Category: Christian life

Finding Jesus

Finding Jesus

How is it that you sought me? Did you not know I must be in my Father’s house?

Recently, I’ve been getting a lot of comfort from the fifth joyful mystery of the rosary: the finding of the child Jesus in the temple. Mary and Joseph anxiously search for Jesus after He stays behind in Jerusalem following the Passover feast. When He is finally found, listening and talking with the teachers in the temple, He seems to have expected them to know where He would be, instead of traipsing across Jerusalem looking everywhere. But they didn’t just know He would be in the temple and they seem even to struggle with His response.

Why is this comforting to me?

Mary was conceived without Original Sin, she bore the God-man in her womb following a conversation with an angel, and she humbly bears the honor being Queen of Heaven and earth. Yet she did not know that Jesus would be in the temple.

Joseph was a man who was clearly directed in his dreams, nobly labored to provide a life for Mary and Jesus, and lived a life governed by faith, justice, and wisdom. Yet he did not know that Jesus would be in the temple.

Those closest to Christ during His earthly life, those who raised Him from a small baby, those who were perfect or nearly so did not understand what Jesus was doing in this moment. The same would be true for many other moments in their lives, too.

And I find this to be extremely comforting.

When I cannot see what God is planning for my future…
When I do not understand how any greater good could be brought from this present pain…
When I do not find much reason to hope…
When the sadness of the present blinds me from seeing the joy that is certainly to come…
When I seek but do not find, ask but don’t receive an answer, knock but do not find an open door…
When I wonder but seem to get no closer to understanding…
When I cannot find Jesus in the present moment although I know He must be close…

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His Yoke is Easy and His Burden Light

His Yoke is Easy and His Burden Light

Come to me, all who labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn from me; for I am gentle and lowly in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. For my yoke is easy, and my burden is light.
(Matthew 11: 28-30)

His yoke is easy and His burden is light.

Over the past few weeks, I have wondered, “Is it really easy and light? It doesn’t feel that way.” I’m not certain it generally helps to consider that Christ suffered far more than I do. It isn’t a comparison game I want to play. Instead, various circumstances in life arise which can make us wonder how Jesus can say that what we are receiving in life is easy and light. The stress might not amount to the crucifixion, but it can still feel paralyzing. The pain might not compare to the scourging, but it can still feel crippling.

And yet Jesus always speaks what is true: His yoke is easy, His burden light.

Not that long ago, in a Bible study in prison, we were talking about this passage from Matthew’s Gospel. As different questions were asked, we spent a little time talking about a yoke and how it would look to be “yoked” to Jesus. The image that came to mind is one that stuck with me in the days that followed. I had mentioned that we step into the yoke/harness shared with Jesus and that He never abandons it, even if we run from the yoke. And I kept coming back to that image of Jesus faithfully shouldering the burden, while I so often long for escape and to slip out of the offered yoke.

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Aim Higher

Aim Higher

For a while I would joke that I don’t pray for humility as a teacher because it comes to me whether I pray for it or not. And yet, just to prove that life isn’t always as humbling as I may need, the Lord decided to show me that when I pray for things (mostly, it seems, humility) that He delivers what I need, albeit not in the way I want.

On Ash Wednesday, I was listening to a Lenten reflection and prayed along to the Litany of Humility. It is a prayer I love and hate and, probably, need to pray more often. Right on cue, the Lord delivered a humbling situation the following day. A student was giving unsolicited advice about how I might improve his life by not assigning study guides or making him work on it (instead of the math homework he found more pressing) during my class period. I listened for a while, attempting initially to get him to understand that while he might not need it, there are other students who do. The conversation concluded when I recommended that perhaps he pursue a career in teaching since he would be able to be the perfect teacher for students. He, clueless perhaps to the implications because he isn’t really that cruel, commented that he didn’t want to be a teacher but was going to “aim higher.”

I sat there for a moment as a lighthearted moment grew sour.

He didn’t want to be a teacher (which I didn’t really expect to be the deep desire of his heart), but he wanted to “aim higher.”

