In today's Gospel, we hear that Jesus came that we might have life, and have it to the full.* What do we have to do, what's our part, so that we might have life to the full?
God is inviting us into deeper life in all that happens. In what we expect, what catches us off guard, what pleases us, what seems distasteful, God will work all of it for our good, if we but love Him.**
In what we find challenging, we might not understand the purpose of the circumstances in which we find ourselves. Here as always God calls us to trust in Him, to go forward in faith in Him.
Once we've come out of difficult times, we are not merely to feel relief that we are no longer enduring such trials. Surely we are to be grateful to God that we're through such tribulation.
Yet upon emerging from such taxing tests, we do well to take stock of what lessons were just being presented to us. What was God just trying to teach us? Were we resisting it, or were we embracing it?
Last week Highway 1 reopened a half dozen miles north of the hermitage, after being closed for three months due to collapse. The road opens, yet do we find life in the road we've always taken?
The way in front of us may be closed, or perhaps God is opening up a new way for us, or maybe God is showing us a way that has always been open to us. What seems like misfortune may be a blessing.
When the path is cleared, do we want to go back to going the way we used to go? We may have evolved such that we no longer feel inclined to proceed the way we used to take.
To the extent we embrace what God is trying to show us, we find true life. God wants us to have life to the full, yet God leaves it up to us whether we accept the truth of His invitation.
* John 10:10
** Romans 8:28
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