THIS is, of course, impossible to do.
But we can always
try. The truth is we need to size God up since as image and likeness
of God and children of his, we need to know him as much as we can in
order to conform ourselves to him. It’s in the trying that matters.
It’s not in knowing him completely, because he will always remain a
mystery to us.
Yes, God is full of mysteries. We can never fathom his
will and his ways. And yet he is also the most obvious and nearest
object of our mind and heart if we bother to care. And that’s because
God is everywhere. He is the fullness of love, the maintainer of our
existence. Wherever we turn, whether around us or inside us, things
will always point us to him.
But for all this mystery and inscrutability of God, we are
made to know him fairly enough because we are left with his word and
laws, with his sacraments, with his Church, etc. Our faith tells us
that the Holy Spirit continues to be with us, and where the Spirit is,
the other two persons of the Triune God are also with us.
To size God up, we need to know his commandments, for
those are where we can find his divine will for us. Following that
will, obeying his commandments and laws is what would connect us with
him.
In this regard, we have to distinguish between the
so-called Old Law and the New Law. Both of course are necessary for
us, with the former as some kind of preparation and prerequisite for
the latter.
The Old Law as expressed in the Ten Commandments simply
describes how we ought to behave as a human person, endowed with
intelligence and will. It tells us what is proper to our human nature.
By itself it does not bring us to our supernatural goal of living our
life with God, but simply predisposes us to it.
It’s the New Law that does that. As articulated by Christ
himself, the God who is the perfect image of God himself and therefore
the very pattern of our humanity since we are the image and likeness
of God, we have to love one another as he himself has loved us.
Christ becomes the standard of our loving, and he showed
this to us by first obeying the will of his Father who wants him to
pay for all the sins of man by offering his life for us. And with that
death, he shows us the extent of his love for his Father and for all
of us. In short, his love goes all the way. It’s total. “Greater love
has no one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends,” he
said. (Jn 15,13) Suffering for others out of love for God is the very
substance of the New Law.
The extent to which we follow this New Law is also the
extent to which we can manage to size God up. That is why we have to
learn to continually go deeper in our eagerness to suffer for others
out of love for God. Without this attitude, our effort to know and
love God as we ought is hampered, if not aborted.
And the drama involved in following the New Law need not
entail extraordinary circumstances. It can be done in our usual
struggle against our personal weaknesses and temptations.
When people ask me how they can handle their sexual
weaknesses especially when they are alone, I usually tell them to
intensify their prayers and spirit of sacrifice whenever they are
alone as when they are preparing to sleep because that is where
temptations come and our weaknesses are stirred.
try. The truth is we need to size God up since as image and likeness
of God and children of his, we need to know him as much as we can in
order to conform ourselves to him. It’s in the trying that matters.
It’s not in knowing him completely, because he will always remain a
mystery to us.
Yes, God is full of mysteries. We can never fathom his
will and his ways. And yet he is also the most obvious and nearest
object of our mind and heart if we bother to care. And that’s because
God is everywhere. He is the fullness of love, the maintainer of our
existence. Wherever we turn, whether around us or inside us, things
will always point us to him.
But for all this mystery and inscrutability of God, we are
made to know him fairly enough because we are left with his word and
laws, with his sacraments, with his Church, etc. Our faith tells us
that the Holy Spirit continues to be with us, and where the Spirit is,
the other two persons of the Triune God are also with us.
To size God up, we need to know his commandments, for
those are where we can find his divine will for us. Following that
will, obeying his commandments and laws is what would connect us with
him.
In this regard, we have to distinguish between the
so-called Old Law and the New Law. Both of course are necessary for
us, with the former as some kind of preparation and prerequisite for
the latter.
The Old Law as expressed in the Ten Commandments simply
describes how we ought to behave as a human person, endowed with
intelligence and will. It tells us what is proper to our human nature.
By itself it does not bring us to our supernatural goal of living our
life with God, but simply predisposes us to it.
It’s the New Law that does that. As articulated by Christ
himself, the God who is the perfect image of God himself and therefore
the very pattern of our humanity since we are the image and likeness
of God, we have to love one another as he himself has loved us.
Christ becomes the standard of our loving, and he showed
this to us by first obeying the will of his Father who wants him to
pay for all the sins of man by offering his life for us. And with that
death, he shows us the extent of his love for his Father and for all
of us. In short, his love goes all the way. It’s total. “Greater love
has no one than this: to lay down one's life for one's friends,” he
said. (Jn 15,13) Suffering for others out of love for God is the very
substance of the New Law.
The extent to which we follow this New Law is also the
extent to which we can manage to size God up. That is why we have to
learn to continually go deeper in our eagerness to suffer for others
out of love for God. Without this attitude, our effort to know and
love God as we ought is hampered, if not aborted.
And the drama involved in following the New Law need not
entail extraordinary circumstances. It can be done in our usual
struggle against our personal weaknesses and temptations.
When people ask me how they can handle their sexual
weaknesses especially when they are alone, I usually tell them to
intensify their prayers and spirit of sacrifice whenever they are
alone as when they are preparing to sleep because that is where
temptations come and our weaknesses are stirred.
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