Deacon
Tom Writes,
“Can
Anybody Help?”
There was a commercial on TV a while age showing a man riding in
circles on his new lawn mower while he tells the viewers that in addition to
the lawn mower he also just bought a car and a house among other things. Now he
is “Up to his eyeballs in debt.” Then
he looks at the camera with glazed eyes and asks, “Can anybody help me?” This is a sad but fairly accurate depiction
of our human nature at work. It is not unusual that we dig ourselves a deep
hole before we recognize the trouble we are in and ask for help.
Our spiritual lives can be very similar. In the reading from Isaiah the
Prophet begs the Lord to come once more to the aid of His people whose
sinfulness have made their good deeds seem “like
polluted rags. The Prophet dares query God, “Why did you let us wander, O Lord, from your ways and harden our
hearts so that we fear you not?”
The first step in solving any problem is first to recognize that we
have one, like the fellow in the commercial reaching out to “anybody” who might be able to help him
with his financial problems. We do well to take this approach with our
spiritual shortcomings and reach out to God and ask Him to “rend the heavens and come down”, and
come to our rescue, not in a physical sense as in the Nativity, but as He has
promised to “be with us always, until the
end of the age.” Mt 28:20
The image of God as the potter and we the clay is a powerful one for us
to explore this Advent. Just like clay in the hands of an artisan, God shapes
and molds our lives…if we let Him. And that’s the key; God does not barge into
our lives but rather waits for an invitation.
Let us invite God into our lives in a deeper and more intimate way this
Advent Season so that He can mold us and fashion us into whatever beautiful
vessel will be most fulfilling for us. On our part, we need to be watchful so
that we may recognize how God is always by our side, constantly shaping us
through the events, people and the always-changing circumstances of our lives. This
Advent lets be on the lookout for the many ways God comes to our rescue.
Happy New (Liturgical) Year!
and,
Enjoy the Day.
Deacon Tom
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