And it was humbling.

I remembered, annoyed, that just the previous evening I had prayed the Litany of Humility. This is why I don’t pray that prayer, I thought, as I pondered what to do in the wake of a fifteen year old boy telling me my current career choice was way below what he hoped for himself. I sat there at my desk, pride bristling, wanting to offer one of a thousand caustic barbs barreling to the front of my mind. But I didn’t say any of them as I thought, But this probably why I need to pray this prayer more often.

If I were humble, I wouldn’t be annoyed by the careless words of a teenager. I wouldn’t want to offer a bit of my sharpened tongue. I wouldn’t, as a small form of revenge, sidestep answering a question he had on the study guide he just complained about yet which I had thoughtfully crafted as a way to help my students be successful.

And yet I all of these things happened. I was annoyed, I wanted to offer a biting word, and I chose not to give a straight answer to his question.

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Answering Prayers We Didn’t Pray

Answering Prayers We Didn’t Pray

Jesus, looking at him, loved him and said to him, ‘You are lacking one thing. Go, sell what you have, and give to the poor and you will have treasure in heaven; then come, follow me.’

The rich man in today’s Gospel received a beautiful, difficult blessing. He was able to ask Jesus how he could inherit eternal life and then he was told the answer.

It seems, however, that the rich man was hoping for a different response. Perhaps he wanted Jesus to say, “You don’t need to do anything else–you will inherit eternal life.” Or maybe he wanted Jesus to have some small request or some additional rule to follow. Instead, he is invited to follow Jesus after selling his possessions. This does not seem to be what the man had anticipated or he might not have asked Jesus the question. This good news, this call to discipleship which others received with wild abandon, is met with sadness and a disheartened turning away. The rich man asks a question, receives an answer, and then sulks away. How difficult it is to seek and then find that the cost is higher than you are willing to pay!

This is often true for us, too. We want the Lord to provide an answer to a present difficulty. Hoping for guidance and direction, we implore Jesus to show us the way. Yet when an answer, a path, or a gift is offered, we quickly realize it isn’t what we hoped we would receive. His ways and thoughts are far above our ways, yes, but we keep hoping, over and over again, that they will match up. We find ourselves desiring that just once our meticulously crafted and very comfortable plan will be the one the Lord has also been preparing for us. Many times we, like the rich man, ask questions with specific answers in mind or ask for grace but are focused on very particular graces.

Jesus sees this man wholly. He knows him through and through. The deep desires of his heart and the secret dreams and imaginings are known perfectly to the Lord. It is in light of this knowledge that Jesus offers the answer of sell what you have, give to the poor, and follow Me. Jesus doesn’t need more information to offer a better response. He offers the answer which is perfectly crafted for this man’s heart. Jesus looked at him, loved him, and then placed His finger on the very point which needed His attention right then. The Lord invites him to eliminate what separates them and to become His disciple.

Perhaps before every hard thing that enters our life, the same situation unfolds. Jesus looks at us, loves us, and then points to a lack in our hearts. He does this not to hurt us or to unnecessarily grieve us or to cause us to turn away from Him. Instead, it is this abundant love and great knowledge of our innermost being which causes Him to offer us a grace we didn’t ask for and mercies we didn’t expect. They often come wrapped in problems, accompanied by heartache, and bathed in tears. We don’t want them. We generally desire to resist them. And yet they come, through various means and different channels, from the hand of the Lord.

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A Wintry Grace

A Wintry Grace

Snow has a way of making people live out the Golden Rule a bit better.

Perhaps this doesn’t happen for all five months of winter, but the first few snowfalls find my vehicular encounters with people more pleasant as a whole. People are more inclined to give extra space, wait for someone to pull ahead of them, use blinkers, and not honk when a car is sliding through the intersection with a clearly red light.

In short, we seem to naturally offer more grace to one another.

As I navigated the snowy roads a few nights ago, I was wondering why we find it more natural to be gracious in such situations, when normal driving conditions often bring out the frustrated side of humanity. Maybe it is because it is in our best interest to be gracious. Although the light may be green, it is clearly better for us to wait until the skidding car careens out of the intersection, rather than race toward it because the light indicates we can. Or maybe we don’t desire an accident and the headache that insurance claims naturally bring about.

