Die to Self
“We are all required as a condition of our very salvation to die to our self-will and to grow into the pattern of Christ, who said he came ‘not to do my own will, but the will of him who sent me’. To die to self-will and self-interest is to suffer. Old Adam screams in our ear, ‘Don’t let that One get too close; he wants to kill me!’ And Old Adam is right.
Some of us are called to endure special sufferings for Christ, persecutions… All of us are required to be ready and willing to endure persecution for Christ; but even those who are not persecuted must suffer the death of self for Christ, or else Christ cannot be born in them. If Adam will not die in us, then Advent will have happened only once: in the world, long ago, and not in our souls. God will come and miraculously pitch his tent in our souls only if the soul is like Mary, ready to say, ‘Let it be done to me according to your word.’”
~Peter Kreeft
Some of us are called to endure special sufferings for Christ, persecutions… All of us are required to be ready and willing to endure persecution for Christ; but even those who are not persecuted must suffer the death of self for Christ, or else Christ cannot be born in them. If Adam will not die in us, then Advent will have happened only once: in the world, long ago, and not in our souls. God will come and miraculously pitch his tent in our souls only if the soul is like Mary, ready to say, ‘Let it be done to me according to your word.’”
~Peter Kreeft
Comments