Snailbites

Here is the Session 4 video from CFCY Conference. This video is so meanigful, because it is the story of our lives. From member to leader, from hopeless to hopeful. But did you get the concept?

Ton, in the beginning, was going to kill himself. Cut to John, a frustrated leader who begins to lose hope in his service. No one reads his fliers, so what’s the point. But one day, a random person, Ditto, sees the flier and decides to check out a meeting. He meets people, becomes active, and soon becomes a leader. Now he is the one leading the meeting. At the meeting, he inspires a girl, Ton’s sister Lani, to write a letter. That letter reaches Ton, and he reads it, and regains hope. Soon after, John posts another flier, and lo and behold, Ton sees it. And the cycle continues…

The idea behind the video was that everything we do matters. Everything we say matters. Every little act changes the world. We lose hope because we only see the small things, like putting up fliers. But when you put on the God glasses, you will see that one letter affects one, who affects another, who affects a community, who affects a neighborhood, who changes the world. Everything counts.

Wanna pray with me?

Dear Lord, you have used us and this community of CFC Youth for your greater glory. We know that you have a great purpose for us and for our lives. We know that the service we do is changing the world. We know that you have annointed us to take on this incredible job.

It is because of this knowledge, Lord, that we cry out to you to restore the brokenness in our community. Please forgive us for our transgressions, and instead look with favor upon your people. We are still here to serve you and to build your kingdom. And we ask that you allow your Spirit to move through us and lead us, and may nothing get in the way of your work.

We ask this in Jesus name. Amen.

I remember talking to Fr. Michael, my parish priest, about Hope. This was all before Conference, when I sought to learn as much as I possibly could about Divine Hope and about Lamentations. I remember something he told me very well — that, it is not until you experience Hopelessness, that you can fully understand what it means to Hope.

I remembered our conversation, and this line, and had a brief moment of clarity. I looked back on my life, and all of the hopeless situations in my life. I remembered feeling absolutely hopeless in college, questioning if I’d wasted 4 years of my life studying things I didn’t understand. I remembered feeling hopeless before my parents joined CFC. I remembered feeling hopeless when I got emails about the change in CFC leadership.

I remembered these things and the disparity I felt. And the pain of confusion that comes with not being in communion with God. I remembered the questions that had no answers — the finite human mind trying to finite-ly frame the infinite perfect plan of the Lord.

I remembered all these things and breathed a sigh of relief and of peace. Because in every desperate moment in my life, I have cried out to the Lord, and He has heard my pleas. It is in these incredibly hopeless moments that the Lord was closest to me.

There is no prayer that He has not heard and answered. I can’t explain that. Our own human intellect is always prone to justifying things against the workings of the Lord.

Our Holy Father, Pope Benedict, noted that the human mind will always seek to rationalize the unexplicable plan of God. It will always come up with a million and one reasons to believe whatever it can mentally grasp. But that is where Faith comes in. We believe in things unseen, no matter how irrational they are to the human mind. Scripture tells us that we are “citizens of Heaven”, and we should see above what the World tells us and trust fully in God’s plan.

I’ve been a Full Time Worker for this community for 3 years and I know that while I seek answers just as everyone else, what our community really needs right now is to simply love. We need to love each other, love our families, our leaders, our households, even our enemies… We need to come before each other in humility and honesty, and pray as One Body. We need to spread love and make it contageous. For Scripture tells us that if we do not have Love, then we are simply a noisy gong.

May I continue to lament for mine and my community’s broken covenant. There is no prayer that is unheard. And even in the present time, as we dwell in our own humanness, God is still concerned with us, with me, with you. And he continues to be absolutely fascinated with us. We have no choice but to Love.

Love is the answer.