Who is God for you? How does He manifest in your day-today experiences? - Daily Reflections December 2,2014

GOD OF HISTORY

 

It is always God who reveals Himself first. He is always the initiator and man responds to this “revelation.” God reveals Himself in two ways: through His creations and through His Words in Sacred Scripture. Ancient civilizations tend to worship mountains, volcanoes, the sun, the moon — simply because they can’t get over the wonder of these creations without their realization that Someone higher and magnificent had created all these things. Meanwhile, Sacred Scripture is the language of God in human form. In reading the Bible, God directly speaks to us in a way we could understand Him. Other than these two ways, are there any more means to know God through His revelation? Yes, there is — through experience.

       In today’s Gospel, Jesus says, “I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children. Yes, Father, for this is what you were pleased to do.”

      Some people do not believe in the first two ways by which God reveals Himself, but the third way — experience — is undeniably irrevocable. It is every person’s encounter with his own personal God — a God who moves and touches one’s life every single event. Indeed, God is the God of history, He is not outside history; He is in history. And to understand such a phrase requires true knowledge, a divine knowledge rooted in faith. As St. Thomas of Aquinas says, “The end of education is contemplation.” Contemplation is the realization of God, one’s sensitivity to His omnipresence — immanent and transcendent. Then it results to one’s fear of the Lord, which is the beginning of knowledge and the birth of wisdom.

       Finally, Jesus says, “Blessed are the eyes that see what you see! For I tell you that many prophets and kings desired to see what you see, but did not see it, and to hear what you hear, but did not hear it.” It takes the Spirit of knowledge, the fear of the Lord, and wisdom to see what the Apostles saw and experienced — the God of history. Fr. Joel Jason

 

REFLECTION QUESTIONS: Who is God for you? How does He manifest in your day-today experiences?

 

Lord, help me to feel Your presence always, whenever I am at work or at home, in good times and in bad times, and in my past, present and future.