C
catholicray
Guest
One can be intellectually right and still dead in trespass. Do not think to save yourself by merely acknowledging the truth. I have walked this path and it ends in death.
Consider the character of love. It is striking to discover that love can not merely be a concept of abundant charity. A key characteristic of love is life. In the biblical sense life and love are inseparable. To be sure, life without love is death and that love which is not living is not a true love.
What is love? I can not say with perfect precision. Nevertheless if you live to die for yourself then you have not lived in the first place. The way to life is to live for love. Consider not your own happiness and how to obtain it. This is a snare of the devil. Instead seek peace and patiently wait for happiness to find you. Love, while I can not explicitly define it, is something to be found in our seeking. We can seek it through compassion for creation including ourselves. One may be intellectually wrong but he/she will not fail to correct their intellect in seeking compassion for their whole existence.
Let the law of the spirit be mercy and let the law of the flesh be obedience. You can not fail to live in harmony with the Gospel this way. Then, to serve in humility and meekness is to live. One needs very little intellect to live this way. This is true life rather than the mirage of life we are tempted with by the adversary. When we fall into temptation we fall into the pit of death and we veil true life from ourselves.
There is not a scientific formula for the salvation of ones life. Yet if we need direction it is to guard ourselves against temptation that we may not fall. True life awaits atop the mountain we scale and sin bars our ascent. True life does not exist apart from love. If we are successful in our ascent we will find love waiting for us as well. The reward is worth the loss of this life a mere shadow of what awaits us.
Then let me let go today. Let love and life guide my footsteps. May I no longer walk where I desire for I am a wicked man. Yet may I desire where I am led by mercy, compassion, and obedience. I despise my half-life. I pray that I may have life in totality. I desire to be real among the mirage built by deceit. And if I am wrong what other worthy reason to take even one step? Lord you have prepared the way. You have lead me to it. I pray for your grace and strength to start walking.
Amen
Consider the character of love. It is striking to discover that love can not merely be a concept of abundant charity. A key characteristic of love is life. In the biblical sense life and love are inseparable. To be sure, life without love is death and that love which is not living is not a true love.
What is love? I can not say with perfect precision. Nevertheless if you live to die for yourself then you have not lived in the first place. The way to life is to live for love. Consider not your own happiness and how to obtain it. This is a snare of the devil. Instead seek peace and patiently wait for happiness to find you. Love, while I can not explicitly define it, is something to be found in our seeking. We can seek it through compassion for creation including ourselves. One may be intellectually wrong but he/she will not fail to correct their intellect in seeking compassion for their whole existence.
Let the law of the spirit be mercy and let the law of the flesh be obedience. You can not fail to live in harmony with the Gospel this way. Then, to serve in humility and meekness is to live. One needs very little intellect to live this way. This is true life rather than the mirage of life we are tempted with by the adversary. When we fall into temptation we fall into the pit of death and we veil true life from ourselves.
There is not a scientific formula for the salvation of ones life. Yet if we need direction it is to guard ourselves against temptation that we may not fall. True life awaits atop the mountain we scale and sin bars our ascent. True life does not exist apart from love. If we are successful in our ascent we will find love waiting for us as well. The reward is worth the loss of this life a mere shadow of what awaits us.
Then let me let go today. Let love and life guide my footsteps. May I no longer walk where I desire for I am a wicked man. Yet may I desire where I am led by mercy, compassion, and obedience. I despise my half-life. I pray that I may have life in totality. I desire to be real among the mirage built by deceit. And if I am wrong what other worthy reason to take even one step? Lord you have prepared the way. You have lead me to it. I pray for your grace and strength to start walking.
Amen