God's Ways Are Not Mine

Divine Intimacy #97: "As long as mortification does not strike at our pride, it remains at the halfway mark and never reaches its goal."

I've spent most of my life talking. Whether it be to entertain, inform, or influence, I've used my gift of communication nonstop since I was able to speak. It is time for me to be quiet.

As I recently drove up to visit my parents for a visit, I heard a question inside me. "Am I enough?" This was a question asked to my heart and mind by our Lord. I answered, "Yes," followed by, "I want You to be enough."

For about two years now, our Lord has continually invited me to the desert. In the desert, He wants me to live a life of silence, sacrifice, penance, and prayer. I've tried for the last two years to figure out how to be silent without giving up social media.

Social media is a stimulant both to use and to create with. It is a source of noise whether using it to ingest secular or religious content. This noise can help us who are deaf to the still, small, silent whisper of Jesus to learn about Him and open ourselves to Him, but once it has served that purpose, it needs to be set aside. I am at that point. I do stress the word "can" above because I believe that this is only possible by God's grace and that, for most people, social media is an impediment to spiritual, emotional, and mental growth and health.

I am unable to understand why, as I near the release of my book, Becoming a Good Man, our Lord would call me to silence, but His ways are not mine. I am unable to understand why He would give me the gift of communication and then ask me not to use it, but His ways are not mine. So, I obey, imperfectly, with complete trust that He knows what is best for me and others.

With this understanding, I have deleted all of my videos from the internet. For now I will continue to write here on my blog with the knowledge that this may also need to disappear.

We are overwhelmed with the noise of information that keeps us from the wisdom and love of God we are designed to seek. I have found the one internet source for knowledge I will allow myself. I encourage you to seek out the same. If it is this blog that you feel called to follow, so be it. The multiplicity of sources tickling our ears is part of the noise I believe we must separate ourselves from. So, if you are not fed here, I encourage you to move to whatever source our Lord guides you to.

As a general guideline, I post on this blog Tuesdays and Fridays at 4 PM EST/EDT.

This post is outside the normal flow of posts. I write from my old journals which means posts here are from 2021. The reason for this is to see the progression of my life with Christ. The date the post was originally written is always at the bottom of the post.

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Colloquy from Divine Intimacy #97:

O Lord, You who have sought for adorers in spirit and in truth, preserve me, I beg You, from the pharisaic spirit against which You fought while on earth, and which is so opposed to You, who are infinite Truth and Simplicity. Grant that while mortifying my body, I may mortify my pride even more, or better, mortify it Yourself.

You who know the secret places in my heart, the most deeply hidden instincts of my self-love, prepare for me the most effective medicine for purifying, healing, and transforming me. You alone know where this most harmful microbe nests; You alone can destroy it. But how often, alas, in the varying circumstances of my life, I have not recognized Your hand, Your work; and I have tried in so many ways to escape the physical and moral sufferings, the mortifications, humiliations, and difficulties which You Yourself had prepared for me.

How blind I am, O Lord, and how poorly do I recognize Your ways, which are so different and remote from my limited human views. Give me, O God, that supernatural sight which can judge events in Your light, and which can penetrate the true meaning of the sufferings which You place in my path. Intensify this light in proportion to the obstacles You prepare for me to strike my "ego, my pride, my opinions, my rights, because it is then above all that I am terribly blind, and groping in the dark, I reject the medicine You offer. I may lack, O Lord, the means of carrying out the purification of my ego, so foolish and so proud. But nothing is lacking to You, You who are the All, and whose infinite mercy utterly surpasses my misery. I confess, O Lord, that I have often strayed like a lamb which, leaving its shepherd, has taken a wrong path. But I desire to return once more, and I come back with complete confidence because I know that You never tire of waiting and of pardoning.

Here I am, Lord; I place myself in Your hands. Mortify me, purify me as You wish, for whenever You afflict, it is to heal, and wherever You mortify, life increases. Silence sacrifice penance and prayer. In particular silence I resist. Thankfully by Gods grace alone I have deleted all videos from YT.  But I still engage in idle chatter far too frequently. I still probably write too much especially during prayer time. His ways make me uncomfortable and call me to something that though I resist it and say it makes no sense to me on a soul level I do send I understand.

In the last month I have not used social media when I’ve had the opportunity to and have jumped into porn and gluttony. I also haven’t spent any money despite strong temptation and the ability to do so. It reminds me of how I felt with weed. There is no going back.