What is Your Focus?

 

In the early morning I awoke and thought about my past.  I remembered all the stock trades I had made, and the time I had spent analyzing stocks.  Overall, I made money.  As I lay there, I couldn’t recall what happened to it.  So much time spent; so little worth-remembering results.

I had a dream about a woman who was at a support group meeting.  She was explaining why she had to have an abortion.  Everyone there understood.  And then, at the end of her touching story, she said: “And then I had another.”  And she was given a card with a number to call.  The number ended in “PARDON”.  She was deeply sorry for that first sin that she felt compelled to do, but she kept on doing it.

Repeat sins are so easy; that is why we repeat them.  We don’t think to repent of them.  They hurt God, however, just the same.  And no one says they are sorry.  Sins are a such a casual focus of our lives we don’t think to repent, but like my stock market focus, if we really thought about them, we probably wouldn’t see the major benefit of doing them.  They were done more out of habit then need or desire. 

I was focused on money; the woman was focused on casual sex.  Many/most people focus on things they want to do, without ever thinking much about why.  Often it is to become recognized by others; sometimes it is to please our senses.  We often think we are doing just what everyone else is doing.  But if we only focus on doing what everyone else is doing, we are not realizing that we are unique beings.  We look in the mirror and see someone different; it is obvious.  But if we are unique, different, why?  Do we ask that?  The only one who could answer that question is the one who created us, because He created us for a reason, a unique reason. 

It’s kind of like, if I were a creator, and I created a beautiful gold cup for placing on the altar.  Certainly, you could take that cup and play in the sand.  You could point out that many people are playing in the sand with cups.  But what do you think I, the creator of that unique cup, would think of your playing? 

We so easily find some focus in life and continue doing it.  We may look back at some point, as I did on my stock trades, and wonder why I so valued doing that with my life.  Or we may look back and see we were in some habitual sin we just continued --- because we could.  But we so rarely consider why we were created; what was the purpose the creator intended for us unique beings.  I think if we did, we would see more clearly the sins we commit and how we are failing our creator, and what He probably thinks.  And we might see, if we spoke to Him, why He created us, uniquely, now.

And what we should focus on, which would please Him.  And we might remember all the parables Jesus told of people who disappointed Him, and what happened to them, from the vineyard lessees to the man who wasted talents.  We were made for a reason, a unique purpose.  It should be our focus.  As a head start on figuring out that focus, we should remember what Jesus said WAS the primary purpose for lives in general:  to love God and to love neighbor ----- not self or what we feel good doing.  He exampled love to the nth degree, and He chose to die on a cross for love of God and neighbor. 

What is your focus?

Mother's Day Peace

 

My mom’s been gone for almost 8 years.  It seems longer.  She is missed.  But I think I’ve gotten closer to Mary, the mom Jesus gave us, in this time.  I prayed to her this Mother’s Day and even to her husband, Joseph, who I began seriously praying to of late.  I prayed for a friend on the Feast Day of St Joseph the Worker on May 1, and less than a week later she said that she had found work, after a long period of layoff.  Every member of that Holy Family hears our prayers.

Which, I guess, is why the meditation I read this afternoon in Stinissen’s book hit home.  We ALL have so many worries in these times, and we ALL seem to be alone --- but we’re not.  This is the meditation from yesterday in his book: This is the Day the Lord has Made:

 

Peace Among Worldly Fear

If we were to ask people what their deepest, ongoing feeling is, I believe that many would answer: “I’m afraid, I feel consumed by unrest and worry.”

Fear plagues a large segment of humanity.  To the individual, it often shows itself in nervousness, physical tension, sleeplessness.  Whether we want to or not, we are all children of our time, and none of us can expect to be completely spared this worldwide epidemic of fear.

None of us can close our eyes to the fact that there are serious reasons for fear.  We really don’t know where the world is headed.  A handful of people have the power to turn our world into a burning inferno --- in a few places, this has already happened.  It isn’t surprising that a wave of fear is rushing over us all.

Nevertheless, the Bible teaches that the afflicted and anxious person can find peace in God, that God is a refuge and a bulwark in times of trouble, that God is the God of peace.  At the birth of Jesus, the angels proclaim peace on earth (Lk 2:14).  Before Jess leaves the disciples to return to the Father, he promises them his peace (Jn 14:27).

For the one who confidently surrenders to God, there is a way to peace in this fearful world.

The visible, outer world will become a world of peace only on the day when God creates a new heaven and a new earth (Rev 21:1).  But your inner world can --- already now, day by day --- be permeated by the peace of God.  It is difficult to reason how this happens.  Still, the more you grow in confidence and reliance, the more you will know this mysterious and divine peace.

 

What beautiful thoughts for today!  Stinissen’s book was published in 2000, but it could have been yesterday.  When we are in desperate need, of a job, of peace, of inner peace, God is there for us, as is his earthly mother and father.  I pray the Surrender Novena each day, and try to put it into my heart, to really surrender everything to Jesus.  I know of some lives that prayer has radically changed, when people surrender to Jesus.  Only he can give peace in this world, and in me. 

Happy Mother’s Day to any moms who might read this.  Don’t be afraid; God is in control if you surrender your worries to him.  You can find his peace among this worldly fear.