We live in a time where pop culture and the virtual reality hold precedence over our emotional and intellectual potencies. We have inarguably along the way, lost our capacity to mutually resolve issues. Anger, panic, anxiety are self control mechanisms that enable us to guard our egos. Our vulnerabilities are closely guarded as the fear of letting out the unknown could reverberate into thin air. In a society that favours scientific temper and holds religion in abeyance, people in a quest to combat their weaknesses seek religious discourse or acquire other means to reform their antiquities.
As a practising Catholic, I made a few mental commitments to myself in order to find favour with God. When we love someone so deeply, making a sacrifice ensues instinctively but the thought of having to surrender my ways of life in order to draw nearer to God would sound like a bargain.
God’s love isn’t arbitrary by nature. A willingness to permit the divine energy to enter into the crevices of our being where sin strongly resides, requires us to fully surrender ourselves. Even Jesus cried out in agony in the garden of Gethsemane asking God to take away His cup of suffering. It’s noteworthy mentioning that, when we can’t help our unbelief, our strengths are made strong in our weaknesses through prayer and supplications.
Our imperfections proffer an opportunity to seek God’s countenance by cleaning ourselves through the sacrament of Reconciliation. Where there’s sin, God’s grace always abounds. No doubt, embracing change requires an insurmountable will to encounter the hurdles that challenge our habitual instincts. We easily succumb to disappointment when our free will interferes with our attempts.
In Genesis, we see Adam and Eve were endowed with liberty to access all possibilities except the forbidden apple tree. But Satan in the guise of a serpent wanted man to umbrage God’s supremacy. It wasn’t too long when the cult of utopianism saw man plundering and asserting his claim in every arena. The temptations of sin and its complicit act draws us into the wilderness of our own orgies where the temporary gratification of its desires allures us into damnation. As Jesus was led into the wilderness, the demon taunted him to renounce his salvific mission and prove His Godliness by turning stone into bread. In moments of fasting and deprivation, He could have easily used His power to His advantage and then accused Satan for laying a trap just as Adam had done so by holding Eve accountable for enticing him.
Until our last breath, the viles of sin will certainly tamper with our integrity but a strong commitment to faithfulness over failures will strengthen us so that we do not fall out of grace with God. During this penitential season, let us strive in all earnestly to make a sacrifice that is befitting of God’s pardon. Let not our obligations and rituals become a mere display of popular piety but instead promulgate a pious environment that will keep our conscience in check. I leave you in the encouraging words of St Augustine who says, ‘’To fall in love with God is the greatest romance; to seek Him the greatest adventure; to find Him, the greatest human achievement.”
