Worry

As I prayed the rosary in front of Our Lord this night, I had worries on my mind. I had worries in recent days about a task I was confident He was calling me to do --- He seemed so persistent in his knocking at my door --- and the path He asked me to follow seemed to be so adorned with flowers. It seemed the right path. But I worried about my will, and the paths I thought would be good to follow. Would my concerns with MY WAY of doing things lead us both astray --- would I lead us from His intended destination? I worried.

A friend asked me to pray for her: was the path she thought to follow the will of the Lord, or only her ego disturbing their conversation? I laughed; I recently had asked the same question, I told her. We all so worry: Am I doing right? Am I doing enough? Am I doing good enough? And as I prayed the rosary I reflected on these mysteries of my life, as I thought about the mysteries of Jesus’ life: my worries; His worries; the parallels; and the insights He gave me this night about worry --- and its silliness.

Why do I doubt You can do anything?
Why do I still worry?
I am never alone, for You are with me.
Spirit of Wisdom, guide me.
Lord, let me love others as my children, as You would love them.

That last meditation gave me pause: Let me love as You would? My worries seemed to be about my relationship to God: Am I doing Your will, or am I doing my will? A thing which I had forgotten, however, is that all my actions inevitably involve others. This last meditation reminded me that love is about how I treat those others. Thinking on this, I can see that if I love others as my children, as He would love them, then my actions will not --- indeed cannot --- be only of myself, or my ego, for He will truly be with me. If I do things in the right mindset, I need not worry that my will is getting in the way. So I relaxed a little, but then I saw that’s only part of the story. My relations with others are not only about what I do --- which I seemed to worry so much about ---but they are also about what they do.

My doing His will consists in doing the best I can AND in not preventing His will for me through the people He brings into my life. My total relationship with others is not just in my control. So often I focus on and worry about my actions, but it is when those actions are touched by others’ that God’s Providence comes into play --- His actions beyond my will to change. How do I react to those?

We see few huge miracles in our lives. It is in the little details of our lives that we see God’s love. Sometimes we don’t notice them, and it seems we are alone, or that things are just happening to us by chance and beyond our control. Do you really believe you and your life were created by chance, however, like a spilled bucket of paint, and some image that appeared in the splatter? No, each hair of your head was carefully drawn by your Creator. Like an artist in love with His work, no small detail of you is unimportant to God.

The ultimate artist, God stares at His work, He makes small changes, unnoticeable by most, but He notices. To Him, each little detail, an added change, perfects His effort. Those small changes are actions He does to us each and every day, through the people around us. The people we see in our daily doings are little whispers to us from our surroundings, surroundings He created. When we hear them and react to them in trust, He smiles; His perfection in us is being achieved. His love is being accepted by His beloved.

How is He creating His perfection in you today? Is your unruly child perfecting you in patience? Is your unappreciative spouse teaching you to love without counting the cost? Are your fervent prayers in the quiet of the church, your screams and cries to God, answered in silence, teaching you that love does not have to be spoken between lovers --- it is enough to be in each other’s presence, and know in confidence that you are loved, even in your trials, even in your sadness?

There is nothing to worry about if we seek to do God’s will, as best as we discern it, and treat all His other children exactly as He treats us, with a total giving love, no matter what they give us in return.

If we can do this, living within the artistry of His creation, accepting how He created us and how he created our surroundings at each and every moment, His work will be perfected. We cannot see His whole painting of creation now, but one day we will be united with the Great Artist, and see His masterful work, and likely cry, arm-in-arm with Him, at its amazing beauty. And perhaps then you may point to some small corner of His canvas and say: “Oh look, is that me?” And He will just smile, and hug you. You make it perfect.