Faith is not a gift.
Faith is something for which you MUSTASK.
Life is the gift. Why? Because itinitially cannot be asked for; it must simply be lived until you can ask foryour needs! And the newborn comes out asking, usually quite loudly!Somewhere along the life line EGO advances so awfully horribly farabove the person which God meant to create. Oh how far people get from therealization they are totally dependent upon God! We must be like thelittle children, remember? Dependent. But perhaps many are notaround little children so much these days or they’d know beyond anydoubts that children ask ask ask!
Even Jesus gave us the reminder in Hisprayer. He told us how to pray. “Our Father”
Does a little child beg? No, Theydemand with hope. “Give us this day our daily bread.”
What bread? A baby given its food andclothing and shelter still craves something more or else it fails tothrive. It craves love.
What daily bread then suppliesnourishment for body and soul?
The Holy Eucharist. This too is aGift. And it is best if you ask for It. Because “It” is God. Because with the appearance of earthly food comes Heavenly Food. Godwith us as Food for our journey to God in Heaven. “With” is animportant word to contemplate.
With.
The Lord be with you.
And with your spirit.
Life is given to the new human being. Life is from God. But the Lord is not with the child yet, why? Because of sin. And so the child must be purified. So says theancient custom of purification in the Jewish religion, so says thecustom of purification, Baptism, in the Catholic Church. Even Jesuswas subject to The Law; though pure He was purified in the Law. Itwas not an empty ceremony, His flesh was marked permanently as oursouls are marked permanently. A child swims in the life-givingwaters of the mother’s womb by God’s grace, and the child will bewashed in the life-giving waters of Baptism and receive greatergrace.
And the Lord is with the child.
When we approach Holy Communion we askthat Jesus commune with us, body and soul.
Okay, “…lead us not intotemptation, but deliver us from evil…”.
Now I get the “…deliver us fromevil part ..”. But I have always wondered about that ‘…lead usnot into temptation…” part of the prayer. So, I prayed about itand contemplated it. Then I thought I got it. He’s my Father and thesentence isn’t just lead me not into temptation but it also asksdeliverance. “Into” then is the key word. This earthly life isfull of temptation which me must bear living through withoutsuccumbing to it, and sometimes to get out of a fire one must be leadsafely “through” it. Lead me not through this life’s temptationswithout deliverance from temptations.
Maybe I “got it” before but didn’t conciously realize the knowledge?
Because once when my son Mark was verysmall, we went to the 4th of July carnival in town. Thefirst day was filled with “Mommy I want…” and every hawker ofgames called out to him and he would pull me in that direction, and Ispent most of our time telling him “NO!” until finally I took himhome, with him screaming and crying about how mean I was. What I’dintended on being a fun day with my son was just a battle of willsgoverned by my low income.
Prayers. And realization came. How doI teach my child how to say no to temptations? To look but resistwant. I asked him the next day after his nap, if he’d like to goback the next day after church. You know the answer. I talked aboutthe ride he’d missed the day before because we got stuck in the aisleleading up to the rides. I told him “Let’s play a game called No, thank you, we are going to ride the ride!”
Hand in hand, I took him to the longaisle where all the hawkers were calling out to play their games. And I lead him into temptation…. down that long blaring path fullof flashing lights, and big plush toys and Star Wars themed masks andtoys that crowded the walls of their stalls.
“Come on Lady, win a prize for thekid!”
“You wanna prize, don’t you kid?”
“What are we going to say Mark?” asI lead him through temptation.
He yelled “No thank you! We are goingto ride the ride!” time and time again while holding tight to myhand.
“Next one, here we come!”
No whining, no screaming “I wantthat, I want this, I want that!” He played the game well and bythe end HE was pulling ME and yelling his answer before they couldturn their pitch on us.
“There it is! The ride!” He wasscared but I let him go, watched his face turn from fear to wonder tolaughing as he saw the other kids laughing. As I lifted him fromhis seat seeing the disappointment on his face that it was over, Ioffered him another ride I pointed out.
“All by myself again Mom?!” and Icould say yes. Funny how “ all by myself” meant “ stay rightthere Mom” while he kept his eyes on me the whole time, waving andlaughing as he passed me by and I pretended to catch him. I soughtout ways so that I could say yes to him. “Oh look Elephant Ears toeat!” “Can I have one Mom?” , “Yes!!” A couple more“Mark look!…” , “Can I?” and “Yes!” and one moreride and he was queasy enough he didn’t object to going home.
He asked to go the next day. I knew thecarnival would pack up and leave in the night, and farm life would beback to usual. Yet, I had to go to the grain mill, and decided toshow him one more lesson in life. Memories.
I brought the old tan Ford to a haltwhere we’d parked the day before. The park looked desolate under thehuge old maple trees, the grass with yellowed paths worn through thegrass. We walked them. “Look Mark, this is where we played theno-thank-you game.” He wasn’t very thrilled and frowned when wecame to where he’d ridden the rides. “But why is it all gone?” I explained and when I finished I said they’d be back next 4thof July.
“Do you believe me?”
“Yes.” Childlike faith. How had Iearned his? My Yeses were as good as a promise. My Noes were firmand unrelenting, and seldom used. And my Maybes meant “If youkeep bugging me while I’m thinking about it, the answer will be NO.” But I planned on tweaking ita little when he was old enough to understand change.
Discipline requires faith too, and it makes me understand that not only do I develop faith in God, but God has faith in me. And this faith is why there is freedom when a soul is thankful for being dependent upon God.
Faith IS a gift, according to the Catechism of the Catholic Church:
"According to the Catechism of the Catholic church (paragraph 162) "Faith is an entirely free gift that God makes to man. We can lose this priceless gift, as St. Paul indicated to St. Timothy: "Wage the good warfare, holding faith and a good conscience. By rejecting conscience, certain persons have made shipwreck of their faith."44 To live, grow, and persevere in the faith until the end we must nourish it with the word of God; we must beg the Lord to increase our faith;45 it must be "working through charity," abounding in hope, and rooted in the faith of the Church.46"
Sure, we can decide NOT to use or grow the faith, but it's definitely a gift.
How many stories do we hear from Scripture in which God calls forth people who never even heard of him? How many times in life do we hear examples of folks who have grown up in atheistic or strictly secular homes who never heard the Gospel, but suddenly feel a stirring, a call, to the Lord?
We're all like David, the youngest, out there in the field and God calls out to us FIRST.
How we answer him? It's our decision. But He'd never not call us or love us, even if we clap our hands over our ears and try to ignore Him.
~ Tori
I think that we all have a different story. I converted five years ago, and for me faith was a gift. If you have time, you can read my conversion story on the second page of my blog. Also, I wrote my last post as a response to my son, who is an atheist and calls me "arrogant" when I talk abot my faith. He says that I maintain to know something that he doesn't know. He believes that religious people think they are "special".I feel tenderness towards him, because it seems to me that he would like to experience my faith after all, but his rationality stands in the way.However, we have a very good relationship and our discussions about faith ultimately bring us closer. But again, in my last post I do my best to describe how I live my faith.