The Gospel of Yes Daily Reflection for Dec. 20, 2023
DECEMBER 20, 2023
WEDNESDAY OF THE THIRD WEEK OF ADVENT
A YES TO THE PRESENT MOMENT
OPENING PRAYER:
COME, HOLY SPIRIT. I welcome you into my heart as Mary did. Come with power. Help me to offer my own yes to God the Father, saying with trust: “May it be done unto me according to your word.”
TODAY’S THOUGHT:
It is very important to remember that our yes to the Lord is a yes offered in this present moment to whatever the Lord may be asking of us at this time. We don't know what tomorrow will bring, so there is no point in worrying and fretting about it and whether we will be able to say yes to it. We just need to offer our yes to the Lord today, in this present moment. The Lord will provide for us tomorrow.
All of the great spiritual writers are very clear on this point. We cannot let our yes to the Lord today, in this moment, become paralyzed by the unknowns of tomorrow. We cannot hold back our yes now out of fear of what may come tomorrow. The Lord will give us everything we need tomorrow when we get there.
Another important aspect of the spirituality of the little way is to live in the present moment. Not to go endlessly over the past but leave it entirely to God and his mercy. Not to torment ourselves about tomorrow but entrust it to his Providence. The Gospel is very clear on this point. "Therefore I tell you, do not be anxious about your life, what you shall eat or what you shall drink, nor about your body, what you shall put on … Which of you by being anxious can add one cubit to his span of life? … Your heavenly Father knows that you need them all." (Matthew 6:25-33) Worrying has never solved any problem. What solves problems are trust and faith.
Living in the present moment means accepting the poverty in us: not insisting on going over and over the past or taking control of the future but contenting ourselves with today. But this is very liberating. God does not dole out grace by a sort of profit-and-loss accounting of my past based on my good and bad actions. He gives me grace according to my faith today: “Be it done for you as you have believed!” The past doesn’t matter. If today I make the decision to believe, to hope, and to love, I can be certain of having all God’s love to rely on. That is what happened to the good thief: “Today you will be with me in Paradise!” (1)
And again:
“The present moment is the soul’s meeting place with God . . . the point of contact with the divine will. Regardless of its form and content, it is, by its very nature, the expression of God’s will for us. In this precise minute, God wants us to accomplish an action that very often will be neither extraordinary nor grandiose, but mundane and tiny. Its only value will be that it is God’s will. But, to be precise, is not this will sufficient enough? The present moment conveys not only the divine will, but also God’s presence. If, at this moment, the Lord asks us to be in such-and-such a place or accomplish such-and-such an action, it is because He waits for us there. At this precise moment, we meet Him and, if we look for Him elsewhere, we will miss Him.” (2)
TODAY’S PRAYER:
Ask your heavenly Father to give you grace today, in this moment, to say yes to what he is asking of you now. Our spiritual life is meant to be one of "daily bread", not looking too far beyond the present moment, asking our Father to provide for us now. Tomorrow will take care of itself.
Our Father…
And then offer this prayer from Fr. Andre, making his words your own:
“Lord, day after day, moment after moment, action after action, I write the novel of my life, and I write it for eternity. Help me to live out each moment as fully as possible. This moment that You give me will never be given again. I do not want to be anguished or tense because of it but wish to waste nothing in life. Each moment is a drop of union with You. I do not live yesterday or today. I live in this moment. And I am united to You. I have everything.” (3)
FOR YOUR REFLECTION:
John William Waterhouse, The Annunciation. (1914)
John William Waterhouse was a British Italian artist who painted in the Romanticist style. Many of his paintings depicted mythological themes, which were favorites of the Romanticist artists, but here he has captured the Annunciation in vibrant deep blues and purples. A halo crowns Mary's head, but so does her right hand, raised in surprise, while her left hand rests on her chest. Mary has been in prayer, seen in the open scroll of the Scriptures which rests on the pedestal to the right, but she is nevertheless caught off guard by the angel's sudden appearance. Gabriel's hair is swept back, giving a sense of motion even though he stands still.
When God comes to us and asks for a yes in the present moment of our daily life, it can often catch us by surprise. We often think of our yes to God as coming mainly in the big and dramatic moments of life. But it is in the small, daily, and often mundane moments that the Lord most desires our yes. These seem too small to us to matter to God, so we are often surprised.
Notice the colorful flowers growing out of the cracks in the stone to Mary's right. Like these flowers, God often appears in places and times we don't expect. Stone blocks don't seem hospitable to flowers springing up, but there they are. The "present moments" of our days may not seem hospitable to God, but it is right there that he shows up.
Pray today for the grace to say yes to the Lord in the present moment, even when it may catch you by surprise or seem too ordinary a place or time for God to be at work. Make use of one of the Prayers of Surrender and Abandonment to help you say yes today.
Fr. Jacques Philippe. The Way of Trust and Love: A Retreat Guided by St. Therese of Lisieux. Scepter Publishers. Kindle Edition.
Father Victor Sion, Pour un réalisme spirituel, L’instant present (The present moment for a spiritual realism) (Éditions des Béatitudes, 1989), 15–16.
Father André Sève, excerpt from The Sun of Prayers, quoted in Fr. Joel Guiber, Abandonment to God: The Way of Peace of St. Therese of Lisieux (p. 33). Sophia Institute Press. Kindle Edition.