A God of Order

I have been dealing with a lot of questions about our God to be a God of order while there are also others who will argue that God is also a God of spontaneity and we can’t put Him in a box and limit Him to certain rules and order.

There are 2 biblical references where Paul refers to both of them: 1 Cor. 14:40 NAB says “…everything must be done properly and in order” and in 2 Cor. 3:17 NAB also says “where the Spirit of the Lord is, there is freedom.” Of course, as we know, God does not contradict Himself and even Paul who wrote on 2 occasions addressing the same church and people does not intend to contradict himself.

The physical laws of nature (we refer to them as natural laws) demonstrate the order that God has caused. Ordered systems or structures do not happen by accident, never without an intelligent cause to direct the order.  If we hold all the parts of a watch and regardless how many times we throw them in the air, they will not fall down in order and assemble themselves accordingly. You will need a pair of hands and the logic of a mind to assemble it and put all the pieces into its proper place, sequence and order.

However, as I reflect on the many attributes of God and being a God of order is one of them, I have realized that while it is true, I can say that it is not His highest or the most important attribute. He doesn’t cause order because of His compulsion about perfection but He causes order as a necessity to express His love. And so the perfect order of His creation is about love and not about being organized.

Some few months ago, quite a number of my FB friends were hitting “Like” left and right about a video by somebody named Jefferson Bethke’s entitled “Why I Love Jesus but hate religion.” It stirred up a lot of debate but obviously I have come to realize that truly a lot of us have failed to see from the beginning that there is something wrong with the message and it is actually harmful. I have dealt with this issue by posting several good explanations why the video of Jefferson should not hold and I am not going to deal with that here anymore. I am mentioning this because it has something to do with I believe.

I believe that God has willed to leave us a Church so we can be put into order. “When they saw him, they worshiped, but they doubted” (Mt. 28:17 NAB). This happened immediately before His great commissioning and ascension into heaven and every time I encounter this verse, I feel some kind of relief because I know that I am not alone. That these people who have personally witness Jesus dying on the cross and powerfully rose from the dead as He promised will still have that window in their faith to doubt. So I can have excuse if I doubt from time to time.

I believe Jesus fully understood our human failings and brokenness that even after showing himself to His followers 3 days from a death they all witnessed, we will continue to have doubts and reservations on things we have seen and have believed. The verse ended by Christ’s commissioning the 12 apostles … “Go, therefore, and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you. And behold, I am with you always, until the end of age.” Note that Jesus did not say… I am with you until you die and neither He meant that the 12 will live for 2000 years or more. With this, He perpetuates His Church as we all know that has been founded on the apostles with the bishops as their successors.

This is the same Church, we strive to follow some order and hierarchy as God has designed her to be the channel of His love and mercy. He endowed with spontaneity so we can celebrate the many gifts of the Holy Spirit in our lives and in our community. We cannot profess to love Jesus and hate the religion and the Church that He has established. As faith is a gift, we have received it through her.

For those who have been trained to be organized and orderly, we will need to find the source of that compulsion. And unless otherwise, it is motivated by our own consciousness to express the love of God that He has allowed us to experience, then we will realize that our compulsion for order and organization are self-serving designed to feed our emotions and ego.

It is time to realize, it is God who creates and puts everything to order. Our role is not to create but to participate in His creation. When we come into terms with this, then we will see that we only need to follow the leading of His natural laws that He has given us and we will stop fighting one another, especially those who we call brothers and sisters.

The Last and Final Performance

Some 2 years ago, I have started to consider running in a marathon. At my age, physical and health condition I know this is close to impossible. But I have come across a co-worker, a temp I have hired at that time who was into running and in one of our conversations she had mentioned that she regularly participates about 2 or 3 marathons a year. I am probably 2 to 3 years older and so my hope started to come back that maybe it is possible. She started giving me reading materials on how to prepare for a marathon, starting small (5K) and extending it to a full marathon (42K) in a span of 2 years.

I indulge myself into reading and started my own preparation by running on my treadmill and lifting some weights for 30 to 45 minutes every day or as often as my busy schedule would allow me. I started to lose some pounds and some few muscles started to appear. Every day doing that feels like I am dying but as I continuously do it, I notice I began to run longer and faster and lift heavier weight with more repetitions. A twist of fate halted everything I was doing and now still struggling to get into the same routine.

The point of the matter is I do have some understanding on how athletes prepare for their once in a lifetime last and maybe final performance. They will have to endure years of training and disciplined lifestyles to become ready for that final day. In other words, they are ready to make great sacrifices and are willing to do almost anything so they can reach their goal – by making their bodies ready.

As I reflect on the imminence of my own last and final performance, where I will appear before the greatest Judge of all, I wonder how my day to day preparations by living and sharing my faith will eventually measure up on that day. Will I hear the words….come my faithful servant, inherit the kingdom I have prepared for you….or will I hear…. depart from me as I don’t know you….

