2/17/2021
 |
| Teniers, "Triumph of the Eucharist" |
Ash Wednesday
The penitential disposition is primarily interior. What’s up with this secrecy, this invisibility, this disappearing, unassuming humility?
“I am among you as one who serves.” Yes, it establishes man, firmly, in his place. “It” is this glorious invisibility—the riches of God. We allow the created realities to outshine the beauty of God by yielding to the world, the flesh, the devil. But the richness of God prevails. It disappears behind the veil of the natural, for the sake of nature. God serves man in order and righteousness so that man may attain his highest heights.
Without God’s promoting him, man languishes—is lost. God, holding him up, holds him all the way up—to the top. Man either languishes without God or rejoices with him there is no middle.
The mode God prefers for thus exalting man is to reclaim the resplendence of the secret, interior, hidden depth—where no moth nor worm can destroy—but where only God can dwell with man. The man would walk with God during the breezy time of day.
Reclaim God’s order for man’s affections. Look forward to that walk with him, in peace. Be not distracted by the things of this world—by anything other than the hope for His glorious company.
