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Fr. Joseph Ziliak, Courier & Press, Saturday, March 13, 2004
Have you had the experience
when reading Holy Scripture that you’ve just seen something for the
first time? Such a response is actually fairly common.
What brings that about? I tend to think
that we change through the years. Our experiences will vary. We continue
to grow in awareness of ourselves. We look more closely and deeply
at the Words of life.
The phrase “you of two minds” caught my
attention recently in the Letter of James. The context is: “Submit
yourselves to God. Resist the devil, and he will flee from you. Draw
near to God, and he will draw near to you. Cleanse your hands, you
sinners, and purify your hearts, you of two minds.” (James 4:7-8)
The writer has been speaking of the divisions
that people experience and questions, where do these wars and conflicts
come from? The writer answers that the struggles, the conflicts, the
warring come from within ourselves.
Thus, the writer urges the reader to submit
to the Lord God and find therein the ability to stand firm, steady
and in unity with God’s will.
We notice that we can make choices. We can
choose to do right or wrong. We can choose to over indulge in drinking,
or not. We can choose to overeat, or not. We can choose to pursue
drugs and illicit sex, or not. We can choose to seek justice among
all peoples, or not. We can choose to help those who have few resources,
or not. We can choose to ignore the hurts and pains in peoples’ hearts,
or not.
Remember that the original portrayal of
human sin involved a time and opportunity of choice. The Lord God
told Adam and Eve not to eat of the fruit of the tree of good and
evil located in the middle of the Garden of Eden. Satan under the
guise of a serpent urged them to eat of the fruit. The choice was
made and consequences followed.
We are wondrously made. We are gifted with
intellect and will. We are granted opportunities to increase or lessen
our connection with God. We can choose to help or hurt one another.
We can choose to consider justice as basic to living in communities,
or we can try to use power to prevail.
If we didn’t have the power to choose, how
could we be punished for going the wrong direction? If we were not
allowed to choose, why should we be rewarded for things done out of
force?
At times we confuse the choices. We may
shade realities to do what we want, regardless of whether it is right
or wrong, and thus rationalize to our immediate and personal benefit.
“I will do what I want to do."
A constant self-reflection is needed for
us to stay straight and honest with the Lord. This is the sure way
to walk the narrow and straight path. While we gaze inward, we also
look outward to God’s Word for guidance along the way. Spiritual direction,
a style of living that includes checking who we are and what we do
from the perspective of faith in God, is the right choice. Experience
tells us that we too often choose selfishly unless we are pushed and
prodded to see things from God’s perspective.
These days of Lent provide us with a grace-filled
time for review and reflection on our life. Other ways of penitential
acts simply provide a framework to keep us focused on the ways and
works of the Lord. We are capable of two minds. We experience the
tug within our will for what we are to do, or what we are to avoid.
Unless we stay close to our God and listen
to his voice, we may easily make the wrong choices. We are to choose
the way of the Lord. Our minds are to be aligned to the mind and heart
of our God. Thus our task is to become of one mind with the one in
whom we can trust without fear, without doubt, without anxiety.
Father Joseph L. Ziliak is pastor of St.
John the Baptist Catholic Church in Newburgh.
