The daily grind of an ADHD contemplative, in her 6th decade of this pilgrimage called life.
Mark 14: 3-9
“Costly genuine spikenard”
“It could have been sold for more than three hundred days wages.”
-The Son of God is deserving of our very best high quality “product”.
-Something cheap and shoddy is not more virtuous.
-When she bought it, she paid good money for it because she valued it and how she would use it. Meanwhile by doing so, she was also supporting the provider and his community.
Luke 17:11-19
“Now as they were walking away, they were cleansed.”
-I need to obey even when it doesn’t make sense, even when it initially feels like rejection.
-He provides healing as I step out in obedience and faith.
-This is how Jesus chooses to work, to use my cooperation.
-The one that came back to thank Him realized this. The others became puffed up at how well they followed orders.
Mark 12: 28-34
“Love the Lord your God…with all your strength.”
-Put some action into the ‘feeling’.
-Give it all you’ve got.
-Obedience is the currency of love in action.
He’s not asking me to love beyond my strength, or to do more than is humanely possible. He’s asking me to do ALL that I can and then allow Him to take it from there.
Luke 6: 27-31
“To the person who strikes you on one cheek, offer the other one as well, and from the person who takes your cloak, do not withhold even your tunic.”
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-God knows my needs and He’s the One in control of every situation.
-If the person is not in tune with Him to offer me the love and respect that I deserve, I need to trust that He will somehow provide it Himself.
-By allowing them to proceed, I am essentially giving them enough rope for them to hang themselves. They have free will.
-So no need to go into defensive mode and lose peace over it or allow them to drag me down with them.
-He’s not saying for me to make it a habit of associating myself with these folks though. In fact, there’s a good chance that once they’ve taken what they want they will flee from my life anyway. I need to let them go! He goes on to say that I shouldn’t even demand back the stuff they take. In other words, no further communication is needed.
Romans 12:9-21
“Let love be sincere”
“anticipate one another in showing love”
“Do not be conquered by evil, but conquer evil with good.”
-I must not twist the love that is being presented to me into what I would like it to be, or try to clean it up. I need to just accept it at face value and let it be.
-(anticipate= regard as probable, expect or predict). I need to assume that others (love, admire and respect me.) and treat them accordingly. Jesus is within them, and HE does!
-Be proactive in setting up a chain of positive emotions, by being faithful to the little things.
Day’s Message:
I need to approach others as if every person I come in contact with is an encounter with Jesus. Here’s my opportunity to not only love Him greatly, but also to fully be loved by Him through them, beyond apparent limits or my own preconceived expectations. He can out love me at every turn.
This was another big one for me. Again, I was familiar with doing for others as if for Jesus…but the idea that He’d somehow use them to bring love (grace?) back into my life is pretty amazing to me.
I’m doing a 12 week prayer journey with a group at my church. We read assigned scripture passages, we let it speak to us, we come together once a week for faith sharing. Simple. As I start on week three, I want to start blogging in order to document where the Lord is taking me. If it blesses anyone else in the process, that is an added bonus…God is good like that. 😀
So each day, He seems to be leading me on a particular path…as I’ve been writing it down, it alls seems to flow together from day today. It’s so beautiful how the flow of our lives proceeds if only we pay attention. I normally am not the greatest at paying attention and why I find this group so instrumental right now. It’s genius in its simplicity and helps me to focus in on what’s important for the moment.
I’m going to summarize here where weeks one and two lead me and then go forward hopefully with a daily post…I say hopefully because that’s another thing that I’m not too good at…I always start with good intentions though.
WK1
-He’s seeking me
-He wants to give me His life
-So I can fulfill the mission that He has for me
-I need to clear the way for pure love to work, through forgiveness
-embracing LIFE and LIBERTY
-which is Jesus Himself!
(I was familiar with the concept of needing to be forgiven to be in a state of grace…of repentance for my own sins. However this week brought me a new insight, of needing to forgive others. We say in the Our Father, ‘forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who have trespassed against us’…in fact I have said it so often, that it has become nearly meaningless. But it was impressed upon me the importance of not holding on to the little bothers and resentments that I tend to rehash in my head and heart way too much. )
WK2
-I need to focus on the one important thing
-and leave the outcome to Jesus
-I can’t get distracted
-because failure to obey incurs a penalty
-I need to be faithful in the little things.
-I can trust Him implicitly.
(The big message this week was the fact that little acts of disobedience are still disobedience and do have negatives effects in my life as they build up. That He’s the One that knows me and is guiding me, leave the outcome to Him and just give Him my best…regardless of what others may think or say. He will never lead me into sin, but He will for sure lead me in ways that are beyond other people’s understanding. That’s ok.)
