Sunday, October 7, 2012

To Love is to Die

           I want to talk today about Gods love. Sometimes we get to caught up in ourselves; our wants, our desires. I think we often forget that God is love. We only see Him as a rule maker and a judge. God is far more than that. I used to think I had to DO more to love God more. Although we do have to strive to grow in holiness we cant really do more FOR God, I mean he died for our salvation, what more could you do for Him to repay that debt? Nothing and Jesus knows that, that's why he gave us that gift of love so freely, He knows we cant love Him the same way He loves us. But he does show us How we can learn to love more freely.
           In the Gospels this week Jesus has been talking allot about being childlike, especially yesterday; He said "I give you praise, Father,Lord of heaven and earth, for although you have hidden these things from the wise and the learned you have revealed them to the childlike."(Lk 10:21) What is this child-likeness that Christ is talking about here? Does He want us to behave like a bunch of bratty school children? No!!! He is talking about innocence. He is talking about being the child just before he/she makes their first Holy Communion. That innocence is priceless, if we could all go back to that moment in our life we would realize that we were so pure and open, everything made sense and we were always believing what was being taught to us. We had a "child's faith"!!!! As we grow older we start to wonder and ask questions; which is a good thing that's how we learn, but some people did not get an answer or the answer was not the truth. As we get/got older we started wondering how can this be true, how can that be possible and we started to lose that childlike faith. We don't intend to it just kind of happens as we grow older. We start to try and make our faith our own which is a necessary part of growing up, but unfortunately when we start to search on our own we sometimes get lost and it takes God; in His great love, coming and searching for us, to pull us back to Him. It takes us ten times as long to relearn how to love as a child, to be able to just be.
           What does it mean to just "BE"? I have long thought about this question and the answer is not exactly a set answer. To "be" means to just be in the presence of God and be happy! Nothing else matters just God. Being happy and at peace deep within your heart even if your external world is falling apart. This just "being" sounds like some sort of crazy way of making people just be happy all the time, but just "being" is actually a great gift from God and helps us to see His great love for us even more in our lives. We often think that if we love God than the world revolves around us. That is not the case, lets look at Job he lost everything but still kept up his love for God. Love in all reality is death!! Yes that's right I just said that love is death!!!! You are probably saying to yourself "this guys a nut!" hear me out on this. To love takes great sacrifice! right? Your love for God and Faith (which are really the same thing) are really supposed to be the center of your life, but to have God as the center of your life is a great sacrifice. You may have to get up early in the morning to pray before school or work, you may get made fun of for being "the bible thumper" or "the Catholic freak", maybe you fasted for Mass which is on your lunch hour or maybe you had to give up going to a movie with friends so that you could go to Mass with your family. What ever little sacrifice it is for you  these little things are "little deaths". They make us die to ourselves and let God come just a little closer to our heart. Lets all pray that we may die a little more each day, so that we may love God more and draw closer to Him here on earth.
         
           May our great and loving God come down and remain with us forever!


"For God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life." (Jn 3:16)
Brian