Praying with Scripture – Frassati Reflections

A Walk in the Garden

A few years ago I was telling a friend some difficult things I was going through. After describing my situation and things I was experiencing, she said it sounded like God was digging in deep. He was pulling some weeds, tilling the soil, doing some dirty work… because he was planting something new. He was laying the foundation for a garden.

You know those moments when God finds a way to speak a perfect word to your heart? A word of peace, of joy, of comfort… Whether it comes through the words of a friend, seeing something that speaks to you, or a sense in a chapel or out on a hike, God finds perfect ways to communicate to us. (Which He probably does way more often than I actually pick up on!) Looking back on those words from that friend, I see clearly how God was speaking to me in that moment and how in that time God was laying groundwork for me to step into my vocation of marriage.

Today’s Gospel, Jesus’ parable of the sower, brought me back to the beautiful word my friend gave me years ago and the sense of consolation that came with it. My heart longs to be that of rich soil, not the path, rocky ground, or thorns which do not receive and cultivate the word of God and bear fruit. Jesus’ words have me asking myself, What does it mean to be rich soil? It seems that a heart poised to receive is key – to receive the words of our Father in prayer, through the Scripture, through a friend or experience. However God comes to us, we must be open to receive Him. In this way the rich soil of our hearts may actually take in, nourish, and give life to the word of God and grow a garden that can bear fruit.

This image of a garden moves me more deeply than I can describe. I have a feeling it is because the Garden is what we were created for. Our hearts were designed to inhabit God’s perfect Garden. There is a deep ache within each of us for that paradise, especially as it represents perfect communion with our Father. Perhaps we can each take a moment today to find the garden God has sown in each of our hearts, where we can meet Him naked and unashamed. We are a work in progress, surrendering again each day to the Gardener’s perfect hand. May we allow Him today to enrich the soil of our hearts and lead us into communion with Him. He wants to walk with us. And in these days of much anxiety, uncertainty, and fear, we must remember He is always walking with us and making our hearts into a garden.

To continue praying and reflecting on this imagery, I highly recommend listening to Matt Maher and Audrey Assad’s song Garden here.

You walk with me
You never leave
You’re making our world a garden
Garden · Matt Maher | Composer, Lyricist: Audrey Assad

Setting Captives Free

How saddened the disciples were that Jesus would not be with them much longer in the way they had imagined He would be. While their encounter with the Living Word-made-Flesh had turned their lives completely upside down, journeying with Him during the years of His public ministry, they still did not understand the full picture. In the Gospel today, Jesus sees the grief that fills their hearts in this moment, knowing still the grief yet to come at His Crucifixion, but also knowing the complete joy of His Resurrection and the coming of the Holy Spirit.

It is the deep reception of the Holy Spirit in their inmost beings that set the Apostles on fire after Jesus’ Resurrection and Ascension. By the grace of the Holy Spirit, they can be faithful to their mission of baptizing the world in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit, no matter where they go or what they endure.

In the first reading, we see Paul and Silas stripped, beaten severely and thrown into jail. Yet even there the kingdom of God reigns. Though they are prisoners in every outward sense—put in the “innermost cell” with their feet secured to a stake—they are set free in their innermost selves by Christ and able to be instruments of God’s grace, singing His praises and praying in the dark of night.

Imagine being one of the prisoners nearby, overhearing their love for God spilling forth. Would you scoff at them? Might your own heart be stirred to whisper a small prayer of thanksgiving?

Either way, you’d definitely be most attentive the moment you felt the earthquake shake the very foundations of the jail! What a dramatic revelation of God’s glory! Each prisoner being set free from bondage—chains broken, doors blown open, light piercing their own hearts. This freedom is not just physical, but spiritual—freedom from sin. This outward manifestation of God’s power seems small compared to the inner transformation of the jailer, much like the instance where Jesus healed the paralytic, saying first “Your sins are forgiven,” and then performing a physical miracle to account for our poor human blindness (Mark 2:1-12, Luke 5:17-26).

For the jailer and his family to have received the Holy Spirit so as to know the truth of Jesus Christ is a true miracle and a cause for great rejoicing indeed!

And what about us? How is it that we live in the light and joy of this truth, no matter how dark our present situation may seem? And do we allow the Holy Spirit to inspire us so as to be ministers of joy and truth to others in our lives who may themselves feel imprisoned by doubts, sadness or trouble?

