Brightness
“What is this brightness—with which God fills the soul of the just—but that clear knowledge of all that is necessary for salvation? He shows them the beauty of virtue and the deformity of vice.” (Venerable Louis of Grenada, “The Sinner’s Guide” at page 135).
It occurred to me the other day that I am very blessed to have received the Grace of Faith.
It is no easy thing to live a life without faith. I try to imagine how I would approach my day to day tasks if I did not have faith in God Himself. I cannot even imagine it.
How many times do I call out to God in the quiet of my soul? I may be sitting at my desk and overcome by worry and I call to Him. I may be sitting in a meeting and overwhelmed with stress and I call out to Him. I may be grateful and consumed by love and I call out to Him. When my children were very little, and they had bad dreams in the night, our Faith allowed us to continue through the night. We were able to pray together so that they would feel safe and protected in their sleep. When they were younger and went on their first school camp, we also prayed together. I sent them with a little prayer card and they said their prayers in the night before they fell asleep.
And when the bad times came and I worried about my children as they grew older, I would pray for them even when they did not know that I was praying for them. I would ask God to protect them and guide them. When I knew they would not listen to me, I asked the Holy Spirit to whisper in their ears so that they would listen to Him instead.
And knowing that there was a way to ask my Beloved to walk the road with me, I felt such a lightness – even in times of distress.
In “The Sinner’s Guide” at page 135, Venerable Louis of Grenada says, “What is this brightness—with which God fills the soul of the just—but that clear knowledge of all that is necessary for salvation? He shows them the beauty of virtue and the deformity of vice. He reveals to them the vanity of the world, the treasures of grace, the greatness of eternal glory, and the sweetness of the consolations of the Holy Spirit. He teaches them to apprehend the goodness of God, the malice of the evil one, the shortness of life, and the fatal error of those whose hopes are centered in this world alone. Hence the equanimity of the just. They are neither puffed up by prosperity nor cast down by adversity. ‘A holy man’, says Solomon, ‘continueth in wisdom as the sun, but a fool is changed as the moon.’ (Ecclus. 27:12). Unmoved by the winds of false doctrine, the just man continues steadfast in Christ, immoveable in charity, unswerving in faith.”
And I have been thinking about that today, for there is a brightness that I can access through FAITH, only through faith…
For with prayer, I stand on Holy Ground where everything is clear. Here. At the Foot of the Cross.
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