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Wisdom Story
About three hundred and fifty years ago a shipload of travelers landed on the northeast coast of America. The first year they established a town site, and the following year elected a town government. The third year the town government planned to build a road five miles westward into the wilderness. The fourth year the people tried to impeach their town government, for they thought it was a waste of public funds to build a road five miles into a wilderness. Who needed to go into the wilderness, anyway?
Here were people who had the vision to see three thousand miles across an ocean and overcome great hardships to get to the new land. But in a few years they were not able to see five miles out of town. They lost their pioneering vision.
Musings of a Modern Day Mystic
Blessed Christ, unless I have a fresh vision to awaken me from the sleep that routine sets me within, I cannot be sustained in vital effort toward the future. The successes of yesterday will not suffice for the expectations placed on me today. The things done yesterday will not propel me toward the beckoning horizons of the future.
Who I am is defined, in some sense, by time. This at least seems true in my present state, for I cannot find myself to make sense as a static being in time, since within time I seem to change as I move with the progressive sequences of duration. Therefore, who I am is the result of who I was and who I aspire to be, indeed, who I am becoming as the fruition of the past and this very moment. So, in my being I am formed by time, though a child of eternity, and without a vision of the future I will lose an essential aspect of my own evolving self.
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Yet, my Lord Jesus, the future is exactly where you lead us and I am to follow you, even if it is filled with uncertainty and in the present I might find myself inadequate for it. I rejoice, however, that you have so formed time that forward movement is the opportunity for expansion of my being and vision. I, indeed, find that I can endure almost any present if I have faith that in and by it you are leading me to a fullness of living and being new to me and good for me, as well as good for those who love me and look to me for love. And I am sure that I might have to pass through some dimishments of my being for you to fashion from those reducements a more whole man.
Therefore, my God, may my hope remain strong and heart and mind remain invigorated by and receptive to the daily inspirations of Grace. I do desire and intend to honor you and the stewardship of my life energies, given to me by you as a sacred trust. May I be gifted, therefore, with greater appreciation of the good of today and an enlightened hope in tomorrow. May yesterday not define my tomorrow and may the graces of today prepare my seeing and living for the challenges to come. May I see how your providence joined the events of the past into the garment of today and, thereby, affirm that nothing within my experience is outside of your wise shaping to make me the blessing you call me to be and ever more become.
Suggested Reflection
In what sense do you see the past, present, and future shaping your identity?
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