…Immediately after the sin of Adam and Eve is narrated, the Torah declares that man can master his passionate lust for sin. God turns to Cain and warns him, “If you do what is right, will you not be accepted? If, though, you do not do what is right, sin is crouching at your door; it desires to have you, but you shall master over it.” (Genesis 4:6-7) For the architects of Christian theology, [who preached a new doctrine of inherent, unconquerable depravity, one wonders if] this [divine] declaration of man’s ability to restrain and govern his lust for sin [would be judged, ironically, as] nothing short of heresy. [On the contrary], the fact that the Torah places the comforting promise immediately following the sin in the Garden of Eden [should be] profoundly [reassuring] for [all who hear it, and celebrated by Christians as well as Jews].
The parable of the sower is plain. The seed sown is the word of God. The sower is our Lord Jesus Christ, by Himself, or by His ministers. Preaching to a multitude is sowing the corn; we know not where it will light. Some sort of ground, though we take ever so much pains with it, brings forth no fruit to purpose, while the good soil brings forth plentifully. So it is with the hearts of men, whose different characters are here described by four sorts of ground. [Yet the sole quality] that distinguished the good ground was fruitfulness. By this true Christians are distinguished from hypocrites. Christ does not say that this good ground has no stones in it, or no thorns; but [only that it had] none that could hinder its fruitfulness. All [hearts] are not alike; [yet nevertheless, for love of God] we should aim at the highest, to bring forth most fruit. [Even if we begin with stones and thorns, if we recognize them, we must not let them hinder God’s Word within us– for neither stones nor thorns are permanent fixtures, and we may implore the Gardener to aid us in tending and protecting His grain of the Gospel until harvest. Thus with all diligence] let us look to ourselves, that we may know what sort of [ground] we are.
To love Jesus means to keep His commandments. [Such keeping] is not a matter of mere obedience but of loving imitation. [Try as one might, it is impossible to honestly obey anyone unless one also loves them; neither pride nor indifference can even feign the virtues of humility and dedication required to observe another’s commands. On the other hand,] if I love a person, I want to keep that person’s commandments, both out of loyalty and out of respect for that person’s qualities: [for as one who loves will easily discern,] the commandments [given] will reveal and mirror that person’s qualities. So, the Law given by Moses reveals God’s nature by what He commands. Just so, the actions of Jesus reveal His and the Father’s nature: He heals, He loves, He judges, He forgives, He commands. To obey the commands [given by our loving God] is a response in love, [not legalism. To keep them, like a gift, is the natural and necessary consequence of our personal relationship to Him]: we need to do just that.
The context of the annual Festival of Dedication of the Temple gives a special meaning to Jesus’ claim [of His divinity in John 10:30]. On this festival of the return of the LORD to his Temple (after its desecration by the Syrian King Antiochus Epiphanes) Jesus is claiming that He Himself is the abode of God. [Indeed,] throughout the Gospel, Jesus has been making His own the institutions of Judaism. At Cana, He takes over the jars of water for Jewish rites of purification, making them the wine of His wedding-feast. Then He goes to Jerusalem and [functionally] replaces the perishable Temple with the Temple which is His Body. He makes the Sabbath His own by working on it as only God may do. He, rather than the manna provided by Moses, is the life-giving Bread from heaven. At Tabernacles, the festival of light and water, He declares that He is the Light of the world and the Source of Living Water. Finally, He will make the Passover His own at the Last Supper, and as the paschal lamb. It is this [record of so acting and speaking with Divinely transmutative religious authority] which gives the context and significance to the claim that ‘I and the Father are one.’ [Tragically, even though] the hostile question of the Jews [sparked] off Jesus’ sayings, [they are still unwilling to accept His unchanging response] and immediately after this passage they take up stones to throw at Him, [only misunderstanding] His claim to be one with the Father as blasphemy [rather than Truth].
There are operations in the supernatural order in which we work with our Lord and cooperate with Him in them. But there are others of a very intimate nature in which the one thing He asks of us is that we do not hinder Him. And in order that we do not impede Him, He gives us a spiritual anesthetic — that is, desolation, since it is a kind of paralysis of the spirit which renders us helpless.
