Never Fear

By Marc Massery

Turn to any page of the Diary of Saint Maria Faustina Kowalska and you find spiritual gems. Like this one:

As I was conversing with the hidden God, He gave me to see and understand that I should not be reflecting so much and building up fear of the difficulties which I might encounter. [He said], "Know that I am with you; I bring about the difficulties, and I overcome them." (788)

If we let it, fear of the future can consume us. But God reveals to St. Faustina that He allows all the difficulties we ever face, promising that He Himself will overcome them for us. Even if it's hard for us to understand, if we know that God actually permits the trials we face for a loving reason, then we have nothing to fear.

When we try to figure out the future through our own human reasoning, we're invariably left frustrated and confused. Even if God told us the future, even if we knew when and how a trial would arise, no amount of our own strength could sustain us. Only by God's grace can we overcome the trials He wants us to go through. When we turn away from worrying about the future, when we trust God and keep our attention on the task at hand, we live by faith and we allow God to work more powerfully in us.

As we live out our vocations, we should expect to encounter difficulties that would frighten most people. After all, we do not want to live like most people. As much as grace allows, we want to see our circumstances as God sees them. When we get discouraged and act out of fear of the future, we deny the truth: that God has a perfect plan for our lives. When we worry, we work against God and end up hurting ourselves and those around us. If we catch ourselves acting out of fear, we do not have to get discouraged. We just have to ask God for forgiveness and try again.

If we want to overcome our tendency to become afraid, we have to do what St. Faustina does: "converse with the hidden God." We need to make sure we have a closer relationship to the Lord above anyone else. We can do this by taking time apart from our busy lives every day to be alone with Him and talk to Him as we would talk to our very best friend, telling Him all our needs, desires, hopes, and fears. The more we love Him, the more we'll see the world through His eyes, and we won't fear anything.

My prayer: Jesus, help me to remain in conversation with you today in my heart throughout the day. Help me to see myself and my circumstances as You see them. Let me not fear the future, but look forward to it with the loving hope that You will help me overcome all difficulties, and lead me on the best path to loving You more perfectly.

View the previous Discovering the Diary.

DDBLUE

You might also like...

One sister said to me, “Get ready, Sister, to receive a small cross at the hands of Mother Superior. I feel sorry for you.” But as for me, I rejoiced at this in the depths of my soul.

Turn to any page of St. Faustina's Diary, and you'll find spiritual gems. 

Turn to any page of St. Faustina’s Diary and you’ll find spiritual gems. Like this one: