Lectio
“Live as though only God and yourself were in this world, so that your heart may not be detained by anything human.”
— St. John of the Cross, Sayings of Light and Love, no. 144
Meditatio
We want God to change our circumstances. He wants to change our hearts. He does not restore what is lost or broken in the world. He restores what is lost or broken in us. He does not protect us from suffering. He transforms our suffering through love into new life.
Look to the cross. Look to the crucified Christ. This is not a God who prevents suffering, but who suffers alongside us, who suffers with and for us.
On the cross we see that to love is to suffer. It is to empty ourselves out on behalf of the other, loving even those who persecute us and forgiving even those who torment us.
Through Jesus on the cross, we see what God does for us, and what we do to God. But we also see how and who we are supposed to be in this world. If we are to love as God loves, we must surrender ourselves to love as Christ surrendered himself to love.
In spite of our reluctance, our fear, and our desire for things to be different than they are, through Christ, we learn to say yes to God. We learn to say, “Father, if you are willing, remove this cup from me; yet, not my will but yours be done” (Luke 22:42). And in this surrender to God’s will, we find both freedom and renewal, freedom because we are no longer detained by anything human, and renewal because, in our death to the world and to the selves we once were within it, we are reborn.
With the mind of Christ, we come to accept that what is happening will be transfigured for the purpose of the Father. We come to trust that whatever agony, darkness, or emptiness we may be presently experiencing, although it may not be God’s will that we suffer, our pain will not be wasted in God’s economy. Through grace, in faith, working itself out in love, this dying becomes our resurrection in, through, and with Christ, and we are brought one step closer to perfect union with the God who is love.
Oratio
though my cries go unheard
though I know not why
though I weep
you are faithful
you are love
though all of this will pass away
though I know not when
though I grieve
you are faithful
you are love
though I may not understand
though I may never
though I wait
you are faithful
you are love
Contemplatio
Where in your life are you waiting for God to change your circumstances, when he may be inviting you to let him change your heart?
Related Scripture
“I have learned, in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and I know how to abound; in any and all circumstances I have learned the secret of facing plenty and hunger, abundance and want. I can do all things in him who strengthens me.” — Philippians 4:11–13 (NRSVCE)
For Further Reading
If you enjoyed this post, you may also like What the Flesh Cannot Hold: On Felt Absence and the Love That Remains, which explores the same Gethsemane prayer at the heart of this post — meditating on how the finite flesh cannot always bear the weight of God’s infinite love, and how faith is the yes that holds when feeling cannot.
Robert Van Valkenburgh
Grappling With Divinity.
Wrestling With God.
Returning To Love.
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