In time of spiritual dryness, souls often think as follows: “I go to prayer, and I do nothing, absolutely nothing.” The soul does nothing, but God does a great deal, although the soul may not be aware of His secret and mysterious operations. But when the period of trial passes, we find that we are different. Without our knowing how or when, a profound change was wrought in us: our love is more solid; our virtue has become stronger. According to the familiar expression, we have come out of the trial “as new.” What does it matter that those afflictions may endure for years on end, if finally the soul emerges as new, fit to be united with God and to realize fully the role it was destined to fill on earth?
Desolation, then, is the indispensable means whereby the soul attains its transformation in Jesus, the supreme goal and the perfection of holiness. We think, perhaps, that transformation in Jesus is something that we can achieve with God’s help. But no. Simply having God’s help is not sufficient. God alone can accomplish it, and the only help that we can give Him is to allow Him a free hand, not to impede Him.
We must make our choice: either we choose transformation, and then we also accept the desolation without which it cannot be arrived at; or we refuse desolation, and then we must also reject transformation and thus give ourselves over to dragging out our life in a common mediocrity.
Desolation is a cross, but one of the most precious, one of the most divine. It is not wrought by the hand of men, but by God Himself. It is a work of the Holy Spirit. The trial, therefore, is made in accordance with the measure of each soul, perfectly fitted to its circumstances, requirements, and mission, and to the degree of perfection to which God has destined it. Hence, trial possesses an eminently sanctifying power.
Let us open our arms to it, then, and salute it with the same cry as the Church uses: “Hail, O Cross, our only hope!” In this way, by reason of all that has been said concerning spiritual afflictions, this truth is once more established: God’s ways are not our ways.
Servant of God Archbishop Luiz Martinez
“Worshipping the Hidden God”
Spiritual desolation is terrifying; God feels utterly absent, distant, unreal; all memories of consolation become untranslatable or inaccessible. The heart becomes dry and hollow; prayer suffers, joy withers, peace disappears. How, then, can this profound numbing of the soul benefit us? How can such a chasm of emptiness possibly do us any good?
That’s what this quote clarifies. That’s the paradox. It doesn’t.
Desolation is the anaesthetic. That’s it’s true job. But God is the surgeon.
When we are desolate, we still know God is real; we still have faith burned into our being, even if we feel nothing, even if doubts and fears plague us nonstop. We hope against hope. We cling to what we cannot even sense anymore, and yet we cannot ever deny it outright. Even collapsed under the weight of our cross, we know Someone gave it to us for a Good Reason, and if that raw fact is ALL we have to go on as we hobble on to Calvary, then so be it; it is enough. It must be enough, if it is all we were given. God knows. We don’t. That’s the point.
We forget that we’re not the ones doing the work. When we are anesthetized, desolate, we cease striving after our own notions of success. We stop taking on more than our share, we abandon ambition, we no longer try to guess or even edit God’s plan for our life. We are like unruly yet beloved children, who genuinely want to help Him with the home repairs but keep losing the tools and touching all the wet paint… we don’t understand when He says “no,” even though He says it with love. We can’t quite grasp the truth of our “not knowing”– of our not even being able to know. We just want to help. Come on, Dad, let me plug in the wires. Let me hold the drill. It looks so easy! But pride is lurking, and ultimately the only way to humble our childish enthusiasm is to give us a time-out. Out of the room, away from Dad, unable to interfere. Out of love.
Soon enough, He will come and get us, and show us what beautiful work He has done… all for us! Allwithin us! So we must doggedly hold on to faith, and hope, and charity, even if just with our feeble will– no feelings, no fervor, just a weak but honest resolution to not give up on God. Wait one more day. One more. One more. Keep waiting. Keep trusting. He remembers you, of course! He is working on you, remember? You’re just under anaesthetic for a while. The numbness is not permanent. Be patient, beloved. Carry the cross with gratitude. It is, truly, our only hope, even in this.
Transformation requires desolation. Remember that. So it was with Christ; so it must be with us.
Re-read the Archbishop’s words and take them deeply to heart. You need this understanding, this acceptance. Sometimes, for the greatest good of our souls, all we can do is let ourselves be put aside so God can do His work. This takes immense trust, and love, and humility. Tell God you are willing. Pray fervently for the grace. Then… well, “count backwards from 100”, as they say. Let God decide when to work. Do not impede Him, even in good will. Surrender to that sanctified numbness. And wait on the Lord.
FIGURED OUT HOW TO DO CAMERA MOVEMENTS IN CLIP STUDIO!!!! y’all were really letting me select the whole canvas and shrink it frame by frame manually. or worse, draw each frame slightly smaller. why did i do that.
