THE GOOD
NEWS
ARCHBISHOP BELTRAN
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from
February 4, 2007
“Commit your way to the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will do it.” (Psalm 37:5) Because we are God’s people; we are a holy people; we are a covenant nation; we are a servant people; His Body. John 15:5 tells us, “I am the vine, you are the branches. Whoever remains in Me and I in him will bear much fruit, because without Me you can do nothing.” Jesus Christ molds the motives and conduct of all who are united with Him. “My God will supply whatever you need in accord with His glorious riches in Christ Jesus.” (Phil 4:19) “It is not you who chose me but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit that will remain so that whatever you ask the Father in my name He may give you.” (John 15:16) Open your heart to God’s infinite love for you, filling you with love for Him in return, strengthening your faith to accept His promises to you to give you everything you need. God is ready to help us. His is an unlimited love for each of us. Why is it so hard to accept His love — given to us so freely? If we could but immerse ourselves in this love and let it guide our lives, happiness would be ours. The many things we have and our perceived needs become a very strong driving force in our lives as we strive for success or to “just get ahead.” It is difficult to accept His love and turn ourselves over to Him because we do not trust that we will be able to live our lives and receive the success and rewards of our hard work and efforts to achieve our goals. So maybe we do not trust God to provide and to take care of us as He promised. So we covet what we have and want, feeling that it is up to us to take care of ourselves. This covetousness carries us to the point of asserting the necessity and right to carve out our own life using rules unrelated to our relationships to God. Covetousness is grounded in not believing God. We continue to persist in worry and concern for ourselves and our families. We have placed God in His own little “niche” in our lives where we call on Him from time to time. As our love of God grows, He will become most important in our life and we will be part of His world instead of Him in ours. TRUST in the LORD. Live the lives we have — for Him — using our talents for success — a success that will allow us to return to God what we have been given for His good to accomplish that for which it was given to us — the good of His people. God will judge us for our lives, lives made for His purposes. God’s call to us doesn’t take us out of the world but it leaves us and Him in it for definite purpose. He does not ask of us to neglect our families but just to adjust our relationships and priorities - putting Him first in our lives. Our proper human relationships can never really suffer when He is in first place. From Him, who gave us life and its fruits, we draw our ability to bear life’s fruits. His life giving energy surges through “all the branches of the vine” to give us His vitality and purposefulness. Each of us has “gifts from God that differ according to the grace given to us, let us use them … in proportion to the faith.” (Rom 12:3,6) Our relationship to God, our position before Him is independent of all His gifts to us. Our love, our faith binds us to Him. We are not bound just because we are recipients of His gifts. We permit God to give freely to us. We trust in God Himself and not in His gifts. Our gratitude to God is for His love and His living concern for us, we trust in His goodness, not in the good things of this material world. As we stand in this unconditional relationship with God we permit God to give and take freely, receiving gifts in confidence and with no despair when they are lost. Only faith makes this possible. This gratitude to God for His gifts is not our motivation; it is our response, a response that takes the form of specific acts. Our motive is not our love for God but God’s love for us. Our love comes only after God’s love has moved us to love. When our priorities are right with God there is no conflict between the spiritual life and the physical life, but the spiritual affects the use of the physical and material. Our services and our own gifts are a joyful expression of our faith, using what we have for the purpose God has given it. There are different talents and abilities, not of our choice, specifically given to each of us to be used in His service. Giving needs stimulus from our hearts. It doesn’t come to action by logic and reason, church loyalty and pride, in achievement or even a since of duty, but its activating power is love. We come to realize that this philosophy, which the scriptures proclaim, is the logical reason why God has given us life. Giving is an act of worship, an act of love, an answer to a prayer and a fulfillment of Gods promise to provide the needs of His people, people who live their lives in Him. “Therefore my brothers…in this way stand firm in the Lord.” (Phil 4:1) “They that hope in the Lord will renew their strength; they will soar as with eagle’s wings. They will run and not grow weary, walk and not grow faint” (Is 40:31) Trust in the Lord Goals $3,000,000 AND A 10 Percent increase in number of Donors! Trusting in the Lord, as we enter the 2007 Archdiocesan Development Fund Appeal let His love guide your response to the invitation to participate in the many ministries of the Archdiocese of Oklahoma City, helping God’s family by fulfilling Gods promise to give what is needed. |
Archdiocesan
Development