But maybe, just maybe, it is because we are able to recognize a connection that goes beyond our personal best interest and draws us together as humans. The journey home in inclement weather gives me this feeling of unity that is similar to what I feel when an ambulance or fire truck or funeral procession passes by. For a moment, we are united by something that surpasses our personal desires and we acknowledge that someone else takes precedence.

Grace is often spoken of in relation to God’s free and unmerited favor toward us. While that is true and necessary, grace is also something we offer one another. The unmerited part is particularly difficult for us, though. Oftentimes, there is a natural sense of justice we have about what another deserves, but grace is giving people what they don’t deserve. We acknowledge what could be a fair response toward them and then we choose to be more generous than needed. And because it is freely given, that means it is a gift. In a moment of difficulty, we choose to bestow upon the other a gift they don’t deserve, but one which might cause them to change in some way.

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Birth and Death and Rebirth

Birth and Death and Rebirth

In March, before COVID became a full-blown pandemic, I ordered four icons from an Orthodox icon shop I’ve used in the past. They were able to ship two of the icons before needing to close their shop due to state restrictions and for the health of their employees. The other two would be shipped at a later date, as they were able to re-open and continue production of the icons.

When I got an email a few weeks ago, it said the icons were shipping and would arrive the middle of the next week. The situation was humorous since I had been home for weeks on end and during the one week of the summer I was away, the long-awaited icons were delivered to my doorstep, where they waited for my arrival a few days later. Of course, I exclaimed, to anyone who would listen to me, of course the icons arrive when I cannot be there to get the package.

A couple of days later, I learned of the death of a dear friend of the family. There are dozens of memories of my childhood and young adult life that I can return to and find this man filling the scene with his lively personality. He and his wife were friends of my parents. They were present for important sacraments and were the babysitters for my younger sister and me on occasion. Later, they were my bosses as I worked for them during the late-summer and fall. So many reflections on their frequent presence in my life and the unique role they had in relation to my family. Over the next few days, my family and I reminisced over the eccentricities and humor of our beloved friend.

When I returned home a few days later, I retrieved the package on my doorstep, grateful that it wasn’t damaged by rain or heat. I opened up my package and saw the two delayed icons.


The Raising of Lazarus from the dead


“Epitaphios”–an image of the body of Christ used in Orthodox and Byzantine liturgies at the end of Holy Week

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A Sacrifice of the Will

A Sacrifice of the Will

I purchased it several years ago, but this Lent I decided to start reading Hinds’ Feet On High Places by Hannah Hurnard. While I don’t want to give too much away for those who may be interested in reading it, I do want to focus on one point that has struck me repeatedly throughout the book.

Several times, Much-Afraid, the character followed in the story, is called to sacrifice her will for the Shepherd’s will. This story is an allegory of the Christian life, but the repeated need to make altars upon which to lay one’s own will, is rather striking. Each time, she assembles an altar from whatever materials lie close at hand and then she places her own will on the altar. A fire alights from somewhere and consumes the sacrifice, making a burnt offering of her very will.

There Much-Afraid built her first altar on the mountains, a little pile of broken rocks, and then, with the Shepherd standing close beside her, she laid down on the altar her trembling, rebelling will. A little spurt of flame came from somewhere, and in an instant nothing but a heap of ashes was laying on the altar.

Hinds’ Feet on High Places, pp. 71-72

In the midst of reading this book, the coronavirus has swept the nation and world. It felt very real when my bishop suspended all Masses. Suddenly, I was in a similar position to the people I ministered in Honduras, who go without Mass for undetermined periods of time. It was something I never considered happening here. During the season of Lent, I suddenly felt like a tremendous sacrifice was being asked of me. Yet the end probably won’t come at Easter, with the beautiful Triduum marking the end of the wandering in the desert. Who knows how long we will be left to wander in this sacramental desert.

