LET’S be
reminded always of what Christ once said. “Let
your ‘Yes’ be ‘Yes,’ and your ‘No,’ ‘No.’ For whatever is
more than
these is from the evil one.” (Mt 5,37)
Our life in a
nutshell can be summarized with these words.
We need to say ‘Yes’ always to God, and ‘No’ to the
enemies of God and
of our soul, namely, our weakened flesh, the sinful
allurements of the
world, and the devil himself.
If we follow by
this divine dictum, for sure our life will
be made simpler and happier, meaningful and fruitful,
because then we
would be living our life according to God’s will and
ways, which is
proper to us since our life is meant to be a life with
God.
This means that
we have to know God very well, something
that we can do—of course, in a gradually progressive
way—by reading
the gospel and availing ourselves of the other sources of
our faith.
Such knowledge
would transform us and prod us to conform
our thoughts, words and deeds to God’s will and ways. We
would know
what things are from God and what things are not.
We therefore
can never exaggerate this need of knowing God
as best as we can. We need to do everything to develop a
systematic
way of growing in our knowledge of God.
It’s important
that we be quick to distinguish between
what are God’s and what are not God’s. Especially in
these days of
rapid developments when the line between good and evil is
getting
blurred and grayish, and the forces of good and evil are
in such
constant battle as to often leave us confused and
bewildered, we need
to develop a sharp sense of discernment.
Of course, it
should be a sense of discernment that is
effective in the context of a very dynamic world. We are
not anymore
living in a simple world where black is black and white
is white,
where innovations are threatening to wipe out traditions,
where a
growing culture of relativism is undermining the
legitimacy of the
absolute.
And one good
way of developing this sense of discernment
is to follow what Christ himself suggested to his
disciples once: “If
anyone wants to be my disciple, he must deny himself,
take up his
cross and follow me.” (Mt 16,24)
We need to say
‘Yes’ to this command of Christ and learn
to say ‘No’ to ourselves. This means that we have to
conform our will
to Christ’s will and to say ‘No’ to our own will. We have
to remember
that our will that is not in conformity with Christ’s
will is a will
that is out on a limb. Sooner or later it will only do
evil and end
badly.
We have to
concretize this ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ in our life. We
have to say ‘Yes’ to a time of prayer, recourse to the
sacraments,
generosity in sacrifices, continuing development of
virtues. We have
to say ‘No’ to all forms of self-indulgence no matter how
legitimate
these forms of self-indulgence may appear to us.
We have to say
‘Yes’ to love of God and others, fidelity
to our vocation, responsibility to our duties, recourse
to continuing
means of formation, no matter the effort and discomfort
they may
involve. We have to say ‘No’ to impulse buying and
impulse access to
the Internet and the new technologies.
In the latter
case, it might be a good idea to put clear
limits, like opening the cell phone once or twice per
hour only, or to
put it away when we are already in bed which should be a
time of
intense prayer and presence of God.
We have to say
‘Yes’ to the clear indication of our
conscience and ‘No’ when we start to haggle, bargain,
argue with our
conscience and start to rationalize. Temptations should
be shot down
immediately, not giving it any foothold…
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