“A peaceful spirit with oneself and others is one of the greatest gifts of God. Follow that spirit and all His inspirations: He will work wonders in your neighbor and yourself. When one has learned how to remain in peace in one’s soul, God holds His divine school in the soul where He teaches everything without noise of words to attentive, peaceful and docile souls in such a way that directors have nothing to say but: Listen to the voice of God’s Spirit, or better still – follow faithfully the interior impulse of His grace.”
Father Jean-Pierre de Cassade, S.J.
We are all searching and longing for peace . . .. peace in our hearts, within our families, in our lives and the world. But often, peace seems elusive or unattainable. When experienced, it seems to slip through our hands like grains of sand and fade like dust blown into the wind. Peace just doesn’t seem to be something we can readily hold onto!
Yet, on the night before He died, Jesus promised us peace. “Peace I leave with you; My peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you” (Jn 14: 27). If peace is something promised to us by Christ, why is it that we fail to experience it?
Just prior to Jesus’ promise of peace, He declared that the Father would send us the Holy Spirit, who would teach us everything and guide us to all truths! Christ knew how necessary the Holy Spirit would be in our lives. He realized that without Him, our peace would be like a gift unopened!
Most of us fail to maintain peace in our lives because we either forget to call upon the Holy Spirit, or when He speaks, we do not follow His advice. Being attentive to His voice and then following His promptings would save us endless frustration and suffering. We would maintain our peace and pass it on to others. We would be star students in the school of the Holy Spirit, while reaping the benefit of Christ’s promise to us.
Think about all those times in your life, when you heard that “still small voice” and cooperated. There are so many times, and some life changing – for you or the person involved.
I remember years ago when a dear friend, who was very ill, kept coming to mind. I just could not shake the thought of her. As it turned out, she was in the hospital, scheduled for surgery the following day. I stopped what I was doing, and spent time with her. She asked me to get a priest to administer the Sacrament of the Sick. I did. She did not survive the surgery! I thank God often for His inspiration, as well as my obedience to His promptings.
Often, it is in simple matters that the Holy Spirit speaks to us. You are having a conversation and you’re about to say something. Something nudges you to hold back and refrain speaking those particular words. Sometimes you listen, and your delighted that you did. While other times you don’t, and wish you had. A relationship has been wounded and your peace is gone, along with your friend’s peace! Now it’s time to pray and ask the Holy Spirit for a ton of humility, along with the right words, to apologize and rebuild the bridge to peace!
The Holy Spirit is always busy in our lives, directing and guiding us in so many ways: we get the thought – don’t go that way and later find out there was a tragic accident we may have been involved in; Leave now, not later while going on some errands, only to run into a person who needed a listening ear; It’s so and so’s birthday, or give this person a call, and when doing so, find out they felt alone and forgotten. You were there answer to prayer!
When we become attentive to the promptings of the Holy Spirit, we will be amazed at how often He intervenes in our lives. We will begin to pray more vigorously, to be open to accepting the graces, to respond and be docile to His direction. We will then taste the peace that Christ promised – the peace the world cannot give to us!
We need to wake up to the gift of the Holy Spirit in our lives and not “substitute our own action for that of the Divine Worker, who labors ceaselessly in us at the work of our perfection. How much more progress (and peace), would we make (and feel), if we made it our principal study not to get in the way of His action, to abandon ourselves to Him and wait (Father de Caussade).
No truer words spoken Avia Joy! Just today I was going to leave Mass and say my rosary in the car while I ran several errands. I know it was the Holy Spirit that made me stay and ask a friend if she was all right and if she wanted to pray a rosary. She told me no, she wasn't all right, that she was just diagnosed with a brain tumor! She asked if I would pray the rosary with her because she didn't have the strength to pray one aloud! Thank you God for the grace to listen to your Holy Spirit and words of counsel.
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