If there’s something that strikes me about us Catholics, it’s how much we don’t know. I’m not talking about the stereotype that we don’t know our Bible (although, I must confess, I probably know less than I ought to), but rather, that our entire faith is a celebration of the incredible minuteness of our human capacity in the face of the vast ocean of God’s grace. As St. Augustine concisely put it, around 1700 years ago, “If you think you understand, it isn’t God.”
So I’m going to do a little something different
with this post today. I’ve interspersed it with stanzas from one of my
favourite hymns, “These Alone” by Dan Schutte (video at the end of this post), based on a prayer by St. Ignatius of Loyola. And although my blog has been a good way thus far to mark
the new things I’m learning and internalizing every day, this post shall be a
reiteration of all the things I don’t know—and thank God for that.
Take my heart, O Lord, take my hopes and dreams
Take my mind, with all its plans and schemes
Give me nothing more than Your love and grace
These alone, O Lord, are enough for me
I actually meant to begin (and post) this two
weeks ago, when I was thinking a lot about what it meant to surrender to God’s
will. I’m a frenetic planner by nature. Close friends can attest to how I often
cannot put my mind at rest until I have a problem set out in a mind map,
schedule, or battle plan. This constant need to have my problems delineated and
put on the conveyor belt on their way to being solved, to know what’s happening next, even permeates my
time off-duty: I, sadly, flip to the ends of books more often than I’d care to
admit. (Don’t you? No? Okay.)
Those two weeks came and went without me ever
feeling in the right mood to sit down and type a big chunk about what I don’t
know, until problems piled up at my door that I had to let in and sort out. And
these nights, before I lay me down to sleep, instead of going through battle
plans in my head, I’ve been trying to let them go instead: to ask God to “take
my mind, with all its plans and schemes”. It seems counter-intuitive that you
can be much better off with a tenuous faith in He Who Cannot Be Seen rather
than plans which give you a semblance of comfort, but to quote St. Augustine again
(very eloquent, this man), “Our hearts are restless, until they find rest in
You.”
So take everything I think I know, Lord- take
my tangled strings and hanging knots and weave them into the tapestry which I
know You have in mind for me. Take my yearnings and longings and uncurl them in
the palm of Your hand, place me against Your heart, and keep me there. You know
better. Let that be enough for me.
Take my thoughts, O Lord, and my memory
Take my tears, my joys, my liberty
Give me nothing more than Your love and grace
These alone, O Lord, are enough for me
“Strangely
enough, if God’s will is to be done, there is only one way things can end. And
that’s crazily comforting. There’s no need to make plans or worry about how to
get there. God can handle that,” said my friend Anne over skinny pizzas one day
(I paraphrase your words, dear, but I hope I got the gist right).
It seems that growing up, our problems are more
open-ended than multiple choice, and sometimes the distance between where I am
and where I want to be terrify me so much (to paraphrase Tracee Ellis Ross)
(too many quotes?) (never too many quotes). But it is in these chasms that I
hear, most clearly, the voice of God calling me to Him, to trust him. As Father
Clifford said in his Homily two weeks ago (on the Sunday when I ought to have
written this post), “God speaks to us most powerfully through interruptions.” What
we see as a long-fought-for, long-trudged road coming to a dead end may well
just be a curve in the road He has in mind.
And the strangest thing is, once we start to
let go of the human conception that we know what is best for us, and start to
glimpse the enormity of His excellent
plan, there is so much joy. There is a fullness of joy which I cannot hope to
entirely comprehend and terrifies me in the same way vast oceans and great
mountains and beautiful flowers terrify me: when I realize that I am a small
part in a huge and wonderful world, and I am fearfully and wonderfully made.
I surrender, Lord, all I have and hold
I return to You Your gifts untold
Give me nothing more than Your love and grace
These alone, O Lord, are enough for me
The second reading on that Mass two weeks ago
was from St. Paul’s second letter to the Corinthians, 12:8-10: “Three times I
appealed to the Lord about this, that it would leave me, but He said to me, ‘My
grace is sufficient for you, for power is made perfect in weakness.’ So, I will
boast all the more gladly of my weaknesses, so that the power of Christ may
dwell in me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships,
persecutions, and calamities for the sake of Christ; for whenever I am weak,
then I am strong.”
Three
times St. Paul asked the Lord
to rid him of his afflictions. (I must have badgered God at His door far more
often than that.) (Sorry.) But like St. Paul, I only found peace once I stopped
asking for more, and started asking
for less. I need to learn to stop
asking for God to fill my half-empty pot with more of what I think I want/
need, and to start asking him to empty me so He may fill me with Himself. As
Sir Thomas Browne wrote, at least three centuries ago,
“If thou could’st
empty all thyself of self,
like to a shelf
dishabited,
Then might He find
thee on the ocean shelf,
And say, ‘This is not
dead,’
And fill thee with
Himself instead.
But thou art all
replete with very thou,
And hast such shrewd activity,
That when He comes He
says, ‘This is enow
Unto itself—‘twere
better let it be,
It is so small and
full, there is no room for Me.’”
I like to think that at the end of the day when
we reach Heaven’s doors, I will lift up my empty hands and tell Him, “Here are
the gifts You gave me, Lord. I have used them all, and now I return to You.” As
another friend wrote to me a few weeks ago, “God loves you so much, and He
loves you enough to give you this life. That alone should bring you so much
joy.”
Let me be filled with Your love and grace, God.
Nothing more, nothing less.
When the darkness falls on my final days,
Take the very breath that sang Your praise
Give me nothing more than Your love and grace
These alone, O Lord, are enough for me
Admitting you don’t know anything, when you’ve
made an entire life on being the one who knows what’s going on, is terrifying.
But it’s also really liberating.
One of my favourite books of all time, Anne of the Island, has this to say
about death: “I think, perhaps, we have very mistaken ideas about heaven- what
it is and what it holds for us. I don’t think it can be so very different from
life here as most people seem to think. I believe we’ll just go on living, a
good deal as we live here- and be ourselves
just the same- only it will be easier to be good and to- follow the
highest. All the hindrances and perplexities will be taken away, and we shall
see clearly. Don’t be afraid, Ruby.”
I think it’s also super applicable to letting God’s
will reign in our lives- we will be ourselves just the same, only it will be
easier to follow His word.
Lord, help me to let go of the bitterness and
anger I feel when my plans don’t come to fruition. Help me to walk by faith and
not by sight. Help me to keep my head lifted to the sight of Your eternal glory
and fullness of grace, and help me to walk by this light, forever and always.
I don't know so much—but You always know better.
For those who are curious as to what “These
Alone” sounds like, here is a video (filmed at my church!):
For a truly inspiring article on opening your
heart to God’s joy and love in the midst of human grief, read this!
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