Born of God

 I can think of nothing more beautiful and more powerful to read than the Prologue to the Gospel of John:  In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God....

It seems to me that anyone who takes the time to read these words slowly and reflectively would have to be moved by them. And those who are moved by them, again it seems to me, must respond to them:  

his own people did not accept him, but to those who did accept him, he gave power to become children of God, to those who believe in his name, who were born not of natural generation nor by human choice nor by a man's decision but of God.

....born of God,
born of truth, born of goodness, born of light, rejecting the darkness,
born of justice, of loving-kindness, born of mercy and gentleness to all......

I have a remarkable book on my shelf called Why Can't We Be Good? by Jacob Needleman, a professor of philosophy at San Francisco State University.  Needleman explores the question of why mankind (we) repeatedly violate our most cherished values and beliefs.  According to him, we know what is good, but we mysteriously fail to live by the ethical, moral,  and religious ideas that will guide us to authentic life. According to him, we are unable to be good!

Two thousand years after giving the Law to Moses on Mount Sinai, God sent His Son into the world for that very reason ---- we were (and are) unable to live by the Law!  The Son pitched His tent among us -- the literal meaning of the phrase He dwelt among us --- in order to give us the "power," the ability, to enter into divine life -- to be born of God and no longer of men.

ANd how will we know that we have been born of God?  St. John tells us in his first letter:  If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, his Son, purifies us from every sin.....Anyone who claims to be in the light but hates his brother is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother lives in the light, and there is nothing in him to make him stumble.

In The City of God, St. Augustine writes about the universal sin -- the lust to dominate.  This scourge seems to lie at the very heart of all mankind.  We can see it in two-year olds in nursery school and in every year thereafter:  I must have the toy you are playing with; I must be better than, smarter than, prettier than, funnier than..... I must be right; you must be wrong.  We never outgrow the lust to dominate.  

But when we are born of God, the Spirit of God in us begins to gently but surely move in us to change the lust to dominate into a passion to serve:  I am among you as one who serves.  I have said before that when we open the door to Jesus (Rev. 3:10) , He comes in and begins to re-arrange the furniture in our house.  He gives us the power to become like God!  Yes, it takes a lifetime, but He continues until the end to overcome in us the lust to dominate others.  He has pitched his tent among us! The question is whether we will allow Him to contine dwelling in us and among us.

Right Turn

It was an early morning trip to church, as usual.  I think I may have had a meeting.  When I got to the railroad tracks, my car seemed to have a mind of its own.  Instead of turning left, I turned right, for no apparant reason.  Maybe I was still half asleep.  Suddenly awake, wondering why I had done that, I decided that since I was now half way to the local gas station/pit stop, I'd go ahead and get a cup of coffee on my way to church.  

As I opened the door to the store, I was met by a very frightened and desperate young man, about 17 years old.  "Please," he said, "can you drive me somewhere?"   I hesitated, not sure of his character or motives.  Would I end up in a ditch somewhere?   More frantic, he said, "I have money.  I can pay you for gas money."   "That's not what I'm worried about," I said.  

I went to the cashier.  "Look at me.  Look at him.  If I end up in a ditch murdered, he did it."  

"Please," said the young man, desperately.  "He dropped me off to get something and he's coming back for me in a minute."  

With that, I hurried him into my car, and we took off at his direction.  He was guiding me into an area of Pass Christian that I was unfamiliar with, and I began once again to wonder about where I would end up.  But as we talked, I discovered that he was being trafficked, and that there was a warrant out for his arrest.  Now he was afraid that I would take him to the police station.  I reassured him:  "I'm not going to do that.  You've suffered enough already."

I found out that he wanted me to take me to a gas station owned by the father of an ex-girlfriend.  He was sure the man would take him in and keep him safe, despite the fact that the girl needed an abortion.  We talked about abortion, but he was not in a position at that moment to think about the right or wrong of abortion.  His own life was in danger.

Looking back now, I wish that I had thought to ask him one question:  What happened the moment before he met me at the door?  Had he desperately prayed to God for help?  Had he asked for a way out?  I'll never know if I was an answer to his prayer, or if God reached down before he could even think to ask.

At any rate, that's one right turn that turned out to be the right one!

Paying Attention to God

 I have a wonderful book called Paying Attention to God: Discernment in Prayer, by William Barry, S.J.  Now I love the title of this book because it seems to me that paying attention to God is the one thing that most of us do not do.  We may be engaged in prayer, in ministry, in works of mercy, etc. --- but it seems to me that somehow we are not really convinced that God is actively engaged in our lives.  There's a huge gap between heaven and earth, and God is in heaven; we are on earth.   

St. Paul says, In him we live and move and have our very being (acts).  God is not remote to us; He is actively engaged in every part of us: our minds, our hearts, our wills (souls).  ANd He is not static: He is not a noun but a verb: I AM.  He is dunomis in Greek -- energy (dynamite).  There is no moment in which He is not acting in us and with us and through us.  

So it would probably be beneficial for us to start paying attention to what He is doing in our lives.  St. Ignatius taught his followers to practice the Examen, that is, at the end of each day to look back at the God moments, the places where God was acting during the day.  It may take a few days to get the hang of it, but once we start practicing, we may find ourselves smiling at the memory of those moments -- and thanking Him for being there.  As we continue the practice, we begin to notice the moments when they occur instead of waiting til the end of the day -- The fullness of joy is to see God in everything. (Not sure which saint said that!)

I guarantee that once we start paying attention to what God is doing in our lives, we will begin to know that we are loved and cared for.  What we do is important, but what God is doing on a daily basis --- that's the whole story! Most of our attention is on what we are doing --- and I guarantee also that focusing on that will bring us not joy but chagrin, if not frustration.  For which of us does not struggle and stumble through life?

One small example of God at work in my mind:   I have been taking Melatonin at night ever since I started chemo because someone told me that Melatonin helps chemo work better.  A few nights ago, as I picked up the bottle, I thought to myself, "I think I'll skip it tonight and see whether it affects my sleep or not."  I don't know why that thought went through my mind; it's the very first time I skipped the supplement on purpose.  

About an hour after I had gone to sleep, the fire alarm went off in our house.  Both of us were startled out of sleep and pretty disoriented and groggy, trying to figure out what to do.  My husband had taken a sleep aid; I had not.  One of us had to get on a ladder in the middle of the night.  As I climbed up, I thought to myself, "Thank God I did not take a melatonin tonight; I need all the clarity I can get right now!"  Thinking about it the next morning, I came to the conclusion that it was the Holy Spirit acting in me that night when I decided to forego taking the supplement.  I had to smile and thank Him for "little things" that make such a difference in my life!  

We can dismiss such accounts as coincidence, or we can at least start to wonder --- and pay attention -- to the fact that God might be closer to us than we thought.