I’ve been doing the St. Anthony Novena this week and a number of things have come together that is hard for me to even explain right now. But suffice it for me to say that I feel the Lord working in my soul in a profound way. I’ve been journaling all week and now I feel led to just scribble down a few of the ‘messages’ I’ve been receiving. This is the point that I need to say that I use Christian lingo a bit and if this all seems very strange to you, then maybe just skipping it for now might be the right thing for you. Only because I really want to get to what I need to write instead of explaining why I feel I’m receiving messages in the first place…lol. But let me just say that I’m not ‘special’ or insane, this is the type of relationship that the Lord wants with each of us. 😉 And I also need to say that these messages are most and foremost for ME. I’m not a theologian and if the terms I use aren’t correct and somehow contradictory to church teaching, then I am the one in the wrong and have misunderstood. I’m only sharing them in case they may inspire others to pursue a closer relationship with the Lord, because I’m thinking that this is going to become more and more important in the coming days. So let’s get right to it.
1) Let the Lord set you on FIRE!!!
Be led by Him in His service, don’t refuse Him anything. Even when it seems like foolishness. It’s the everyday, yet extraordinary forms of obedience that He requires. He is calling each of us to HOLINESS right where we are.
I specifically understood Him asking me to “Be a woman of glory. A light in the darkness. Keep growing in sensitivity to God’s grace.”
2)Jesus alone is the answer and where our help is to come from.
Release all idols (strongholds, addictions, inordinate attachments…specifically helplessness, perfectionism, emotional dependence on other people.)
Don’t fight the old, just build the new.
Focus on love (to love is to struggle).
Purity is required for this type of all encompassing love.
3)Serve others and be a light.
Build each other up. Give grace to receive grace, especially through prayer.
Spread love wherever you go, especially in your home and those closest to you.
Wherever you are(even in the virtual world which is growing in metaphysical strength.), you are needed according to your gifts.
Sometimes you are there as a spiritual warrior (Be aware that you need to be properly prepared) and other times as a healer to bind the wounded.
God’s Work is to Make it Perfect
by guest blogger Rachel McHugh
In my experience, whether I like it or not, there tends to be a lot of guilt and fear associated with being a Catholic mother. We know that Jesus says “My yoke is easy and my burden light”, but it often doesn’t feel like it. In one sense, our Catholic roots give us an excellent grounding for knowing that our work as parents is important- the dignity of Catholic motherhood finds its basis in the motherhood of Mary. Yet even though we know our work to be valuable, we often can’t help feeling…well…that we’re *bad* at it. I don’t think I’m alone in this feeling, either! And it seems to us that the stakes are very high- our children have eternal souls, and we certainly don’t want to be found responsible for steering them wrong.
Now how are we to reconcile the apparent contraries of Jesus’ words “My yoke is easy and my burden light” with our own knowledge of how difficult it is to be a parent? Children are people just as much as we are, with their own expectations, their own ideas, their own frustrations. Their psychology is either different from ours, frustrating us and making it difficult to understand their motivations; or else it is maddeningly similar, and we are horrified to watch faults with which we have struggled our whole lives begin to be apparent in them. And we love them insanely- which makes our failures and weaknesses a hundred times more painful. Oh, there’s certainly joy in parenting- but it’s easy for this kind of guilt and fear of hurting them get in the way of some of that joy.
We want them to know God, to love God, and to have life abundantly. Is there a foolproof way to make sure it’s so?Yes indeed, and it’s called grace. But the concept of grace is not often very well defined for us. We know that it is the way that God works in us and makes us holy, but how exactly does that work in our lives as parents? How does it help us to bring our children to God?
St. Therese is my favorite saint. She’s known as the Little Flower, and her teachings have been called the “Little Way”. She offers the following insight in her autobiography: “I understand, Lord, that when a soul allows herself to be captivated by the odor of your ointments, she cannot run alone, all the souls whom she loves follow in her train; this is done without constraint, without effort, it is a natural consequence of her attraction for You.” So in other words, it’s not necessary that we do *anything* special to attract our children to God except that we be drawn in ourselves. That’s it! Therese may not have been a parent, but she was given the task of acting as novice mistress in her convent, which could be considered a parallel task. Here’s what she has to say upon hearing that the prioress wanted her to take on the role:
“Mother, from the moment I understood that it was impossible for me to do anything by myself, the task you imposed upon me no longer appeared difficult. I felt that the only thing necessary was to unite myself more and more to Jesus and that “all things will be given to you besides.” In fact, never was my hope mistaken, for God saw fit to fill my little hand as many times as it was necessary for nourishing the soul of my Sisters.”
Note what she says- “it was impossible for me to do anything by myself”. THAT is grace. The moment we recognize that it’s impossible for us to bring children up in the “right” way, we are free to let go and let Jesus do the work in us. And he won’t fail us! We have to stop believing that it’s possible for us to fail, because it’s impossible for love to fail…impossible for God to fail.
Jesus said “be perfect as your father in heaven is perfect.” How is our father in heaven perfect? By his Being. By grace, that is the same for us. It is our “being” that is made perfect. That means that in all the messiness, in all our mistakes, in our faults, failures, etc, even in our guilt and fear, God has made it perfect. The incarnation, crucifixion, and resurrection make all things well. Our parenting can’t possibly “fail” if we love God. And loving God basically comes down to letting God love us. Which in itself is something that only he can do in us. We are weaker than we imagine, really. In the same boat as our children.
