As a part of our daily routines, we should strive to reflect on life, death, and resurrection, because we do not know the day or the hour when we will pass from this life to the next. As Paul points out in Romans (8:11), eternal life begins now. He says:
If the Spirit of the One who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the One who raised Christ from the dead will give life to your mortal bodies also, through his Spirit dwelling in you.
In other words, the one who created us out of love sustains that life in us by the presence of the Holy Spirit, from now unto eternity. The most important question of our life is: How do we know if God’s Spirit is dwelling in us?
- We know we received his Spirit in baptism when we became children of God and members of his Church. It is in his Church that he has given us the means to be confident that his Spirit is dwelling in us.
- He makes available to us an abundance of his grace through the sacraments, which are a personal encounter with Jesus Christ. Jesus waits for us to approach him in the sacraments so that we can receive the grace necessary to live our lives in communion with him.
Without this grace, the Holy Spirit cannot dwell within us. God has a wonderful plan for each of us, but he has to be the most important part of the plan. St. Irenaeus said, “The glory of God is man fully alive.” We can only be fully alive when the Holy Spirit is dwelling in us and influencing the way we live. The choice is ours.
Now Is the Time
We are all tempted to think, There is no urgency to taking the word of God seriously; there will be time enough later to prepare for eternal life. However, if the Holy Spirit is not dwelling in us because we are not faithful to what God asks of us, how can we expect him to help us make the right decisions in the future? Now is the time to prepare for the future.
During the coronavirus pandemic that began in 2019, we lived in a time like no other, affecting the whole world. Many of the things we took for granted one month were taken away from us the next. This is a sample of how millions of people throughout the world experience as a normal way of life. For many people in this country because of the pandemic, life will never be the same. They may have lost loved ones, lost savings for retirement, or lost their means to provide for their family. One of the things we never dreamed was the loss of our place of worship and the opportunity to receive Jesus Christ in the Holy Eucharist. This, too, we may have taken for granted. There are Catholics in other parts of the world who rarely can attend the Holy Mass and receive the Lord.
Our Response & Hope
How we react to crisis is a measure of our spiritual maturity. The following quote from 1 John 2:17 is especially for these times:
“Yet the world and its enticements are passing away. But whoever does the will of God remains forever."
The will of God for us right now is that we find strength in a faithful relationship with him because we trust in all the promises he has given us in the holy Scriptures, and we act on those promises.
In the Gospel of John (11:1-45), Jesus comes to the home of Lazarus, Mary, and Martha after Lazarus has died. Jesus, says to Martha, “I am the resurrection and the life; whoever believes in me, even if he dies, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die. Do you believe this?” she said to him, “Yes Lord I have come to believe that you are the Christ, the Son of God, the one who is coming into the world.”
Everything about our life on earth will pass away except our relationship with God. During these times we may have lost much, but if the Holy Spirit is dwelling in us because we have chosen to live in a faithful relationship with God, we can be confident that we will be “fully alive,” now and for all eternity. This is the message of hope that we must share in these difficult times.
Deacon Tom Fox, K.C.H.S., and Mary Jane Fox, D.C.H.S. are the Co-Founders & Co-Directors of Pilgrim Center of Hope. The two left their careers after a profound conversion experience and began working full-time in ministry at their parish in 1986. After several years and having impacted tens of thousands of families, the Foxes founded Pilgrim Center of Hope in 1993 as a response to the Church’s call for a New Evangelization. Deacon Tom is an invested member of the Equestrian Order of the Holy Sepulchre of Jerusalem, a Commander Knight of the Holy Sepulchre.
Pilgrim Center of Hope provides events, experiences, and media; initiating a desire in people to encounter Jesus Christ in their daily journey of life. See what’s happening & let us journey with you! Visit PilgrimCenterOfHope.org.
