PEOPLE OF THE WAY
“Peace be with you.” – Jn. 20:19-31
In today’s Gospel, Thomas echoes the voice I hear when my faith challenges me. This Lenten season painted a cloud of sadness above me and walked me through a state of melancholy as I faced certain news of those who have been a part of my spiritual oxen team. Fear, doubt, and grief permeated my mind and heart. I discovered that when I look at myself in any particular situation or meeting place with others, I see two reference points - who I truly am before God and who I am operating at the moment.
Holding despair and helplessness in the ache of my heart, I felt my disconnectedness from God and the Church most deeply and sadly. My fallenness, it seems to me, has something to do with this loss of perspective. However, God’s love never ceased to be there for me as I held myself captive behind closed doors of my imprisonment where the fog of desolation descended upon me. God waited patiently for my walls to come down, slowly opened up the roads I thought were once impassable, and led me from the point of readiness to move on.
“Be there...it’s going to take time…” kept replaying in the silence of my prayers and charge of my tears. God gently ushered me into realizing how much He trusts me to remove my limiting barriers and exposing me to the pain and beauty for “people of the way.” I found myself in gratitude for the grace of remembering the fragments of my life leading me towards greater wholeness in Him. In recalling these moments and strengthening our net, I walk closer to His heartland where my faith is true, real, and sacred.
Lord, I want to see you more clearly, love you more dearly, and follow you more nearly, day by day.
Tam Lontok