Time seems to move at a much faster rate these days than in my youth.

Time seems to move at a much faster rate these days than in my youth.  I can remember as a young man wishing the school year would go by faster so that we could get to summer.   Or ticking off the days till Christmas, vacation, or some other event that I just couldn’t wait for.  Now here I am almost a dozen years after moving to Illinois wondering where the time has gone.  Between driving the kids around, working on a summer project, praying the Liturgy of the Hours, exercising, attempting to clean the house, and doing what little ministry I can; I find the day is already spent before I even realize it.   What used to seem an eternity now tends to go by as if someone has attached the second hand of time to the ceiling fan and placed it on high.

I often wonder what that will be like in eternity?  When we step beyond the veil of time and space itself into a place with no time.   What will a second be however to the infinite majesty of God’s existence?  What is this little while he speaks of?  Did the disciples even realize how profound that question was in light of who Jesus is?  The incarnate Word of God that had existed before time began?   How amazingly different life must have seemed to God experiencing it from the confines of time and limits of the human intellect and will.  Would we make the same choice to not only descend to the confines of what must have seemed a most confining prison, not for the sake of ourselves, but for the other?

I understand more fully these days what Christ meant when he indicated we would suffer grief, weeping and mourning but would again see joy.   He has sent His Spirit to us that we might taste the bliss of eternity through the Sacraments and the Church in the here and now.   Those little glimpses where we are so overwhelmed with God’s presence that our senses are knocked for a loop.  Sometimes in my prayer, I find myself losing the words and only being present.  Those are the moments that keep me going.   I know they are a consolation, something that I shouldn’t need… and I have realized I don’t need them.   I want them.  I want that intimacy with God that brings life in such abundance that the joy overflows from my cup into those around me.  For three weeks now I’ve been fasting.  One meal a day.  One hour a day I spend eating, to remind my body it doesn’t need food as much as it needs God.   I’ve been avoiding things that waste my time and trying to do those things which draw me closer to God and to my family.  Will I go back to Facebook full time?  Instagram?  Twitter?  Snapchat?  I don’t know.  What I do know is there isn’t enough time in the day as it is and I want to spend as much time now preparing for eternity as I can.

His servant and yours,
Brian Mullins

"Let the words of my mouth and the meditation of my heart be acceptable in thy sight, O Lord, my rock, and my redeemer. - Psalm 19:14

A reflection on the readings for Thursday of the Sixth Week of Easter: May 25th, 2017

Acts 18:1-8
Psalm 98
John 16:16-20