Mark Dohle
Well-Known Member
In consolation or desolation, we are called to trust
Monday, September 5, 2011: There is no need to force your prayer, as if it were something of your own doing. It is enough to remain with Me, content to be in My presence as I am content to be in yours. Adore Me and trust Me to restore your energy, your health, and your joy in My service. Those who adore Me know that My presence renews the soul and the body. Experience this—as you already did today—and teach others to find in My presence the rest for which they long, the peace that the world cannot give, the joy that renews the heart, and the strength to follow Me in My sufferings, even along the way of the Cross. To adore Me is to demonstrate that all your hope is in Me. To adore Me is to show Me that you count not on yourself nor on others, but on Me alone. To adore Me is to give Me the freedom to act within you and upon you, in such a way as to unite you wholly to Myself, as you have asked Me to do: My Heart to your heart, My Soul to your soul, My Body to your body, My Blood to your blood.
A Benedictine Monk. In Sinu Jesu: When Heart Speaks to Heart
--The Journal of a Priest at Prayer (p. 181). Angelico Press. Kindle Edition.
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When we give friendship to another, it is something that is a grace. We give and receive grace from one another. We cannot demand that anyone loves us, or befriends us, it is a gift.
So the love that is offered us by Christ Jesus is a gift as well, but one that is much more than the love and friendship that we offer one another. When we say that God is love, it is not just a feeling or an emotion that comes and goes as it does with us. But an enduring reality that our human relationships are a dim shadow in comparison.
We long for union, but if we do not understand that we have an immortal soul that is made only for a loving relationship with God, indeed a love so profound that Jesus Christ incarnates is us. The only obstacle is our lack of trust, and yes, of faith. In order to taste the goodness of the Lord, we have to sit at the table and sup with God.
In consolation or desolation, we are called to trust and to draw near the Lord who is in fact already one with us. Our yes can be given in times of joy, or sorrow, or in seasons of our life when we are weak and wander away from our first love of God. We are always being called back to having an intimate loving relationship with the Infinite.
When we adore we are drawn outside of ourselves. We expand, and our heats ability to receive God’s love grows as we deepen our love and trust.—BrMD