17 Aug 2016
Sometimes I think, “Why can’t I be more like . . . St.
Francis, or St. Benedict, or our Blessed Mother; why can’t I be more radically
devoted to God like them?” Or, “why
can’t I have the spiritual depth like . . . St. Augustine, or St. Clare, or St.
Francis de Sales?” And, “why can’t I
have the kind of relationship with Christ like . . . everybody else seems to
have?”
And, in that, I suppose we’re not that different from the
worker in the vineyard who wondered why the last guy hired got the same pay as
somebody who worked all day. It’s easy
to focus on what everybody else seems
to have, and to overlook our own blessings.
And the vineyard owner’s response to that is basically, “Don’t worry
about the deal I made with the other person, focus on the deal I made with
you.”
None of us here is Saint Francis, or Saint Clare, or Saint
Whomever. God’s relationship with them
is different than his relationship with each of us. The beautiful thing to keep in mind is that
God is in relationship with each of
us. “The Lord is my Shepherd.” He’s the Shepherd of a lot of people; but
he’s nonetheless MY Shepherd. And our
Shepherd has made a deal with each one of us, individually.
Regardless of how others’ relationships with God look, it
shouldn’t distract us from our own
relationship with the Lord. We might
ask, “Why can’t I be more like . . . Saint Whomever?” To which Jesus says, “I didn’t make you to be
Saint Whomever; I made you to be you, and I made you personally to know and
love me.”
The Lord is my
Shepherd; my personal Shepherd. May we
take that to heart today and always.
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