God's Providence in Each Person's Life

In the collect of today's liturgy, we pray:  "O God, whose providence never fails in its design, keep from us, we humbly beseech you, all that might harm us and grant all that works for our good."  We might reword this as follows: "O God, whose providence never fails in its design, keep from (insert any one's name, especially someone with whom you might be having problems) we humbly beseech you, all that might harm (this person's name) and grant all that works for (this person's) good."  Note how praying for this other person in this way changes your heart, and mine!

Let us remind ourselves that God's providence "never fails in its design" for this other person or for ourselves.  God has a plan for the good of other persons and our own good. When we think of others in this way, especially persons with whom we are having some kind of difficulty, our attitude changes from thinking ill of them, perhaps, to seeing them from God's perspective.  Also, when the problem I am having is that I want to help where I am unable to help, God reminds me that He is that person's Savior, not me. And that whatever is happening in this other person's life that I am finding problematic is of God's design and will bring about some good for this person to which I am not privy!  In other words, God is God and I am only one of His created beings just like the person with whom I am troubled!

Insatiable Preying: Why not change to Loving Insatiably

In today’s first reading, Job 19: 21-27, Job says to his friends, his harassers: “Pity me, pity me, O you my friends, for the hand of God has struck me! Why do you hound me as though you were divine, and insatiably prey upon me?”

Those, I believe, could be the words of family members, children, adolescents, young adults, the elderly  who are repeatedly abused verbally, emotionally, psychologically; those who can do nothing right to please an angry boss, an angry spouse, an angry parent, any angry friend, an angry coworker, an angry employer/employee.   Those words could be put on the lips of victims of human trafficking, slave labor, drug trafficking, angry jailers or guards of prisoners and so on.   Victims could be saying: “Why do you hound me as though you were divine, and insatiably prey upon me?”

My heart aches when I think of those scenarios.  However, the Word of God also pierces my heart to the core; God’s Word is also about me and it is to me that I need to apply Job’s challenge.  Yes,  I need to ask myself whether I play God, “hound…[another] as though…[I] were divine, and insatiably prey upon…[others]? Do I spend a horribly large amount of time complaining about others, about the president, the vice president, congress men and women, the Church, whoever and whatever, instead of focusing on doing good in the small part of the world in which I physically live—my family, my religious community, my workplace, my civic community—making the world in which I live a better place. Or am I too busy being the world’s critic? If so, then, I do not have to change, since I believe everyone else is bad, disgusting, and doing things poorly.

Is it time for me to begin living my life for the better, for the good of those around me, bringing them the gift of the Spirit’s  power within me to love, to forgive, to radiate the power of God at work in me  instead of trying to change others?