As we journey through the Season of Lent, is our resolve to keep our Lenten promises beginning to weaken? Is the devil trying to tempt us with thoughts of futility? What difference does it make if we give up chocolate? We’re going to start eating it again on Easter Sunday!
If we are beginning to slip, let us ponder: The Holy Spirit led Jesus into the desert where He fasted for 40 days and was tempted by the devil. Although hungry, Christ was filled with the Holy Spirit and in His loving obedience to His Almighty Father, He did not give in to the devil’s temptation. Do we allow the Spirit of the Lord to lead us and protect us on our journey as we try to be obedient to God?
In our prayers, we say we believe in the Holy Spirit, but do we actually follow the promptings of the Holy Spirit, thereby giving our Lord full rein of our existence? To be true children of God, we need the Holy Spirit dwelling within each of us. The Holy Spirit awakens our faith which gives us hope and the inspiration to share God’s love in the world.
Remember: “the love of God has been poured out into our hearts through the holy Spirit that has been given to us.” (Romans 5:5)
Consider this: In His infinite love for each of us, God humbled Himself to become man in Jesus Christ — giving us His body and blood and His Holy Spirit — to unite with us and protect us from sin. Our Lenten journey is meant to help us experience the intimacy of the Trinitarian life by depending more on the greatness of God’s love and less on ourselves in our joys, our works, and our sorrows so that we may share in the glories of Heaven.
Gifts of the Holy Spirit
With God’s gift of the Holy Spirit comes the gifts of wisdom, understanding, counsel, fortitude, knowledge, piety, and fear — wonder — of the Lord (CCC 1831). Do we accept these gifts and use them in our daily living? Or do we tuck them in the back of our mind because they do not fit well in our current lifestyle and get in the way of what we want in and out of life?
Perhaps we hesitate because we know acceptance means taking on the responsibility that comes with conforming our lives to God’s will. Look at Mary our Blessed Mother. The Holy Spirit led Mary on every journey of her earthly life. From those journeys, Mary was raised in holiness as mother of our Savior, united with her Son in His work of our redemption, to become intercessor and Mother for us all. Mary was indeed filled with the grace of the Lord’s Spirit and through Mary, the Word of God became visible.
“Grace is first and foremost the gift of the Spirit who justifies and sanctifies us. But grace also includes the gifts that the Spirit grants us to associate us with his work, to enable us to collaborate in the salvation of others and in the growth in the Body of Christ, the Church.” (CCC 2003).
By the grace of the Holy Spirit, we too can make the Word visible by the way we live our lives, enabling us to be raised in holiness as brothers and sisters in Christ. Are we willing to accept the responsibility of this lifelong commitment?
Fruits of the Holy Spirit
Do not be afraid to accept God’s love. With God’s love comes forgiveness of our sins and the chance to start our lives anew in unity with the Holy Trinity to love one another as God has loved us. “This love…is the source of the new life in Christ, made possible because we have received ‘power’ from the Holy Spirit.” (CCC 735)
And by the power of the Holy Spirit, we can bear the first fruits of eternal glory (charity, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, generosity, gentleness, faithfulness, modesty, self-control, and chastity) (CCC 1832). In essence, we become extensions of Christ’s presence of merciful love and forgiveness. We are restored in the greatness of God.
As we experience our transformation into children of God, we also recognize our own littleness and limitations, and our need for penance and reconciliation. Perhaps our most difficult task is to admit that without God, we can do nothing. Without the grace of God, we are lost.
Follow the Lord’s Way
The Holy Spirit gives us the strength to follow Christ’s way of life, including the way of the cross — willingly. The more we live by the Spirit, the more we follow the Spirit, sharing our Lord’s gifts and fruits through our acts of self-sacrifice, good works, and prayer during Lent and all the days of our lives. Should we ever have doubts about the workings of the Holy Spirit within us, let us turn to the body and blood of Christ.
Receiving Holy Communion increases the gifts and fruits of the Holy Spirit which help us to recognize and be open to the internal promptings of the Spirit. I call it the spiritual tug. Our Lord is tugging me in a certain direction. Sometimes I follow the Lord’s direction, and some-times I do not.
Following the Lord’s way does not always give me immediate satisfaction or gratification as — let’s say, comfort food. Pasta, wine, and yes, chocolate (but not during Lent). Try as we do to rely on earthly attachments to get us through our trials and tribulations, they do not provide the divine sustenance that we receive from God’s love.
Perhaps our minds “are occupied with earthly things. But our citizenship is in heaven, and from it we also await a savior, the Lord Jesus Christ,” according to the Letter of St. Paul to the Philippians (Phil 3:19, 20). May our Lenten promises help us to become vessels for our Lord’s use in this world, thereby strengthening our commitment to this lifelong journey toward Heaven by way of the Holy Spirit.
In other words, all that we do as God’s loving children prepares us for the second coming of our Savior. “Therefore, my brothers and sisters, whom I love and long for, my joy and crown, in this way stand firm in the Lord.” (Phil 4:1)
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Photo by Samuel Zeller on Unsplash
