Reflection for 10/27/17

I once had a friend who was very clumsy.  Yes, a “friend,” not me.  No matter how hard he tried, he just couldn’t help but make a mess of things.  He would try to be careful around expensive things, but he would usually end up knocking something to the ground.  He would take things apart because he was very inquisitive, but he could never seem to put things back together.  It just wasn’t in his nature to be smooth and suave and debonaire.

 

In many ways, we are sinners, and no matter how hard we try to be otherwise, we are still sinners.  We may want to be virtuous and holy, but at the end of the day, we continue to do the same things over and over again.  It’s as if we can’t escape from the hold that that particular sin or vice has on us.  St. Paul tells us, “The willing is ready at hand, but doing the good is not.  For I do not do the good I want,  but I do the evil I do not want.”  Even St. Paul struggled with his own vices and temptations.

 

Sin takes a hold of the heart that is given over to sin, and without the grace of God and a strong will—a VERY strong will—sin can be nearly impossible to overcome.  Oftentimes we think, “I can’t do this.  I can’t be holy.”  And the reality is, “YOU can’t.  But GOD can.”  If we rely on ourselves to overcome sin, then we never will have victory because it is not in our nature to overcome sin.  Rather, if we rely on God for the strength we need, then we can do anything.  

 

But we have to give God something to work with, and that is where a strong will to overcome sin comes in.  It is a basic principle of theology that “grace builds on nature.”  If we are not trying to develop the natural virtues, if we are not making practical changes in our lives to overcome sins, then how do we expect God to help us?  God’s grace does not work like magic.  We have to put safeguards in place to help us in the battle against sins.  Indeed, “Why do you not judge for yourselves what is right?”  We must give ourselves credit, we know what we need to do in certain circumstances, we just need the strength of will to actually do it.  Lord, grant us the grace we need to overcome evil in our lives.