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| The Persistence of Memory (Salvador Dali) |
Today's readings: Ps 98, 146; Deut 8;11-20; James 1:16-27; Luke 11:1-13
Service projects – particularly those spanning several days and states – reveal a lot about people. Ask almost anyone rebuilding a home or painting a school and they will tell you they are working hard. Watch them a while, and you’ll see differences in performance that don’t necessarily depend on age, experience or ability. People believe they are working hard as long as they are working harder than they usually do. By the end of a lengthy service project, many people – young people in particular – have their eyes opened to the difference between what they think is hard work (based on past experience) and what is actually hard work.
Persistence is similar. Many of us think we are persistent, but crumple in the face of real resistance. In Luke 9, Jesus advises his disciples to be persistent in their faith. He says a neighbor woken in the middle of the night by a knock on the door does not respond out of an inner sense of charity, but because the knocker is persistent. Jesus isn’t telling us to pester God into submission, but that true persistence can accomplish what appeals to good nature may not. How often do we hear someone claim something was meant to be or not meant to be because it was or wasn’t convenient? How many dreams are abandoned because of a lack of persistence? How many poor decisions are based on expedience? Important things – building a career, raising a child, achieving social justice – require persistence. More than that, they require us to examine whether we are actually persistent, or whether we merely think we are.
On the other hand, let’s not confuse being persistent with being stubborn. When we follow urgings of the Spirit despite resistance, we are persistent. When we grow deaf to the Spirit and insist on our own way, we are stubborn. Persistence is the fulcrum that balances complacency and obstinacy. To achieve this balance, this practice of discernment, we must yoke persistence with prayer. As we grow in faith, what we thought was tremendous persistence yesterday may be a fraction of what we need for tomorrow. Or we may realize that while we’ve been knocking, what we need to ask for has changed. No matter the outcome, a healthy persistence leaves us knowing we’ve done what we were called to do.
Comfort: Success not yet achieved is not the same as failure.
Challenge: List some dreams you’ve let go. Is it time to pick one up?
Prayer: Holy God, strengthen me when my flesh is weaker than my spirit.
Evening readings: Ps 66, 116
Service projects – particularly those spanning several days and states – reveal a lot about people. Ask almost anyone rebuilding a home or painting a school and they will tell you they are working hard. Watch them a while, and you’ll see differences in performance that don’t necessarily depend on age, experience or ability. People believe they are working hard as long as they are working harder than they usually do. By the end of a lengthy service project, many people – young people in particular – have their eyes opened to the difference between what they think is hard work (based on past experience) and what is actually hard work.
Persistence is similar. Many of us think we are persistent, but crumple in the face of real resistance. In Luke 9, Jesus advises his disciples to be persistent in their faith. He says a neighbor woken in the middle of the night by a knock on the door does not respond out of an inner sense of charity, but because the knocker is persistent. Jesus isn’t telling us to pester God into submission, but that true persistence can accomplish what appeals to good nature may not. How often do we hear someone claim something was meant to be or not meant to be because it was or wasn’t convenient? How many dreams are abandoned because of a lack of persistence? How many poor decisions are based on expedience? Important things – building a career, raising a child, achieving social justice – require persistence. More than that, they require us to examine whether we are actually persistent, or whether we merely think we are.
On the other hand, let’s not confuse being persistent with being stubborn. When we follow urgings of the Spirit despite resistance, we are persistent. When we grow deaf to the Spirit and insist on our own way, we are stubborn. Persistence is the fulcrum that balances complacency and obstinacy. To achieve this balance, this practice of discernment, we must yoke persistence with prayer. As we grow in faith, what we thought was tremendous persistence yesterday may be a fraction of what we need for tomorrow. Or we may realize that while we’ve been knocking, what we need to ask for has changed. No matter the outcome, a healthy persistence leaves us knowing we’ve done what we were called to do.
Comfort: Success not yet achieved is not the same as failure.
Challenge: List some dreams you’ve let go. Is it time to pick one up?
Prayer: Holy God, strengthen me when my flesh is weaker than my spirit.
Evening readings: Ps 66, 116
Discussion question: When has persistence paid off for you? (please comment)
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