St. Paul has mentioned something about working out your salvation. He too must have understood the athletes of his time and has reflected that faith is no different. Yet we have such difficult time making the same connection, or even making the same sacrifices for something that is more spiritual and has a far greater consequence on our own soul.

Another example from St. Paul that can be helpful is that he kept asking God for the thorn in his flesh to be removed. While in our case, it may not be a physical thorn in the flesh, we do experience some nagging situations where every day we have to deal with some nuisances in our lives. It could be a spouse or a child or some person we meet and deal with every day or with regularity. We can walk out or decide to severe our relationship with the person in order to stop the nagging situation but where is the virtue here? Pagans do the same and so we are no different from them.

But St. Paul did not give up, he prayed over and over again and by doing the same routine of praying every day and every moment gave him the opportunity to learn the virtues of humility, perseverance and surrender. This is probably he has so much wisdom in all his writings and I am sure in all his undocumented teachings. Eventually, he realized that God has other purpose for that thorn in his flesh that he come into terms and accepted that God’s grace is sufficient for him to endure his pain and that God’s power works best in him in moments of his weakness, only then he understood that he doesn’t feel the need any more to pray for healing.

If we could only see the cross as the positive agent that it is in the faith journey, we could easily and willingly embrace the daily sacrifices that come our way...that we would better understand the concept of discipleship…..that sufferings and trials though we do not want to welcome into our lives are our constant companion not to punish us but to harness us and better prepare ourselves for that one last and final performance.

May this Lent season give us an opportunity to reflect the choices we have made in our lives; turn to Him in the Sacraments and start to truly live out His call to discipleship.  Amen.

Obama Did It Again

---------- Forwarded Message ----------From: INRI <zealous12@verizon.net>To: Undisclosed recipients: ;Subject: Direct attack on CatholicsDate: Fri, 20 Jan 2012 18:22:02 -0500

Email not displaying correctly? View it in your browser Dear CV Friend, Get ready to pay. This morning President Obama called New York Archbishop Timothy Dolan to break the news. Secretary of Health and Human Services and pro-abortion Catholic Kathleen Sebelius just announced that the proposed mandate requiring all insurance plans to pay for contraception, sterilization and some abortion drugs is official -- and Catholics cannot escape. ...and the fig-leaf exemption for religious groups will not be modified, apart from allowing some groups an additional year to comply. Cardinal-designate Timothy M. Dolan responded minutes ago, saying: �In effect, the president is saying we have a year to figure out how to violate our consciences.� Beginning August 1, 2012 (less than eight months from today), the insurance premiums we pay, including the insurance premiums paid by Catholics for employees of churches and schools -- will be used to cover drugs and procedures that are in direct conflict with the teachings of our Church. That's right. Our government will now force us to pay for insurance coverage for birth control, sterilization and even some abortion drugs. President Obama ignored the organized efforts of Catholics across the country, including bold statements from the Bishops, university presidents (including Notre Dame's Rev. Jenkins), and even his Catholic allies like Sr. Carol Keehan. Instead, President Obama stood with his real friends -- Planned Parenthood. Make no mistake, this decision is a direct attack on you, our Church, and the religious liberty of all Americans. Just yesterday, Pope Benedict XVI addressed the bishops from the United States who were completing their "Ad Limina" visit in Rome. The Holy Father specifically cited the "grave threats" to the freedom of the Church in America, and urged the Catholic community to respond, especially with "an engaged, articulate and well-formed Catholic laity." He's talking to you and me. The Holy Father's brief address is a must read (link below). Finally, today marks exactly one year from Inauguration Day. In exactly 12 months, America will welcome a new president, or usher in four more years of Barack Obama and his assault on our liberties. This irony is not lost on us. We built CatholicVote into a movement to advance the cause of life, family, and freedom. Today's decision is an assault on all three. And it MUST be defeated. You have our pledge that we will do everything possible to educate and mobilize the Catholic vote in 2012. For on a day such as this, we realize that elections indeed have consequences. The Catholic vote must rise up like never before.  Sincerely, Brian Burch, President CatholicVote.org U.S. Bishops Vow to Fight HHS Edict http://www.usccb.org/news/2012/12-012.cfm Read the Holy Father's Address to the US Bishops: http://www.vatican.va/holy_father/benedict_xvi/speeches/2012/january/documents/hf_ben-xvi_spe_20120119_bishops-usa_en.html Read the text of the HHS Announcement: http://www.hhs.gov/news/press/2012pres/01/20120120a.html Download the CatholicVote App: http://cvote.to/99  |  Support CatholicVote: https://catholicvote.org/donate   |  Become a fan at: http://facebook.com/CatholicVote   |   Follow us at: http://Twitter.com/CatholicVote This message was intended for: whandsf@earthlink.net You were added to the system September 2, 2011. For more information click here. Update your preferences | Unsubscribe