Saturday, October 19, 2024

Begging For Abandonment to the Love of Christ

We all have this place where we suffer, where we face our own inadequacy, where we discover the smallness of our hearts and the pettiness of all our deeds.

And it is here that Jesus asks each one of us, in the most penetrating and poignant way, to believe in Him, to trust Him.

I do believe that He loves me with an infinite love, giving Himself for me on the Cross, pouring Himself out in the Eucharist, and drawing me to Himself through His ongoing companionship with me in the Church. He summons me from within the relationships entrusted to me, and the cries of the poor and the powerless whose afflictions wound my heart, whose need I recognize as my own, whose desire awakens me to share their struggles and their patience.

The love of Jesus is within the fabric of my life. It is mysterious and yet I know it constitutes “who I am” and draws me toward “who I want to be.” The love of Jesus gives meaning to everything and opens up the possibility for hope in every moment.

Why do I fail to entrust everything to this Great Lover? Why am I afraid? What more could He possibly do to deserve my trust?
Jesus, I entrust to You what seems so often to me to be such a complicated business, namely the abandonment of myself to You, the giving of everything over to You, the surrender of everything to You...even my weakness.
Jesus, I entrust "my-entrusting-of-myself-to-You" TO YOU! 
That's an awkward way of putting it. But I'm sure He knows what I mean.

I will not give up. Even if I am broken, God is still God, and still Glorious – even more clearly so, for He takes my brokenness upon Himself. Here, more than anywhere, it is clear that He is worthy of all my love. He has proven Himself. Thus, in every circumstance – even in the face of the prospect that I have nothing to give, that I am worthless, that all my aspirations in life may end in failure – the only reasonable possibility for me is to love God.

So even if I am nothing, I still have the desire—the need—to love Him. I beg that I might be able to love Him.

From nothing, God creates, God brings forth life. Jesus I trust in You. Convert me. Conquer me. Recreate me in Your merciful love. Give me a new heart.