How great is the longing for peace! But peace alone is not enough, it is about a true peace that cannot be broken immediately. Without devaluing all serious efforts for peace, there is more at stake. For like everything that is given to us human beings, true peace also comes from God. It is the same with the striving for freedom. How many efforts and struggles, uprisings and even revolutions are carried out in the name of a freedom that is to be acquired, which one has previously missed. But often the decisive point which the Father addresses in the following text is missing!
“As long as man does not live in the truth, he cannot feel true freedom: you, my children, who are outside the law, which I created you to obey, you think you are living in joy and peace, but at the bottom of your heart you feel that there is no true peace in you, nor true joy, and that you do not know true freedom, the freedom of your God and Father who created you!”
What a fundamental statement! True peace and true freedom can only come about in accordance with the law of the Lord. From this statement the urgency of proclaiming the Gospel becomes clear. It is a matter of leading people to union with the will of God in the encounter with the love of God. Everything else must ultimately fail to achieve the goal. This applies to the personal life as well as to the life of the peoples. Not to live in truth, that is, in union with the Lord’s command, is to miss the deepest meaning of existence and therefore generates unfreedom and discord. One must not be deceived by this, even if some people would appear outwardly happy and content. Do we know their inner being? According to the words of the Lord, there can be no true peace within, which only God can give. This is also addressed to those who know the Lord’s law well but do not obey it.
The words of the Father:
“But you who live according to the true law, or rather, who have promised to obey this law which I have given you to secure your salvation, you have been seduced into evil by vice. You have departed from the law by your evil conduct. Do you think you are happy? No. You feel your heart is restless. Do you think that your heart will find satisfaction in the end when you seek your pleasure and other earthly pleasures? No. Let me tell you this: You will never be able to live in true freedom or true happiness unless you recognize me as your Father and submit yourselves to my law to be true children of God, true children of your Father! Why? Because I created you for this one purpose only, that you may know me, love me, and serve me as a simple and trusting child serves his Father!”
It is good to bear in mind the principal state of the soul which does not strive for the commandments of God: “You will never be able to live in true freedom or true happiness unless you recognize me as your Father and submit yourselves to my law to be true children of God, true children of your Father!”
I address us as Catholics! Are we really aware of this or have we already become so accustomed to the frequent forgetfulness of God and lack of faith that we more or less take it for granted? Does it no longer dismay us that we see so many people who live past the real life? Obviously our heavenly Father is not used to it. Only he knows what treasures he has prepared for us, what joys the soul can receive when it submits to the mild yoke of our Father.
What a tragedy not to know the real meaning of existence, what darkness for our soul not to be able to reach out for the light of the Lord, but to have to stay mostly in the dungeon of transitory things and to be in danger of becoming blunt.
The urgency of proclaiming the Gospel, and thus the love of our heavenly Father, becomes ever stronger in a time of apostatic darkness. We should not allow ourselves to be intimidated by the indifference or even hostility that surrounds us, and we should bear witness to true peace and freedom through our lives and our Word!
Harpa Dei accompanies the daily scriptural interpretation or spiritual teaching of Br. Elija, their spiritual father. These meditations can be heard on the following website www.en.elijamission.net
