Tuesday, May 19, 2009

God Speaks Again

I am astounded by how God has been using the Bible to teach to me so personally recently.

Tonight I reached for my Bible, and again I opened to a random page.

I found no particular item on that random page to be exceedingly relevant to me (unless, of course, you would count the paragraphs my eyes first saw, which explained false witnesses and the importance of having at least 2 or 3 witnesses give testimony in a trial, which seems providential since I have jury duty next month).

When I flipped to the page that followed it, I found one item of definite interest. And then when I flipped to the page that followed that one, indeed the message became even more personal.

The first message came from the first paragraph of Deuteronomy, Chapter 22. It was all about the care of neighbor's animals, which just happens to be what I spent a lot of time discussing today with my neighbor's mother. The girl in the apartment beside mine was in a horrible accident last week, as you know, and--as a result--I will be sharing the care of her cat with another neighbor for an indefinite period of time. The verses in the Bible said to me tonight that I shall not see the animal of my kinsmen without showing concern for it, and that I should see to the animal's proper care by being helpful. Amazing! Clearly, to do this will be to do God's work.

The second message was from verses 9 to 11 of the same chapter, and--because of the vineyard imagery that is so vivid in the passages that spoke to me in March and April and because I have been tempted to stray from my promise recently by contradicting my own self with my actions--I can only think that this one is the next lesson that God is trying to teach me:

You shall not sow your vineyard with two different kinds of seed;
If you do, its produce shall become forfeit,
Both the crop you have sown
And the yield of the vineyard.

You shall not plow with an ox and an ass harnessed together.
You shall not wear cloth of two different kids of thread,
Wool and linen, woven together.

And so I can't help but think that God has seen the hypocrisy in my recent actions and is reminding me that to behave contrary to my promise is to confuse the soil by sewing two different types of seeds, perhaps the weeds of falsehood among the fruits of truth.

Being unequally yoked with someone is of particular sensitivity to me because that has happened before in my life.

The mention of wool being woven with something other than wool can only make me think of my devotion to the Brown Wool Scapular (which is to be made of 100% wool) and perhaps how my devotion to good things can be diluted by the presence of other sinful "threads" of my life, which only tangle me up in confusion.

I open the Bible so infrequently and for such short amounts of time and yet God is showing me such grace by giving me these relevant verses! I shall certainly start opening it up more!

The third and final year of my Marian promise begins in just 33 days, and if I am correct in my understanding that I may begin to plant seeds in the third year, then I must be very careful about what I sew with my actions.

God, please help me to learn from these messages and never to stray from Your Will for my life!