The Lord asked us to place our wills upon the altar and to accept them being made into a burnt offering, a living sacrifice for the Lord. Arguments about what ought to be done aside, I am confident the Lord can use this time to shape us, to pull us out of the normal and help us see the miraculous in what we mistook for ordinary.

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Travel Light

Travel Light

As a way to prepare for walking the Camino de Santiago, I bought a few guidebooks and researched suggestions online. The book that had sparked the desire to complete this pilgrimage was Fr. Dave Pivonka’s Hiking the Camino: 500 Miles With Jesus. Prior to reading this book, I had only a vague interest in the pilgrimage, partly spurred on by a fellow teacher who wanted to make the trek. I read about Fr. Dave’s journey and I was intrigued.

Casually, with little intention of it actually happening, I made the next logical investment: guidebooks. Then, I chatted with my younger sister, pondering if this could really, truly happen. Finally, we booked plane tickets, bought necessary gear, and prepped for a pilgrimage that was largely unknown to us.

Along the Camino, several of the American pilgrims asked if we were on the Camino Facebook page. It wasn’t something I had looked for or uncovered in my searching, but when I returned home, I joined the group. Since then, I’ve read numerous suggestions people have for others about to make this pilgrimage, appreciated pictures from people currently on pilgrimage, and read the questions first-time walkers have for the more experienced.

One thing that has always struck me is how particular some people are about the weight of their pack. It is, understandably, one of the most significant things to consider, but it wasn’t something I spent a great deal of time analyzing. In retrospect, I should have taken less.

At two separate points of the trip, we mailed things either home or ahead to a later stop. Church clothes that we hoped to wear were shipped ahead when we realized Sunday would be a walking day and Mass would be attended in our everyday Camino clothes. Pajamas were mailed as we just slept in the clothes we would wear the following day. The pack I already thought was small was pared down twice. When I finished the Camino, I resolved that if I ever did it again, I would be far more particular about what I brought along.

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From My Heart to Yours: A Lenten Devotional

From My Heart to Yours: A Lenten Devotional

Lent is fast approaching.

Even though I’ve been consistently thinking about Lent over the past few weeks and prepping my students and small group for it, I still haven’t fully decided what I will be giving up/adding to my life for the next 40 days. Many ideas are swirling around, but I haven’t landed on specifics yet. This morning, I was talking with one of the prisoners and after I explained a little about Lent, he asked what I would be doing for it. Great question, friend, I thought, I’m not quite certain yet.

However, there is still time to decide. Time to prayerfully consider how we can draw nearer to the Lord’s heart as we wander into the desert so that He may speak to our hearts more intentionally.

To that end, I created a Lenten devotional for you (and me)! I’m excited about this little project and I hope that it will enable us to have a more fruitful Lent. (Click picture below for the pdf)

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There Is Always Hope

There Is Always Hope

I don’t recall exactly what it was about. During parent teacher conferences, I spoke with a parent and it was either about the grade, the student’s faith, or something, but whatever it was, the parent ended with, “So there’s hope?” And I, filled with a conviction that stretched beyond the moment, replied, “Yes. There is always hope.”

I felt the weight of that truth in the moment after the parent left.

Always. Hope endures despite all difficulties.

For someone who often skews toward pessimism, it is helpful to remember that hope persists, even when it seems illogical. I mean, we worship a God who rose from the dead after three days. He chose the most unlikely people to pass on the faith, who continually misunderstood Jesus and ran away when scared. Yet this Church still lasts. In spite of corrupt popes, Church scandals, intense persecutions, harsh dictatorships, and every other difficulty, we see that life can still burst forth from death just as the frozen ground will one day again yield to the gentle strength of new flowers.

The other day in class, I found myself saying, “Death isn’t the worst thing.” For me, it was obvious that this was true. I spent much of my first year of teaching hoping for death. Not in a morbid or depressed way. Rather, I was thoroughly convinced of the glory of the Beatific Vision and I was also thoroughly convinced that I wasn’t yet experiencing it in a room filled with angsty, complaint-filled teens.

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