The Saturday in the First Week of Lent: Yes, we are willful creatures
The Saturday in the First Week of Lent
Hebrews 10:32-39; Matthew 24:9-14; Psalm 34:1-8 or Psalm 124
Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate.
Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure.
It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us.
We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant,
gorgeous, talented, fabulous?
Actually, who are you not to be?
You are a child of God.
Your playing small does not serve the world.
There is nothing enlightened about shrinking
so that other people won't feel insecure around you.
We are all meant to shine, as children do.
We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us.
It is not just in some of us; it is in everyone.
And as we let our own light shine, we unconsciously
give other people permission to do the same.
As we are liberated from our own fear,
our presence automatically liberates others.
--Marianne Williamson
We live in a world that tells us we are not enough, and more than that, can never be enough, to satisfy anyone, much less the Almighty. I don’t think for a single minute that’s true, heretical as that may sound. Someone sent me a birthday card once, for my 22nd birthday, and one of the tag lines in the card was, “If God had a refrigerator, your picture would be on it.” I think that’s true: my picture would be on God’s refrigerator. And so would yours.
Yes, we are willful creatures. Yes, we do the wrong thing, time and again. Yes, we are mean and nasty and small sometimes. And God sees those moments. God sees those moments, as frequent or infrequent as they may be, and still loves us. God loves us so much that God came and dwelt among us, to live with us and to love us. If we are worth that, worth that kind of devotion, worth that kind of love…is there any limit to what we can do, where we can go, who we can be?
I invite you, in this season of penance and self-examination, to be loved fully by the God who made you, who dwells with us still, even in the midst of our smallness, our meanness, our willfulness. I invite you to be forgiven by a God who extends grace and mercy in the fullest of measures, and beyond our wildest dreams.
--Rachel
