Category: Be Smitten

As an extrovert who is high energy and who likes to get things accomplished, I have to be mindful when I need to slow down, recharge, and be still to counter the busyness I naturally gravitate towards. I recently heard a talk on the “busyness epidemic” of our world today and its impact on us finding meaning and purpose.  It’s in the silence where we connect with our true self, where we can be still and know ourselves and who we are. 

The mind is a terrible thing to waste. I remember the days of PSAs, with the egg-searing in a hot pan helping us visualize our brains on drugs being particularly memorable.  I agree with this message when it comes to drugs and alcohol and the devastating effects they have on the development of our brains. But not so much on the spiritual journey.

We are to nurture what is good in our life. By the mercy of God, we are to offer ourselves as a living sacrifice, not conforming to this age but to be transformed by the renewal of our minds, able to discern the will of God and determine what is good, pleasing, and perfect. 

God is love. 1 John 4:7-8

No one knows the father like the Son, because he emerged from the bosom of the Trinitarian mystery that John says is love. Notice that John doesn’t say God shows love but rather states that “God is love”. This is a huge distinction. 

Do you think God ever asks “Don’t you want to meet me as I am?” We all want to be truly seen and known. But God is beyond our understanding yet invites us, actually insists on drawing us closer in relationship. 

Who is the Lord, that I should hate him?  Exodus 5:2

The kingdom of heaven is at hand. Matthew 10:7

Jesus came to revolutionize our idea of God. All the ways that people of His time were taught to think were systematically undermined by His teachings and parables. They disassembled the structure of the day and emphasized the idea that the holy is the place to find God. Remember how He overturned the tables in the Temple before His Passion, stating that this was no longer the place to find God? 

You still don’t know me? John 14:9

To feel comfortable with the incredible presence of God is precisely the challenge that Jesus had when He began his ministry as related to us in the Gospels. The first thing Jesus seems to have done in his preaching career was to call us to repent. This is a word that means not to do penance in the sense of some external practice, but to change the direction in which we are looking for happiness, implying that where we are looking for happiness is not the place where it can be found, and certainly not where God is to be found. 

If you seek him, he will be found. 1 Chronicles, 28:9

As we know from the gift of science and the work of Galileo, the earth is not the center of the universe. Given that revelation, we should be led to the realization that “I’m really not the center of the universe” either. However, most of us see the world from an “I” perspective or the “false self”.  But seeing through this lens, we don’t see the world as it really is. We see it inside out, upside down, or not at all. This is a serious situation that has existed since Adam and Eve. It’s what might be called the human predicament or the human condition.

Who, O God, is like you? (Psalm 71:19) When we say God, we don’t really mean God, we mean our idea of God.

Are you feeling a nudge to deepen your relationship with God?  Prayer allows us to give ourselves to this relationship, sharing and exchanging our most intimate thoughts and feelings on both mental and spiritual levels.  This practice helps us know the divine in our life and see the banquet of love before us.  It calls us to the fullness of life.