19th Sunday afer Pentecost Thoughts About How All Things Are In The Hands of God

On this 19th Sunday after Pentecost, we continue with our mini-series on the Sense of Providence.

Last time our spiritual guide began with "darkness." We've likely all known this darkness - when everything seems "black." It could be events that have occurred, some serious physical illness or ongoing disability, a spiritual dryness that devolves into discouragement even despair that we are making any progress in our spiriitual life. 

Blackness comes in many colors.

Learning to understand that God loves us, that He is looking out for us was our first step in freeing ourselves from this dark state. In this, we learn to trust in His Providence.

Today we begin with something that sits behind all this: all things are in the hand of God. We'll see 

- the role of suffering in His Plan for us and for those around us

- how the saints reacted to their own suffering, and why they consider it a privilege to suffer 

- the critical importance of learning to live in the Present Moment.

- how living in the Present Moment will cut away fret and worry and give us deep and lasting peace

- the important distinction between worries and worrying.  

The Sense of Providence (Part 2 of 4)
Father Gerald Vann, O.P.

    “Omnia in manu Dei sunt: all things are in the hand of God. Have you noticed how the saints always seem to be at their gayest when things go wrong? And why is it? Surely because they have just that faith in the plan, and in the Love that makes the plan. And when there is suffering for them, well, that too is part of the plan, and so to suffer is for them a privilege: it is part of that total work which is the saving of mankind, the song of love. And so they never waste time and energy brooding over the past or fussing over the future: they live in the present, they get on the immediate job that God gives them to do; and they leave lovingly in His hands the question of whether it shall be a success or a failure.

 
    “They live in the present. So often we forget the importance of each present moment: so fleeting that it seems of no importance, and yet, as we know, it is forever present to the eternity of God, forever present as an act of love and praise, or as a wastage and perhaps a betrayal. Live in the present: at this moment it is this job, this pain, this joy, that God gives me: then let me make of it as full and deep an act of praise as I can. So you cease to fret and worry, and so you find peace. Sometimes of course the job of the moment is the business of coping with worries; but worries are not the same thing as worrying; we cannot escape problems, but if they are God’s will for us, well, we can accept them as such and do our best with them without letting ourselves get hopelessly flustered, and the very willing of them as God’s will can in that case be a kind of peace.”
 

Happy 19th Sunday after Pentecost!