By virtue of the Sacraments and living in a state of grace, we have the Holy Spirit! We too are set free! Jesus promised His disciples, as He promises us, that He will complete the good work He has begun in us. And what a mighty work He has done! No matter if we were born into the Faith or converted later (or find ourselves on the path of conversion!), it is a gift that by His Light we know Light.

Your right hand saves me.
The LORD will complete what he has done for me;
your kindness, O LORD, endures forever;
forsake not the work of your hands. ~Ps. 138:7-8

What a grace it is to be transformed in the waters of baptism, confirmed in the Faith, brought freedom from our sins in reconciliation, and to receive JESUS Himself in the Holy Eucharist! The Lord has a plan for our lives. We must trust Him every step of the way and bear the crosses He allows us to carry for our sanctification, for even in the darkest night He is the Light we need.

We still have some days of Easter left, before arriving to the great Feast of Pentecost. Prepare your hearts and souls to grow closer to the Holy Spirit. Receive a new outpouring of the Spirit by praying a Pentecost Novena, learning the Veni, Creator Spiritus prayer (which St. JPII prayed every day!) and shedding any chains of bondage to sin in the confessional.

God awaits to do marvelous things in your soul. Let Him in ever more! And let us cry as one with the whole Church, Come, Holy Spirit, come by means of the powerful intercession of the Immaculate Heart of Mary, Thy well-beloved Spouse!

King of Peace

Lord Jesus, reveal yourself to us.

I often find myself drawn to the mystery of the figure in today’s first reading, Melchizedek, a priest and king in the time of Abraham. He stands out against other kings or priests of the Old Testament in that he is both priest and king (Gn. 14). Our reading from Hebrews reveals Melchizedek as an Old Testament prefiguring of Jesus Christ – in other words, he is a foreshadowing of Jesus, the ultimate priest and king to come. The psalm highlights the union of kingship and priesthood seen in Melchizedek and eventually Christ, filled with royal imagery surrounded by the refrain: “You are a priest forever in the line of Melchizedek.”

Why is this significant? Reading today’s Gospel with an understanding of Melchizedek, helps us focus in on specific treasures in the Gospel. In this case, reflecting on Melchizedek allows us to learn more about our Savior, Jesus Christ. Hebrews tell us that that name of Melchizedek means “righteous king,” and that he was the king of peace, yet his appearance in Genesis is only a shadow of the ultimate reality to be fulfilled in Jesus. Jesus is the true priest and king. As we read the Gospel, let us ask the Lord what this relationship between Old Testament Melchizedek and the fulfillment of the kingship and priesthood in Jesus Christ reveals to us about the heart of Jesus Himself.

In today’s Gospel passage, Jesus enters the synagogue and encounters a man with a withered hand. As the Pharisees look on to see if Jesus will heal on the Sabbath, a day in which work was to be ritually abstained from, Jesus engages with the crippled man and heals his withered hand. Jesus asks the Pharisees, “Is it lawful to do good on the sabbath rather than to do evil, to save life rather than to destroy it?” (emphasis mine)

This is our Priest and our King. What kind of priest and king is He? As a meditation, we may allow ourselves to imagine we are the man with the withered hand in Mark’s Gospel….

Jesus enters. He sees us. He engages us. He desires to come close to us. He heals us.

Is this how the first century Jews imagined a king or a priest? Jesus radically challenged the notion of kingship of His day. But further, is this how we imagine kingship today? It may not be. In our very meditation of these daily readings, the Holy Spirit is encouraging us to see kingship through God’s eyes and learn more about the heart of Our Savior, the righteous King, the King of peace. Jesus is forever our priest and king – one who desires to come close to our hearts. A priest and king who knows us and loves us. Who desires to enter in to the most withered parts of our souls. So that we may be healed. So that we may be free. So that we may share in His peace. What a King our Jesus is.

Lord Jesus, Most High Priest and King, thank you for revealing to our hearts the truth of who you are. Most gracious and compassionate priest and king, we open our souls to you. Heal the withered parts of our souls as you healed the man in today’s Gospel. Envelop our hearts, oh King of peace. Thank you, my God and King, for your desire to draw close to me. In Jesus’ name, Amen.

As a step further in your prayer, I invite you to spend time in praise of our King Jesus. Here is a song which may accompany your praise: All Hail King Jesus