But while I'm waiting, Lord, I wish to serve You. I wish to bless Your Name with every fiber of my being. I wish to praise You for all that You have done for me, to be a light here and now, to love those whom You have given me to love.
When I first started discerning religious life (April/May 2009, far too soon after my reversion to the Church), I kept an online journal on a Christian website. I just remembered it in the past week or so, as I was getting ready to speak with Mother Mary Patricia. It's so strange, funny, embarrassing, humbling, to read through those old journal entries, to see my record of the path that God has led me on these past two and a half years.
And oh, what a long and winding road it has been! Only the Lord could have led me out of the wilderness I was lost in then - that wilderness of secular politics, postmodern ideologies, identity crises, hedonism and despair. Only He could have reclaimed the truth of who He created me to be out of all the darkness of our fallen world.
I thought I needed to have all the answers right away...and discernment quickly became just another part of my post-college identity crisis, just another way that I was trying to figure out that all important thing, What To Do With My Life. I should have been listening for Your voice, Jesus - but I hardly knew You. I could only hear You faintly, what with the cacophony of other voices ringing in my ears. Yet even in that poor beginning I was making, You were leading me home to You.
Something I wrote on May 3, 2009, in a brief moment of clarity:
What I felt last night, Lord - that sense of needing to give up control in my life to You; to let go of my best laid plans, of my attachments to praise and honors, to academic achievement and proofs of intelligence; to the empty charades of my self-definition - that, Lord, I cannot turn my face from.
But if I need more time before I can enter religious life - if I need more time to know You and Your Church, to put down my pride and my intellect and my doubts and my preconceptions, to put down mind and will - it is alright, because this path is leading me to You.
And I can still try, Lord, to put down the things that keep me from You, even while living as I am in the world. I can try to put down pride, and seek education because it will help me to minister to Your people, not for my own praise or honor or self-satisfaction. I can try to put down control, and seek the counsel of others with more wisdom than I; seek spiritual direction; let Your Spirit guide my feet, rather than my own plans and goals and desires. I can try to put down selfishness and fear, and live to serve others and to seek You.
I can try, Lord, to start giving my life to You; to start making my life a witness to Your Truth and Light. A light shines in the darkness, Lord, and the darkness has not overcome it. But we must be light for the world and salt for the earth. We are Your only hands here on Earth, Lord. We are Your only feet. We must be Your beating heart, Sacred and overflowing with Love for all the world, for all Your glorious Creation.
What can I give You, Lord, besides my life?
It's still true...what can I give You, Lord, besides my life?
Thank You for reminding me of my weakness, my brokenness, my utter helplessness without You. I am still filled with pride, still like to believe that I can do things all on my own. But what I felt in Alma, Lord, was the truth that I have done nothing to deserve the great gift of this vocation. I am not called because I am oh so spiritual or intuitive or kind or compassionate or so in touch with You (all those things I have believed of myself, Lord). No! I am called only by Your grace. I am saved only by Your grace. I have life and love only by Your grace. I trust that You will continue to teach me this truth, Lord Jesus.
Glory be to the Father, and to the Son, and to the Holy Spirit. As it was in the beginning, is now, and ever shall be, world without end. Amen.
No comments:
Post a Comment