REFLECTION - KEEPING IT REAL: By Greg Schlueter
I can remember getting a sophisticated, hand-held gadget a number of years ago. (A needed, business expense, of course!) While I'm technologically intuitive, to figure out how it worked required more than simply "playing at it." And in the absence of my understanding, while it could probably be used as an expensive paper weight, clearly, it was intended for far greater things.
There's an analogy here. In many ways each of us run our lives like the gadget. We don't quite understand who we are, our identity, our full purpose and potential, and have become content with simply "playing at it." Yet, like the gadget, if we really want to know who we are, how we're suppose to work, we need more than intuition. We need more than any of the various "manuals" offered us by popular media and culture. We need to turn to the Manual, given to us by the Designer-- to inform us of who we are, what we are capable of doing.
God says we ARE holy. We were fashioned for His indwelling Spirit. Holy is the fabric of who we are-- as God has designed us. Like the gadget, either we're tuned into this identity, and it's full scope, or we are not. The extent to which we are is the extent to which we will discover the depths of fulfillment God intended; the extent to which we do not is the extent to which we will remain empty.
Pursuit of holiness requires some simple admissions. We are incomplete. The world does not have the manual. And all this is part of His plan. God created us incomplete so we could find our completion in Him. It's about intimacy! The world conspires to content us in our incompleteness. So many of us go at it alone. Why are we so content with our incompleteness, our brokenness, with simply being a "paper weight"? Seen in this light, Christians are not distinguished so much by what we have acquired, as what we have desired.
Seek Him today. Find Him as much in your incompleteness as you may in fulfillment. Your incompleteness is your beckoning to Him. This is our blessed journey together while we are on this planet. We were created and destined for far more than simply being a "paper weight." Embrace the great call to holiness-- and realize the full depths of the joy and peace that comes from living in who we are.
And above all, let's remain in prayer for one another- for our marriages, our children, our community!
Please join us for our next Catholic Men's and Women's Gathering.
God bless you this day.
Greg Schlueter
