Come, Lord Jesus!
“Any serious person looking back thoughtfully on a few decades of life will realize that even with the best of teachers and guides we have been blind to many truths, or at least to their meaning. This is why we read the Scriptures and especially the Gospels over and over again. As our eyes open to the truth, we learn more and more each time we read them.
…This is because the eyes of the mind and the ears of the heart are being opened and cleared in the process of growing in the grace of Christ. His light and word never change, but we change and grow in our ability to see and hear Him.
This is why the Christian life, when properly understood, can never be boring. Boredom is a clear symptom that we are not growing, that we have lost the meaning of these words: ‘Behold, I make all things new’ (Rv 21:5). The reasons for our blindness, deafness, and boredom are not difficult to discern. We are entranced by the sight of what is vain and passing, and captured by sounds that mean little or nothing.
Even in the most passing things we can find God’s words, but only if we look and listen. Our desires and our hearts are impure: we want God, but we want many other things besides. It could be so easy to escape this emptiness, to find God in all that we see, hear, and experience. The Imitation of Christ tells us that if our hearts are pure, every creature will be for us a mirror of God and a book of holy teaching.
Why, then, don’t we change? Because we cannot change, we cannot escape our blindness and deafness until we are healed by Jesus Christ. ‘Lord, that I may see,’ said the blind beggar of Jericho. Advent is a time to begin again, to appreciate, to value above all other things the coming of Him who is the light of the world for blind eyes and the Word of God for deaf ears. Come, Lord Jesus!”
~Benedict Groeschel
…This is because the eyes of the mind and the ears of the heart are being opened and cleared in the process of growing in the grace of Christ. His light and word never change, but we change and grow in our ability to see and hear Him.
This is why the Christian life, when properly understood, can never be boring. Boredom is a clear symptom that we are not growing, that we have lost the meaning of these words: ‘Behold, I make all things new’ (Rv 21:5). The reasons for our blindness, deafness, and boredom are not difficult to discern. We are entranced by the sight of what is vain and passing, and captured by sounds that mean little or nothing.
Even in the most passing things we can find God’s words, but only if we look and listen. Our desires and our hearts are impure: we want God, but we want many other things besides. It could be so easy to escape this emptiness, to find God in all that we see, hear, and experience. The Imitation of Christ tells us that if our hearts are pure, every creature will be for us a mirror of God and a book of holy teaching.
Why, then, don’t we change? Because we cannot change, we cannot escape our blindness and deafness until we are healed by Jesus Christ. ‘Lord, that I may see,’ said the blind beggar of Jericho. Advent is a time to begin again, to appreciate, to value above all other things the coming of Him who is the light of the world for blind eyes and the Word of God for deaf ears. Come, Lord Jesus!”
~Benedict Groeschel
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