Being Made into a New Creation for the Lord

 In the Collect of today's liturgy we address God as follows: "Almighty ever-living God, who through your Only Begotten Son, have made us a new creation for yourself, grant...that by your grace we may be found in the likeness of him, in whom our nature is united to you."  Note the phrase "made us a new creation for yourself."   I suggest that we rephrase that to read: "made me a new creation for God."  I ask God to do just that for you and for me.  Whenever you or I remodel our home, renew the upholstery of our furniture or even rearrange a room, we do so to make it more attractive, more useable, perhaps, more inviting or however you want to describe your renovations to what once was!  "Remake me" is strong language! What needs to be remade? my attitudes? my desires, my motivations, my priorities, my hopes and my dreams, my relationships or the way I relate to others, especially to those who think differently from me?

In the first reading, 1 John: 5: 14-21, St. John says to us:  "Beloved: We have this confidence in him that if we ask anything according to his will, he hears us."  It certainly is God's will that we "be found in the likeness of him in whom our nature is united."  And, above all, it certainly is God's will that we be "made...a new creation for God," if we have gone astray and are worshipping idols of any kind: idolatrizing protesters, arousers of violence,  those who insists that lies are truth and so on! God's will certainly is that we turn to Him, keep our focus on Him and withdraw from obsessions about what may be happening and about which we are powerless to change.  The only person we can change is ourselves. We are powerless to change another. So, it is one person at a time that needs changing and that person is you/ me. 

Whom am I worshipping? about whom am I obsessing?  Am I more focused on things and persons who are not God than I am focused on God? Jesus says: "I am the Way, the Truth and the Life!"  Am I following Jesus? Am I listening to  the small, whispering voice of the Spirit leading me from within or am I listening to the loud, intrusive voices outside of myself to the extent that I no longer know the voice of my Shepherd, Christ the Lord?  Do I avoid solitude? do I avoid withdrawing to a place of quiet so I can, in fact, hear God's voice directing me from within  to what is right and just for me, that is truly life-giving for me, and thus for those to whom I most matter?

May I have the courage to honestly answer some of the questions in this reflection.