the first Christian -- the first to know the indwelling Presence of Jesus, the Savior of all mankind -- the first to be so overshadowed by the Holy Spirit as to incarnate in her own flesh God Himself.  We are designed by the Creator to be capable of union with God -- in mutual knowledge, in an exchange of love, in obedience to the mission we are given to redeem the earth, to be a blessing to others.  We are created to be "like God" because His Divine Breath animates us.

 

Carl Jung, a non-Catholic, saw in Mary the anima, or soul receptive to the Divine Presence that moves each one of us toward completion.  Without that Presence, we are "like sheep without a Shepherd," "not knowing our right hands from our left" (Yahweh to Jonah, regarding the Ninevites).  When we find our true center, the soul receptive to the Spirit of God, we find both ourselves and God: in knowing Him, we know ourselves.  Without that knowledge, we wander as aimlessly as the Israelites in the desert, not sure of our destination or of our purpose in life -- we simply do not know why we are here.  When we are directed by the Spirit of God, we may not know where we are heading, but we do know the One Who Knows and Who will infallibly guide us to our purpose.

 

Then, even in our uncertainty, we have peace and contentment, for we know ourselves taken care of, guided, and protected on our way.  Last night, after listening to someone tell me again and again (for 3 years now) how her life has fallen apart, how no one will help her, how she hates her job, etc, I finally asked her if she ever thought of thanking God for what He was doing in her life.  "I do thank Him," she began, and then she started listing some of the things she was grateful for.  Instantly, her tone changed from self-pity to gratitude -- for the one friend who invited her to Thanksgiving when her family would have nothing to do with her, for the elderly woman who was so appreciative of her care (she's a caretaker), for the friends who still call and ask her to go line-dancing, etc.  I was amazed at the change I heard in her voice.  Today, I read this in Jesus Calling:

 

A life of praise and thankfulness becomes a life filled with miracles.  Instead of trying to be in control, you focus on Me and what I am doing.  This is the power of praise: centering your entire being in Me.  This is how I created you to live, for I made you in My own image.  Enjoy abundant life by overflowing with praise and thankfulness.

 

I think we are never truly joyful and content until we know ourselves to be truly loved -- and this is the first gift of the Holy Spirit to us.  When the Spirit descended on Jesus in preparation for His earthly mission, the Father spoke from heaven:  This is my beloved Son, in Whom I am well pleased.  And strangely, despite our human weakness and failing, these are the same words we "know" in the depths of our hearts when the Holy Spirit descends upon us -- to know we are loved, to know we are not alone, but that the Paraclete (the One Called beside us) -- this is what it means to have heaven opened to us.  Contentment, not restlessness, is the mark of the Christian in whom the Son of God dwells on earth.