PURPOSE FOR YOUR LIFE
“God
has created me, to do Him some definite service… He has not created me for
nothing." J.H. Newman.
John Henry Newman wrote,
"God has created me, to do Him some definite service; He has committed
some work to me which He has not committed to another. I have my mission - I
may never know it in this life, but I shall be told it in the next. I am a link
in a chain, a bond of connection between persons. He has not created me for
nothing. Therefore, I will trust Him. Whatever, wherever I am. I cannot be
thrown away." We need to trust in our heavenly Father and in His call and
purpose for our lives!
A very significant word that
Jesus uses in His prayer captures the essential meaning of discipleship. The
word "consecrate" (Jn 17:17). Praying for the disciples, He says,
"Consecrate them in truth. I consecrate Myself for them, so that they also
may be consecrated in truth" (Jn 17:17 - 19). The basic meaning of the
word is "to set aside" or, in this context, "to be set aside for
the good of the world."
In the Mass, Jesus is
consecrated to the Father - His gift of self to the point of suffering and
death. We assist at this ritual, re-presenting His sacrificial suffering and
death so that we may benefit from it by joining our own lives to His in
self-offering. St. Paul quotes one of Jesus' sayings, "It is more blessed
to give than to receive" (Acts 20:35). This ought to be a part of our
everyday lives, just as Paul had done and recommended. What stands out in Jesus
and in the great model, St. Paul, is this giving of self to God's work, for the
good of the world and of our fellow human beings.
To do God's work in all we do
for each other is most important. Today, the Church honors Saint Isidore, a
farmer. This day provides us with opportunity to remember our link to the land
and to all those who provide us with food through the guiding hand of God. We
are indebted to them for all the labor they commit themselves to in order to
bring us the necessary foods to stay alive. Food is, for our bodies, what the
Eucharist is for our souls!
I would like to pass on this
prayerful reflection entitled "This Is a Farmer":
Farmers are found in fields
plowing up, seeding down, returning from, planting to, fertilizing with,
spraying for and harvesting it. Wives help them, little boys follow them, the
Agriculture Department confuses them, city relatives visit them, salesmen
detain them, but it takes heaven to stop them.
When your car stalls along
the way, a farmer is considerate, courteous, inexpensive road service. When a
farmer's wife suggests he buy a new suit, he can quote from memory every
expense involved in operating the farm last year, plus the added expense he is
certain will crop up this year. Or else he assumes the role of the indignant
shopper, impressing upon everyone within earshot the pounds of pork he must
produce in order to pay for a suit at today's prices.
A farmer is a paradox - he is
an overalled executive with his home his office; a scientist using fertilizer
attachments; a purchasing agent in an old straw hat; a personnel director with
grease under his finger nails; a dietitian with a passion for alfalfa, animals
and antibiotics; a production expert faced with a surplus, and a manager
battling a price-cost squeeze.
He manages more capital than
most of the businessmen in town.
He likes sunshine, good food,
state fairs, dinner at noon, auctions, his neighbors. Saturday nights in town,
his shirt collar unbuttoned and, above all, a good soaking rain in August.
He is not much for droughts,
ditches, throughways, experts, weeds, the eight hour day, helping with the
housework, or grasshoppers.
Nobody else is so far from
the telephone or so close to God. Nobody else gets so much satisfaction out of
modern plumbing, good weather and homemade ice cream. Nobody else has in his
pockets at one time a three-bladed knife, checkbook, a billfold, a pair of pliers
and a combination memo book and general farm guide.
Nobody else can remove these
things from his pockets and, on washday, have overlooked: five staples, one
cotter key, a rusty spike, three grains of corn, the stub-end of a lead pencil,
a square tape, a $4.98 pocket watch, and a cupful of chaff in each trouser
cuff.
A farmer is both Faith and
Fatalist - he must have faith to continually meet the challenges of his
capacities amid an ever-present possibility that an act of God (a late spring,
an early frost, tornado, flood, drought) can bring his business to a
standstill. You can reduce His acreage but you can't restrain his ambition.
Might as well put up with him
- he is your friend, your competitor, your customer, your source of food,
fiber, and self-reliant young citizens to help replenish your cities. He is
your countryman - a denim-dressed, business-wise, fast growing statesman of stature.
And when he comes in at noon
having spent the energy of his hopes and dreams, he can be recharged anew with
the magic words: 'The market's up!'"
You got to love them!
In the Responsorial Psalm we
acclaim, "Sing to God, O kingdoms of the earth" (Ps 68:33a)!