God Remains Always with Us

Week One No. 2

Grace:

My Lord Jesus I beg for the grace to be able to acknowledge the Divine Presence, the Emmanuel and the Spirit of Life in me

Scriptural Passages:

Psalm 139 God, my Creator, present throughout my life;
Jn 3:1-21 God so loved the world that he sent the Son;
Lk. 24:36-43 In risen human flesh, Jesus eats with friends.

While they were still speaking about this, he stood in their midst and said to them, "Peace be with you." But they were startled and terrified and thought that they were seeing a ghost. Then he said to them, "Why are you troubled? And why do questions arise in your hearts? Look at my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me and see, because a ghost does not have flesh and bones as you can see I have." And as he said this, he showed them his hands and his feet. While they were still incredulous for joy and were amazed, he asked them, "Have you anything here to eat?" They gave him a piece of baked fish; he took it and ate it in front of them (Lk. 24:36-43).

Points for Reflection:

You can say that you believe in God, sincerely, and yet act like someone who does not believe. You would then be a “practical atheist,” which means that you live from one end of the week to the next without so much as thinking about God. Consider whether you may not have lost two qualities of the believer: a sense of awe and wonder and reverence before God, the Creator and Lord, and before God’s creation; and a steady choice to do the next good thing because God is with you.

For a number of reasons, such as the spread of technology and of ideological movements, you might feel that God remains far away from the world, like the maker of a watch that finishes with it and lets it go on its own. Your faith teaches you something very different. God wishes the People to be so close to him that he would seem to be wearing them like a skin-tight garment (Jer. 13:11). Jesus Christ promised that he would be “with you always, yes, to the end of time” (Mt. 28:20).

When the humankind drove the Son of God out of our flesh and killed him, he rose again and returned among us. Now God remains eternally united to humanity by a bond that can never be broken: Jesus Christ who is both God and human. You receive him into yourself in Communion.

God the Spirit of Life sustains everything in existence, even giving energy to your thinking and moving. Through the Divine Wisdom, the Spirit keeps acting in might “from one end of the earth to the other, ordering all things for good” (Wis. 7:15-8:1). As the Psalm says, God the almighty goes before you and behind you, always.


PRAYER: Lord of wisdom, Lord of might, when I think of you, I seem to feel you gazing on me. I am a little afraid that anyone can know me through and through and at every moment. But I feel your gaze as a gentle regard. And in my heart I know that you see me and you are delighted. I am amazed and full of thanks. Amen.


Source: Joseph Tetlow, S.J. (1989). Choosing Christ in the World. Saint Louis: Institute of Jesuit Sources.