What is God Like? But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous. Matt 5: 44-45 ++++++++++ Most people are aware of their one besetting sin. A thorn in the side, a burden that keeps coming into our lives, feelings, and thoughts. So we can often fail, if not in a deed, we do so in our thoughts, that can take on a life of their own, and cause much interior pain, and leaving hidden wounds known only to us. It can be fatiguing having to live with this inner tension. It can also lead to despair and giving up. For with our weakness comes sin. Ways that we relate to others, and to the world in general, in an unloving manner. In seeking relief we can try to medicate our pain, which only deepens our involvement in acting it out. Jesus came to show us the Father. His nature. As well as the Father’s relationship with each human being. What was revealed could not be found out without the revelation. We are shown the reality of the nature of God, or at least to a degree that we can have some understanding about the depth of the love manifested to us in Christ Jesus. We are all made in the image and likeness of God. In our human nature, it would seem that our deepest longing is to be ‘seen’ and ‘loved’. These can also be what we most fear. When we open ourselves up, the feelings of vulnerability can be overwhelming. Jesus shows us His nature, as well as the nature of the Trinity since to see Jesus is in actuality to see the Father and the Holy Spirit in the manifestation of Jesus on earth. In the Sermon on the Plain, as well as the Sermon on the Mount, what he asks of us, is to become like the Father. It presents to us a tableau of overwhelming beauty. What is God, the Father like? What Jesus asks of us, the impossible challenge shows us the nature of God. “But I tell you, love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you, that you may be children of your Father in heaven. He causes his sun to rise on the evil and the good, and sends rain on the righteous and the unrighteous.” Matt 5: 44-45 We are called to be like the Father. Yet we cannot do it. We struggle mightily to be forgiving, loving, but constantly run up against ourselves. What gives us hope is the fact the no matter how we fail, the Father still shines his love upon us. In that process, we slowly look to the grace shown in Jesus Christ, and in that forgetfulness of self, we find that our hearts do expand and heal. The deeper our relationship with the Father, the more we find that we can also love the way the Father loves, we take on the Mind and Heart of the Father, shown to us in Christ Jesus. So failures do not detain us on our journey. We trust in God’s mercy for ourselves and others, looking to his grace and not to ourselves. The Trinity works in the depths of our souls, in ‘secret’ so that we do not get in the way. So we take the next step, then tomorrow we do the same, and the next day. There is always hope, always mercy, always healing when we turn to the Lord. It is always there, we have the key; it is our Yes, to God’s YES.-Br.MD
Mark, The last year or so, I have marveled and prayed about the following petition in the Lord's Prayer: "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us." What an amazing thing to pray; a seemingly impossible goal to obtain! But I think the CCC 2842 paragraph gives us a clue: 2842 This "as" is not unique in Jesus' teaching: "You, therefore, must be perfect, as your heavenly Father is perfect"; "Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful"; "A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another, even as I have loved you, that you also love one another." It is impossible to keep the Lord's commandment by imitating the divine model from outside; there has to be a vital participation, coming from the depths of the heart, in the holiness and the mercy and the love of our God. Back in the 1970s, my life was radically changed by the work of the Holy Spirit I encountered through the Charismatic Renewal. But the vital participation spoken of above in the paragraph is simply a gift of the Holy Spirit that we must ultimately receive with open hands and heart, a yearning which when discovered in my depths I will only be able to marvel at and say, "How did this get here!" So though I know I will continue to practice the spiritual disciplines, I am waiting. Holy Spirit, I trust in You!
I think the father is most like the feeling you get if someone hands you their baby and you’re afraid of dropping it. That’s at least what my fear of offending god is like, like being afraid of dropping a baby.
I see God the Father as this: I am a 3 or 4 year old girl and I can climb up on his lap and put my head on his shoulder in comfort.
