Time for another conversion
"Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand." (Mt 3,1)These were the words of St. John the Baptist who prepared the way for Christ to be known to the public. These words continue to be breaking news, their relevance and urgency never fading away. In this season of Advent when we prepare for the birth of Christ, we should give these words our immediate and operative attention.
We can never say we are already good enough. As long as we are still in this world, there is no level in our spiritual life that can be considered as good enough. It's time we remind ourselves of that old saying, 'the good is the enemy of the best.'
We need to move on always, to continue conquering new frontiers in our spiritual life which is a matter of growing in our love for God and for others. Let's avoid falling into self-indulgence, complacency and luke warmness. These will put a stop, or at least to divert us, in our continuing journey toward our eternal home and they do it with lulling and most tricky appeal.
With love, there is actually no limit. It will continue to make new demands on us, because life itself will also make new challenges and trials on us. Let's never forget that our life will always be some kind of warfare. We have to contend with many enemies of our soul.
With every conversion we make, we get closer to God, we grow in his divine wisdom and goodness. No doubt, we get to gain a lot more than what we seem to lose every time we make a conversion.
We should put our faith in this personal testimony of St. Paul: "Whatever things were gain to me, those things I have counted as loss for the sake of Christ. More than that, I count all things to be loss in view of the surpassing value of knowing Christ Jesus, my Lord,for whom I have suffered the loss of all things, and count them but rubbish so that I may gain Christ." (Phil 3,7-8)
Let's hope that we can echo these words of St. Paul ourselves. Christ has already assured us: "There is no one who has left house or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or lands, for my sake and for the gospel, who will not receive a hundred fold now…and in the age to come eternal life." (Mk 10,29-30)
The mark of true saints is precisely this hunger and thirst for repentance and conversion. Whatever good they did humbled them instead of leaving them proud. They knew who and what was behind all the accomplishments they made, and were more keenly aware of their inadequacies, their mistakes, faults, infidelities, etc.
It's not that they led a miserable life of having a dark outlook in life and a negative attitude toward their own selves. They were a happy lot, whose joy sprang from their living and faithful union with God, their father, but aware of their total dependence on God.
It's their driving love for God and souls that keep them feeling always the need for penance and conversion. It's not just fear of sin and evil that provokes this hunger. It's love of God and souls. It's this love that made them see more things that they need to do.
Due to this love, they also sharply knew that on their own, all they could do is evil, not good. St. Augustine said something to this effect. We are actually nothing without God.
Our problem is that we often think that we can do good by our own selves, without the grace of God. We think that with our talents and good will alone, we can be and do good independently of God.
We easily forget the fact that all our talents and our capacity to do good will all come from God. Our problem is that we usurp the goodness and power of God, and make them simply as our own. This anomaly, done at the very fundamental level of our life, would have tremendous repercussions in all the other aspects of our life.
This is something we should try to avoid. I know it's easy for us to fall to that predicament, and that's precisely why we need to have continuing repentance and conversion. We should not go to bed at night without expressing some penance and reconciling ourselves with our Lord. We have to end the day always reunited with God.
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