Be patient in tribulation, fervent in Spirit

The epistle appointed for today’s mass opens with a long list of advice for spiritual welfare. 

“People are always impatient, but God is never in a hurry!” Nikos Kazantzakis wrote those words and they highlight an important truth: We need to be patient, infinitely patient, with God. We need to let things unfold in their proper time, God’s time.  Thomas Halik once commented that an atheist is simply another term for someone who doesn’t have enough patience with God. He’s right. God is never in a hurry, and for good reason. Messiahs can only be born inside a particular kind of womb, namely, one within which there’s enough patience and willingness to wait so as to let things happen on God’s terms, not ours.

Hence, ideally, every tear should bring the messiah closer. This isn’t an unfathomable mystery: Every frustration should, ideally, make us more ready to love. Every tear should, ideally, make us more ready to forgive. Every heartache should, ideally, make us more ready to let go of some of our separateness. Every unfulfilled longing should, ideally, lead us into a deeper and more sincere prayer. And all of our pained impatience for a consummation that seems to forever elude us should, ideally, make us feverish enough to burst into love’s flame.

To offer yet another image: It is with much groaning of the flesh that the life of the spirit is brought forth!