4 April, Tuesday — With God All This Time

Tuesday of Holy Week

Isa 49:1-6
Jn 13:21-33,36-38

All the while, my cause was with the Lord.

When we started our Catechism class this year, I asked the students to write to God. We had them seal those letters in an envelope which we were planning to return at the end of the year. One of the reasons why we asked them to do so was for them to see that God had always been with them throughout the year.

God is always present and involved in our lives, but it is so easy to not be conscious about his presence, or to forget about him all together. We get so distracted with chores, and for most of us, things just go our way (even with some effort) that we miss his presence in our lives. It’s not the same with God. Every moment of our lives, God is conscious of us. Catechism 301 states that at every moment of our being, God upholds us and sustains us. Wisdom 11:26 states had God ceased to will us, we would cease to exist.

Every single moment of our existence is a moment that God has chosen us.

I believe that this is a truly beautiful message to be aware of. Like everyone else, I have a lot of things to do, and I hope unlike everyone else, I end up idling away a lot of times. I even struggle with prayer. Doing this reflection made me realize that I am short-changing myself by not protecting my prayer time — I am robbing myself of the time to be aware of how God chooses me every single moment.

In many ways, we are wired to desire to be chosen, to be set apart. Let’s just look at how many competitions we are surrounded with. Even lucky draws excite us not just because of the prize, but also because of the fact that out of many participants, we were selected. With God, there is no competition. With God, we are already winners. All the while, we are with God.

This Lent, I’d like to invite everyone to reflect on what it means to be God’s chosen ones, what it means to be always in God’s thoughts. As we reflect on the Passion of Christ, let us be reminded that to be chosen and loved by God means that we are recipients of everything He has. That He emptied himself out of his love for us.

Let us find in ourselves, this awareness of how much loved we are every single moment.

(Today’s OXYGEN by Stephanie Villa)

Prayer: Lord, please give the grace to be aware of you choosing to love me every single moment.  

Thanksgiving: Thank you, God, for loving me into existence.