Let's
ask ourselves a tough
question today: am I a better Christian now than I was a year
ago? Am I holier? Am I more like Christ? Am I really becoming
the saint that God created me to be?
It's
uncomfortable
to ask questions like that. That's good.
- Lent is a time for us to feel uncomfortable.
- Jesus loves us too much to let us be lazy.
- He is like a good coach, always encouraging us to grow,
to improve.
Unfortunately,
many of us aren't growing as quickly or as constantly as we should.
- Professionally we are moving up, maybe.
- Academically, athletically we are making progress, but
as Christians?
- Not really. We're still stuck where we have always
been. On a plateau.
- The same temptations, the same falls, the same sins.
We're still mediocre
Christians.
One of the reasons for this is that we don't go to the real roots of our
selfishness.
We
try to follow Christ more faithfully,
but we don't do so intelligently.
We
keep trying to cut off the branches
of impatience, or greed, or lust, or dishonesty, but the roots are still
intact, so the branches just
keep growing back.
In
Jesus' temptation in the desert, the devil makes the mistake of exposing the three roots
of all our sins. In each one of us, one of these roots is bigger and stronger
than the others (though we all have all three).
If
we can identify which is our main root sin, we can direct our spiritual work
more intelligently, and really
start making progress as Christians.
Getting
to know our root sin and its most frequent manifestations arms us for spiritual
battle. The better we know where we are weak, the better we will be able
to resist temptation.
We are all tempted.
- Every day we are invited to rebel against God in little
things and big things.
- The patterns of behavior around us, our own
self-centered tendencies, and the devil himself are always inviting us to
trust more in our own flawed judgment than in God's wisdom.
But
temptation is not sin.
In fact, every temptation is a chance to exercise our trust in God, to reclaim
territory for Christ's Kingdom, just as Jesus did when he was tempted.
Because Jesus was tempted, he redeemed
temptation. With his grace, his victory over sin
can become our
victory. That's why he came to earth in the first place!
The
message Christ has for us today is a message
of hope.
- We can conquer sin, in our lives and in the world
around us. We just need to stay united to Christ.
- That's what the Eucharist is for - that's why God gave
it to us.
- And that's also what the Bible is for. Jesus parries
the Devil's attacks by quoting from the Scriptures, the inspired Word of
God.
Today,
let's renew our
confidence in Christ and our determination to fight for the
advance of his Kingdom, to cut back our root sin and make more room for his
grace to grow in our lives.
When
we receive him in Communion,
- let's promise
to do our part to stay united to him, to trust in him and seek our happiness
in our friendship with him,
- and let's ask
him which tactic he wants us to use this Lent: whether to
spend more time with him in the Eucharist, or more time with him in the
Scriptures.
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