Discernment: Are You Living the Purpose for Which God Created You?

In today’s first reading, Ephesians 1: 1-10, St. Paul praises God as follows:  ”Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as he chose us in him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before him.”

To understand the impact of this statement, we might think of something that we have created or purchased to serve us in a particular need.  We possess that purchase or created object. It is to meet our need, to fulfill our purpose. It exists for no other reason. The object is ours, no one else’s possession. God created us for His purpose, not for our own purpose or for the purpose others dream up for us. We are God’s, “blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as [God] chose us in [God], before the foundation of the world to be holy and without blemish before him.”

How do you discern whether you are living according to God’s purposes and not your own or that which someone else dreamed up for you? 

If you are living a life of holiness and striving to accomplish the good for which you were created, you are receiving, in abundance, “the fruit of the Spirit,” which is “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness, [and] self-control” (See: Galatians 5: 18-25).  However, if you are living according to the flesh, you are then experiencing the following consequences of those choices:  “immorality, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, dissensions, factions, occasions of envy, drinking bouts, orgies, and the like” (See Galatians 5: 18-25). 

Whose purposes are you fulfilling?

Discerning a State in Life

Are you discerning the direction you want to take in life?  Are you wanting God to show you what He is asking of you?  Broadly speaking, in any state in life, God asks you to “act justly, to love tenderly, and to walk humbly with your God (Micah 6: 8).  But how do you go about discerning to which State in Life God is calling you.

Sister Clare Wagner, OP, identifies four key points connected to discerning one’s state in life:

1.      Listening to God’s purpose

2.     Listening to your heart

3.     Listening to the data available and

4.     Listening to the decision being made in you  (emphasis is mine)

(Source: “Make a difference! A guide for life choice,” National Religious Vocation Conference, 1995)

 I will develop each one of these over the next four discernment blogs.

“Listening to God’s purpose”:  From the quote from Micah, it is obvious that God desires justice toward the oppressed, the orphaned, the widowed, those  who are treated with disdain, the “have nots” of society, the marginalized, against whom society discriminates. His purpose is that all people are set free from bondage of any kind and that hungers for righteousness are addressed.  Love is to triumph over hatred in every segment of society.  No one is to be excluded from one’s love.

If I am “acting justly, loving tenderly and walking humbly with my God”, if I am following Jesus’ way, then, truly, I am making a difference in the world as did Mother Teresa of Calcutta, Martin Luther King, Dorothy Day, St. Francis and St. Clare of Assisi and, yes, the Foundress of my own religious community, Mother Frances Streitel.  Do you want to make a difference in the world as did these men and women?  Do you want to make Jesus’ mission to the poor, the sick and the outcasts of society your own mission? Do you want to participate in the mission of Jesus to bring fuller life to others by revealing God’s love for all, especially the poor (Mission Statement of the Sisters of the Sorrowful Mother, 2013)?

Do you see yourself abandoning all to serve the poor and the needy of this world---needy in any area of their lives—and giving your all to bring fullness of life to yourself and others,  excluding no one from experiencing God’s love through you?