Thursday March 29, 2007

Thursday of the Fifth Week of Lent

March 29, 2007



Jesus said to them, “Amen, amen, I say to you, before Abraham came to be, I AM.”

John 8:58
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Is anything is what it is? Is anyone are who they say they are? I found myself asking these questions after I found out that a priest I knew had left the priesthood after forty plus years to get married. It shocked me when I heard the news because if I thought anyone was a priest for life it would be this humble, holy, serving man. I am not casting any judgments on this good man, it just jolted me into realizing ever more deeply how people and things can change.



I am sure we have all had the experience of finding out that someone is different than we thought they were. They tell us one thing and their actions are quite different than who they said they are. I think, at least on some level, we are all hypocritical and we can say one thing and yet do another. I know, for example, that the Gospel I preach in church is not always the Gospel I live up to in the streets. One time traveling I prayed that I would have the opportunity to share the Gospel with someone. God was going to show me the person and I was going to let that person have it! I was going to share the Good News of Jesus’ saving love and watch the Holy Spirit set a soul on fire. My whole focus, as always, is that every person would be consumed in the fire of God’s love. My opportunity arrived! And you know what I did? I made about two or three harsh judgments on this person even before we entered into an initial conversation. So much for loving someone and wanting them to be consumed in the fire of God's love! This person actually started the conversation by asking me, “Are you an ordained minister (I was wearing my color)?” Sheepishly, I replied, “Yes.” She came back, “Well, I am a Christian and I love the Lord.” I started repenting in my heart right then. I set out to love and I condemned. I have been a priest for almost ten years now, I have prayed for at least an hour a day for over two decades, I go to confession monthly, I know I am stepped in Gods’ grace; and yet, I am still so quick to condemn and slow to love. I say I am one thing, a loving priest, and yet so many other times I do not live the Gospel of mercy I profess.



Sometimes, in light of what I just shared, I wonder if I will ever make it there. Will I ever be who I say I am? That is where faith comes in. That is where faith in the “I AM” comes in.



Jesus calls himself, “I AM.” That means that Jesus is who he says he is and that will never change. Jesus cannot be a hypocrite- that is impossible. Now, you and I can be hypocrites and that is reality. But we should not lose hope and say that is the just the way it is always going to be. Why? Because Jesus, in whom there is no hypocrisy, calls us to be one with him in heaven forever. And he who calls has the power to make it happen. We just need to go to Jesus, the one who is who he says he is, the I AM, the one who does not change: and let him make our lives a perfection representation of our words.

We just keeping going to Jesus who is good and loving and truthful and sinless all the time and he changes us into him. Jesus changes you and me, the "I was not” who came to be, into him. Our words and our lives match perfectly because of the work of “I AM.” That sounds like heaven to me.



Live the confronted life!

+Fr. John