You never really notice the extent of how short we fall from being the Christians we’re called to be until you ask yourself, is there one commandment I have been completely faithful in keeping? You might think “well, I’ve never murdered” but murder is rooted in anger. Truth is, to be faithful to even one commandment by sheer willpower is impossible; for even if you do succeed, you are probably flawed by pride. As you reflect on how you still struggle with the simplest commandments and reflect on the more difficult ones (such as loving our enemies), then comes the question that echoes of slight despair: if no one is perfect, not even the saints, and we’re called to be perfect, where do I even start? When evaluating ourselves, our mind enjoys the comfort of switching between pride and despair. This is because it’s easiest to dwell on [pride of] the past and [despair of] the future. What is most difficult is assessing the present; what’s in your control, weighing your options, making a choice. To begin to follow any “difficult” commandment requires first and foremost the present moment—where your will lies. ³
“The difficulty of commandments is not in the nature of the commandments, but in the will of those who pursue and execute them.”²To begin to follow any commandment, no matter how difficult, we are to only follow one: you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This requires complete surrender every present moment: surrender the fear of what others think, surrender what you think, surrender your expectations for justice in this life, your expectation of fulfilment from anything you busy yourself with. It means surrendering our worries: He does not want us to worry about the mistakes of the past, the present moments that concern others and our judgements of them, or the future that our imagination tortures us with. All He requires is for you to ask yourself, “what is God’s will in this present moment”.³ And the answer lies in choosing what is most loving in the situation—in the most sacrificial, self-emptying, and Christ-like manner. Do not wait for some grand moment where your enemy slaps you across the face and you must literally turn the other cheek, because it won’t happen. Rather, when you are angered by a friend and you feel the uncomfortable urge to speak to them and apologize, choose what is most uncomfortable to do at the time—this very discomfort is because what He wills for us is unfamiliar to our nature, yet not impossible. Above all, you must surrender your comfort. This process of sanctification happens little by little, through small interactions and opportunities. It does not come from waiting until you want to forgive someone who doesn’t care how much they hurt you, or until you want to have that healing conversation that would bring up past brokenness, or until you want to give an uncomfortable amount of time, money, and effort to serving others. You will never want to do any of those things because it’s not part of our nature to—it’s part of His. But I promise you, you will feel peace fill your heart like no other because not only do you free yourself of your own bonds of “the ‘strong human’ you should be”, but the more you empty yourself, the more room there is for Him to dwell in you and transform you.
Sometimes, I think there’s this unspoken fear that if we become better Christians, we will lose our personalities. Yes, He wants you to become like Him, but He made you YOU for a reason. You do not lose who you are through these commandments: you won’t be a pushover for forgiving more, you don’t lose your independence by sacrificing yourself for others or become depressed if you take up your cross. Instead, you find yourself through them. We are all being sanctified at our own pace, in our own way. He takes our brokenness and creates a stained-glass window out of the surrendered pieces (and it’s most beautiful when light shines through it). Picture a gardener (The Father), an olive Tree (Christ), the sap (the Holy Spirit), and a broken twig (us). “The gardener will cut into the branch of the olive Tree and tie to it the twig wound to wound. This will allow the twig to live by the sap of the tree. The tree will give it life but will not make it different from what it is; this little branch, which would have died, will not be made into what it is not.”¹ God does not try to take our privileges in life away from us by giving us difficult commandments and then tell us our wounds are not justified. But rather, He wants to share in them and liberate us from the pain through grace; He wants to give us life through what alone, is only going to leave us dead. “God, when He unites Himself to the created, does not destroy what He has created: He fulfills it.”¹
No Buddha, no Confucius, no Muhammed has ever called His children to love their enemies except the One who came and did it Himself. Forgiveness is hard, and the worst kind is forgiving someone who doesn’t even know what they did wrong. But we have to—we’re just called to. So, what is it? Does He want me to suffer just to relate and feel His pain? No. He calls you to forgive because He feels yours. Who else but Christ has said the words, “Father, forgive them for they do not know what they are doing”? Those are the words we are called to repeat, but we can’t on our own because as a human born with dignity, we are entitled to respect. He calls us to forgive because He has and wills to give us grace to do the same. Christ is not sitting up there in comfort as He sends help down below; Jesus Christ is infinite, surpassing all time, and every single one of His wounds remain so long as we still feel them because He suffers with us. He has felt betrayal by friends, felt unwanted, felt constantly misunderstood, has been used etc. Likewise, because we are all made in His image, His wounded heart remains as we inflict suffering on each other too. The call to love our enemies is not to make us feel good or to make us superior to nonbelievers, but rather it is an agreement to surrender to His plan—to become a vessel in which He dwells to heal those around us. This is how He answers peoples prayers, how He spreads love, how He saves the world after physically resurrecting: He lives and dwells within each and every one of us.
As He transforms you, you transform those around you unknowingly. He wants to use us to show each other His love. Your gentleness with someone is the love they never received from their parents. Your encouragement to someone is the push their teachers never gave them. Your patience with someone who lashed out on you in public and embarrassed you is the love they needed but no one ever wanted to deal with them so that’s how they learned to communicate. All of these scenarios require breathing when it’s easier to yell back, speaking when it’s easiest to stay quiet, going out of your way for someone who doesn’t deserve it, really asking someone you aren’t close with how they’re doing while looking past the awkwardness because maybe this conversation is the only time they’ll feel like someone cared about them (sounds dramatic, but I’m serious).
We must allow God to work in us. We must surrender our comfort: the church was never meant to be a shelter from the world and all of its difficulty. We are called to be “lambs among wolves” not wolves among wolves or hide as lambs among lambs¹. We are called to use this Bible, write a gospel of our own, use the privilege of being a Christian and being able to be in communion with Him, to allow Him to transform us into being the light of the world. We get so scared of being the light because we forget we were never meant to do that on our own. Instead, we learn love darkness: our comfort and lukewarmness, we hide from Him the same way Adam & Eve did just in a church and convince ourselves we’re safe. He knows it’s hard on our own and that is why He gives us Himself to help. He knows it’s going to hurt but that’s why He never said it wouldn’t. We forget the only thing He promised about life on Earth is struggle and His help and usually we only agree to receiving one with open arms. Believe and use the faculty of prayer that is at your fingertips to take grace for grace is not given in proportion to your virtue, but rather in proportion to the longing for it¹.Take courage for your fears, strength for your trials, steadfastness for your faithfulness, truth for your relationships, take joy for your cross, and consolation for what someone has taken from you. Take from Him, for as a Father, He feels the need to give. We are the ones who must empty in ourselves an abyss for Him to fill.
And along the way, do not be so worried about your progress: “It is not a matter of success; it is a matter of direction”¹.He is the One who chooses the method and pace of sanctification—leave perfection up to the One Who is perfect. Do not despair when you see your shortcomings because they are all for your own good: “this is why He permits slight defects of character: impatience, susceptibility, envy. Under these exterior imperfections, God hides the real perfections which He infuses into the soul, and which are developing daily, sometimes without the soul’s knowledge. Faults do not take root in the soul that is surrendered to God: as weeds rise, they are uprooted. On the other hand, the good plant is continually growing and developing. Every day, God blots our faults our by our acts of love and self-surrender in exchange for grace and merit.”³ All that is needed is to want to please Him and no one else. So in summary, trust the process.
Books/Sources
¹Churchianity vs. Christianity by Anthony Bloom
²On Repentance and Almsgiving by St. John Chrysostom
³The Gift of Oneself by Fr. Joseph Schryvers