Beginning the work

How does God's love abide in anyone who has the world's goods and sees a brother or sister in need and yet refuses help? Little children, let us love, not in word or speech, but in truth and action. And by this we will know that we are from the truth and will reassure our hearts before him whenever our hearts condemn us; for God is greater than our hearts, and he knows everything. Beloved, if our hearts do not condemn us, we have boldness before God; and we receive from him whatever we ask, because we obey his commandments and do what pleases him

I stand convicted from the above. The truth of the matter is that I have not formed the correct foundation. Since beginning this walk of mine as a priest I have struggled with where God has been leading. Mind you that God has not been overtly pressuring me to do anything... at least as I can tell... what has been happening has been a lot more subtle. Since becoming a Priest there has been this gentle pressure to take up or create for myself a foundation. And the rationale for such a foundation? Simply to allow God access to a life commited to His ministry yet fearful of really turning it over to him. My outsides have done better than my insides.

I was able to steal away for a few days after Easter. I ended up having the opportunity to spend some time at my folks house. It was good not because I did anything but because I really did nothing. For three days it rained. This was terrible for golf but good for the soul. The gem of the time away was my stepfather pushing a book in front of me. It was a short book and supposedly about Golf. Enough to spark my interest and far enough away from church work to have me look at it on my vacation. The books title is Golf's Sacred Journey... Seven Days at the Links of Utopia by Dr. David Cook. It turns out the book was a lot more than an interesting account of Golf. At it's center was a text about coaching and what one needs to be taught. One of the many things that got my attention was its assistance on preparation and building a proper foundation. One line that struck me was "If you want to lead a successful organization, you better build a bullet proof foundation for why you do what you do and how you do it."

The conviction of course was that as a man of faith and religious title, I have been building my foundation on sand. I mean intent is good but intent only gets one so far. Eventually one has to transform work into discipline and get to work. While there are many ways I could go deeper from the above quote from Sunday's epistle the key one that stood out for me was action. What actions am I taking on a consistent basis to sustain me in God to live through all the complexities and stressors of full time ministry? The reality is that I have not been disciplined as I could choose to be. And that is the knock that God has been knocking on my heart for some time. It is time to get to work in building such a foundation...