Monday, December 1, 2008

This is Advent

Day 2.

"The glory of God is man fully alive," wrote Irenaeus. I've heard this line many, many times but it never really struck the chord that it did today.

This morning as I prayed with Lydia, I asked for the graces to live out my vocation, to embrace the crosses of mundanity and sacrifices of my time. I prayed to no longer view my role of a stay at home mom as a loss of self, but rather as a progression to the fullness of who I am intended to be.

For sometime I have felt like I am treading water, occasionally enveloped by a wave. It's time to move past that and live a life that brings glory to God. It's time to act on the nudge I've been feeling and call the local nursing home and see if they need a volunteer visitor and her adorable baby. It's time to allow myself to really celebrate that when my husband heard the line, "Long as you got me you won't need nobody" in a song he thought of me, instead of worrying about making him happy. (I am making him happy!) It's time to start identifying the demons who are attacking me and tell them, in the Name of Christ, to get the hell out of my house. (Literally.) It's time to get up. To wake up.

Because, I think the message I got today is that I have the life I want, I'm just not living it.


Fr. Blake's Sunday sermon, which inspired me to write this post, can be found here.

3 comments:

Veronica said...

anytime after this week, would you want to make a visit to normal? for almost two years now i've been going through everything you have, and it continues to be a daily struggle. anyways, we need to hang out more being so close to each other, and now that we have space i need to host more things. so, let me know what day next week works best if you want to. :) (email works best because we're currently using ryans work computer at home and facebook is blocked :) - vjbyrne@ilstu.edu)
~Veronica

Anonymous said...

Wow, what a start to the season!

You are not alone in feeling this way. Thank you for starting this dialogue. I agree with Veronica, sometimes I read your blogs and feel like you are reading my thoughts!

Anonymous said...

Telling demons to get the hell out of your house is definitely something I have been doing recently. As a mom you may have specific demons that may haunt you and as a man working to find God's will in his life, my demons push down with the daily grind of life. Know that I will keep you and our Blogger community in my prayers and if you get a chance from daily life any little prayer you send my way will be much welcomed. It seems everytime I scare another demon from my house, I am able to breathe and find God's grace in those little things that those pesky demons kept hidden from me. Take care, friend :) -Ra