Sun. 27th Week Year A
Phil 4,6-9
St. Paul tells us that we should “have no anxiety about anything”! Wait a minute, St. Paul! You do not seem to have been so good about following your own advice. Were you not anxious about those wayward Corinthians? What about the “stupid” Galatians? Were you so calm when you “fought those beasts at Ephesus”? Did you not even admit that anxiety over the churches you had formed daily pressed upon you? But let us read further: “…in everything by prayer and supplication with thanksgiving let your requests be made known to God. And the peace of God, which passes all understanding, will keep your hearts and your minds in Christ Jesus.” In the verse just preceding this one, Paul gives us the real reason we need not be anxious: “The Lord is near”. Yes, the Lord is near! No matter our trouble, no matter our problem, no matter how bad things seem to be, He can handle it and He will handle it if we ask Him. But He will do it in His own way (which is most often not our way!) and in His own time (which is often not as soon as we would like). If we can trust Him so much that we already thank Him before He actually answers our prayer for help, then truly our hearts and minds will be in a peace which surpasses all understanding. Until we are saints, (and maybe even afterwards! Cf. St. Paul above) we will always be subject to a certain agitation on the surface of our being, but it will not touch the very center of our selves where God Almighty secretly dwells in all His hidden splendor.
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