Advent—which
is the beginning of the Church’s year—starts in two weeks, and as
we approach the end of the Church’s year, we are reminded of the
end of time as well. The readings for the next two weeks are
all about the end of time and reminding us that all things the things
around us will eventually come to an end.
Every so
often we hear people say that the end of time is coming, or that the
Lord is about to come again, or that God is about to punish the earth
for all the evil that is around. Is this true? We don’t
know. But what we do know is what the Lord himself said about
this kind of thing. We have it in the Gospel reading today.
He said: ‘Take care not to be deceived, because many will
come using my name and saying, ‘I am He’, and, ‘The time is
near at hand’. Refuse to join them.’
The Lord
simply asks us to persevere; to persevere with the daily struggle of
trying to be a Christian, of trying to pray, to go to mass, to get on
with whatever the Lord has given us to do, in married life, in single
life, wherever we find ourselves.
If you were
to ask what is the most important thing for a Christian to do to keep
us going from day to day, I would say without a doubt it is prayer.
Prayer is simply our relationship with God and like any relationship
with another person it takes many different forms. It is as
important as eating and sleeping. If you stop eating and sleeping you
die physically. If you don’t pray in some form, you die
spiritually. It is the exact same thing. When we have
some kind of relationship with God it puts things in perspective for
us. It helps us to see what is important and what isn’t.
It helps us to remember what our life is about and what we are called
to do each day. It also helps us not to become overwhelmed by
all the gloom and doom around us. If you know what the purpose
of your life is, then it is a lot easier to keep going especially
when we are hearing so much negativity around us. Sure we are
in difficult times, but if God is with us, guiding us, then what have
we to be afraid of?
But how, you
might ask, are we supposed to pray in this crazy and very busy
world? Well it’s like anything else, if we don’t make time
for it, it won’t happen. If we just try and fit it in when
everything else is done, we won’t pray, don’t be fooled. If
we see it as a necessary thing, we will make time for it, just as we
make time for eating and sleeping; but if we see it as an optional
extra, then you will never pray.
Our prayer is
the communication line between us and God. It is simply how we
express our relationship with him. The more we are in tune with
God through prayer, the more we will begin to think like God, the
more we will begin to reflect the image of God that is in each of us,
which is a very beautiful thing. People who are close to God
are beautiful, because they reflect this light of God which is in
each of us.
How do I
pray? Think of all the time you spend in your car, or indeed
any time you are alone. We don’t always have to be listening
to the radio. We can choose to turn it off and simply talk to
Jesus and tell him about our fears and hopes. That is prayer.
Spend some time each day thanking God for all things, good and bad.
Tell God about your joys and ask him for your needs. Spend time
in silence before the Blessed Sacrament. Read the Scriptures,
the living Word of God. Stay on for a few minutes after mass
and thank God for coming to you in Holy Communion. Ask God to
bless your families and those people you are worried about.
Prayer doesn’t always change the situations that we are praying
for, but it does change us. So we grow and mature and we learn
the ways of God.
There are
almost as many ways to pray as there are people, and we will all live
our relationship with God slightly differently, but what is important
is that we do have this relationship with God in some form.
Do you find
that your faith seems empty and boring? Do you wonder why you
even bother with it half the time? Ask yourself, are you
praying, are you reading the Word of God? And if not, are you
surprised that your faith seems boring?
Jesus says to
us, ‘Do not be deceived…’ the way to him is very ordinary and
involves the same perseverance that anything else requires as well,
just like any relationship with another person. But the Lord
also says, ‘Your endurance will win you your lives.’ The
path to God isn’t easy, but it is well worth it.
No comments:
Post a Comment