What a day! What a week! Praise be to God!
First of all, the news finally came that we will once again have a resident pastor! YAAYY!!! I can not begin to express how much JOY this brings to my heart. I have worried and prayed for myself and sooooo many others in our parish who desperately need a resident shepherd, and God has heard our cry. Thank you, Father.
Second, I went to spend time with Jesus on Monday, in front of the tabernacle at my very chilly church. It was wonderful. The heat is only on for Mass twice a week, so it was quite chilly with the drastic change in temperature here---22 degrees last night---Yikes!---but the time flew and I barely noticed it at all once my soul was enflamed with His love.
Anyway, I have my own key, and I like to go and just spend time in silence with our Beloved whenever I can. This time, however, I was far from silent, as my mind was running a mile a minute and I had a lot to say. Mostly, I was babbling to Jesus about family and friends and our new priest, and finally talking to Him about my vocation. I begged Him again, as I always do, to please let me serve Him as a religious. As usual, I ended my pleading with an act of faith, giving it to Him and making my quiet fiat, but this time I asked Him to give me some more tangible guidance, a sign perhaps, as it will soon be a year since I sent in my application and was accepted as a postulant.
It has been months since I felt any forward motion on my dream of entering the convent, and I was wondering if it simply was not meant to be after all? I asked Jesus if He wanted me to stay in this town forever, as a lay person, or move elsewhere as a layperson with a new job, or if He was ever going to permit me to become a Daughter of Mary? I am sure there is much I could do, if it is His will for me to stay here, but I prayed that I had already discerned His will correctly, and that He is preparing a place for me in the convent.
I am trying very hard to love the will of God more than my own, accepting that if He chooses not to remove the obstacles to my entrance, then I will be happy to stay right here and give it up, knowing His will is perfect, and that although I can not see it now, His reasons and my genuine acceptance of His plan will bring about far greater good for my soul and the Kingdom of God than my whining about it and remaining attached to my own designs for the future. Once I finally had my say, I remembered that Jesus already knows my heart and that I was there to listen to Him.
The silence in a Catholic Church is tangible when we open our ears to hear it. I can feel Jesus in my soul, working on it, healing it. It never takes long, sitting with Him and being filled with His love, before I remember that I do not need an answer that day --- He always works things out for the best. Every time I simply just sit with Him in the silence and let Him speak to my soul, things always have a way of working themselves out in some way or another, and peace always accompanies the resolution. So when I was ready to leave, I was once again peacefully resigned to wait on the Lord.
If you know anything about my faith journey, (which you can read here), you know that I have never seen Blue Jay birds until last year, when the Lord sent many of them to me all year long, everywhere I went, giving me a huge sense of His love, and a belief that they symbolized something that had to do with my journey. When I first met with the Daughters of Mary, I learned that they were known as the Blue Jay sisters, and that, along with some other good affirmations, made me confident that God was calling me to them, specifically.
After I was accepted by the Blue Jay sisters, I stopped seeing the Blue jays, except on Holy Days (Easter and Divine Mercy Sunday), and then I went back to seeing none, even though my friends reported seeing them everywhere, even flocks of them. This sounds crazy, I know, but I wondered why He took them away? And then yesterday, after having asked for a sign from God the night before, I let the dogs out to do their business first thing in the morning, and there was a big ol’ beautiful Blue Jay! I was not even awake enough to be thinking about anything but getting my office open for the day, and I immediately felt a sense of peace.
God is so merciful and kind and good to us! I had been hearing what I thought to be Blue Jays for a few days prior, but never saw them. I knew what I was hearing, but I had to see to believe…..kinda reminds me of Thomas, who heard of the Lord’s resurrection, but would not believe until He saw for himself. Maybe this is a call to greater faith, trusting in what the Lord speaks to my heart, even though there is nothing to see at this time. Wow.
May it be done according to Your Word.
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