Mary is our model. Mary didn’t always get things *right*. She was entirely without sin, surely; baptismal grace was fully present in her from the moment of her conception. But she didn’t always understand Jesus. She didn’t know why he needed to be in the Temple as a child, and she tried to keep him from preaching at one point. But Jesus turned it all into grace. “All things work together for good for those who love God.” That’s *all*. And we won’t be disappointed- we can’t be.
This doesn’t mean that we won’t see things which disturb us. Our children will still draw on the walls and get playdoh in the rug. They will make noise in public places. They will get angry at one another and at us. They may lie, they may make sexual choices that cause them or us pain. They may use drugs or divorce. And we will feel all the pain of seeing these things. But we can’t fix them for our children any more than anyone could fix our stuff for us. We can let God love us the whole time, in all of our childrens’ messiness and in all of OUR messiness, and we can know that we aren’t responsible for *fixing* our children. Their faults will remain theirs for all their lives, and God will work his grace in them also.
We need good will, and to dive in. God will take care of the part that makes everything perfect. If we can maintain our peace- or at least maintain our peace about NOT maintaining our peace- in the midst of all the mess of parenting…this can only help our families. And it’s hard- it’s hard because when there are human beings, they will hurt each other and there are tensions and frustrations. But we can allow our children to be humans, and we can allow OURSELVES to be humans (harder sometimes). Humans redeemed by Christ. Our only work is Love. All things else will be added.
I’ll end with what Julian of Norwich, an anchoress of the middle ages, has to say about the Final Judgment:
“And therefore when the Doom is given and we be all brought up above, then shall we clearly see in God the secret things which be now hid to us. Then shall none of us be stirred to say in any wise: Lord, if it had been thus, then it had been full well; but we shall say all with one voice: Lord, blessed mayst thou be, for it is thus: it is well; and now see we verily that all-thing is done as it was then ordained before that anything was made.”
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Rachel McHugh lives in Maine with her husband and 5 children. She is a contributing author to the Catholic apologetics site www.NewApologetics.com, mostly in the form of poetry. She enjoys spending time playing internet games in between cooking, homeschooling and having intense, concept-laden discussions with her philosopher husband.
This week we are working on Marriage which is essentially step 6 in the Stepping into it system. But because we are ‘counting down’ to Christmas, it has become our first step.
There is however something that I wanted to remind you of. Especially the ladies who are doing this retreat over at ‘Stepping into it together’ Facebook group. The importance of caring for yourself (which is essentially step one and we’ll go into in a lot more detail later on) and the benefit that that will have for your marriage and all other steps.
We are half of any relationship and the only ones who we can change at all. It is important to remember that we project to the world and on to others what we have inside our heads and our spirits. I have a dear friend who calls it ‘head trash’ so I have adopted that term. Be aware of thoughts and expectations that may not be helpful in establishing a strong marriage…both about yourself and your spouse. Remember that what you choose to focus on grows, so why not pick the good stuff?
Keep in mind any health issues that may be getting in the way also, whether physical, emotional or mental. Get the help needed, discuss it with your spouse. Have the courage and the humility needed to address the hard issues and to leave the outcome to God! Sometimes we are very much on fire to be obedient to God and we keep looking for big and mighty ways to show our love for Him and yet it’s often the little steps that He is looking for. <3
Have a Happy Thanksgiving everyone!
A seven week online retreat for Catholic women.
For those of you coming to this blog for the first time, let me give you a little background of what ‘Stepping into it’ is all about.
It is loosely based on Holly Pierlot’s ‘A Mother’s Rule of Life’. It’s a series of ‘rules’ or ‘steps’ that serve as the backbone for a life of grace, pretty much as a ‘rule’ would for someone in a religious community. It helps in keeping in mind those things that are truly important and the goal in focus. You don’t have to be Catholic, but be aware that all posted will be from a Catholic Christian perspective. 😀
There is so much distracting us today. Some of it is not even necessarily bad, just not the best for us. If you have a goal in sight, and know what you are working towards then you can more easily see the choices you are making as either contributing to that ultimate goal or not.
My ultimate goal on this journey is union with God, and from there stepping out in obedience in all areas of my life. And what better time to bring that back into focus than at Christmas time…Emmanuel, God is With Us!
So just to give you an overview, the steps are...
** What runs through all these steps or the ‘banister’ if you will…is God Himself, as we seek to do His will in all things. Also, ‘the steps’ are really in a circular arrangement so that step 6 and and step 1 actually feed off of each other.
My plan is to start focusing on these topics one week at a time, working backwards starting with step 6. So a ‘count down’ if you will.
So there are exactly 7 weeks from now until the Baptism of the Lord. So we shall start NOW. On the Feast of Christ the King! Could it be anymore perfect? So here is our schedule.
My final point is that this is NOT about perfection, mine or anyone else’s. We are all broken and imperfect, in need of a Savior. And that in itself can be the greatest blessing if you recognize it. My favorite saying is “Don’t walk behind me, I may not lead.Don’t walk ahead of me, I may not follow. Just walk beside me and be my friend.” So essentially that’s what this 7 week ‘retreat’ will be about. We will be using the steps just so that we can have some cohesiveness and all be on the same page. However, we will allow the Holy Spirit to take it from there. No one is ahead or behind, we will all just be ‘Stepping into it Together’. 😉