Eugene continually insisted on his conviction that the missionaries had to be the instruments through which the Saviour spoke.
I don’t need to tell you with what pleasure I read your report and re-read it to others. One can say that your experiment was a master’s stroke, so greatly has the good Lord blessed your efforts. It will always be like that when you place all your trust in Him.
The conversion of souls is his work alone and it can only be obtained by the grace of Jesus Christ, and that grace is given only to the humble, to those who are forgetful of themselves and give back all the glory to God.
Here lies the difference between the fruitfulness of the poor missionary’s sermons compared with the barren results of most Lenten preachers. Let us look always to what is useful, let us seek nothing but God’s glory and the salvation of souls, let us count ourselves fortunate to have been chosen to be the instruments of God’s mercy, and the Lord will work all things to our great consolation.
Letter to Marc L’Hermite, 10 January 1852, O.W. XI, n. 1096.
It is so very awesome how God speaks to us, the people and tools used to feed and guide us, to help us to refocus and and to give a path of sorts for us to step into. Right now I seem to be in that liminal space we are all called to walk in and through, and sometimes it just happens to be more pronounced than usual. And although there is that part of me that recognizes I am exactly where God would have me be, it is not a comfortable place to be in for sure. It seems to be a time of walking in nothing but utter and total faith. We listen to that part of us that holds the voice of God and which calls us to move forward, often when we are at our most vulnerable, our most unsure, when we seem to be more in darkness than light, and when we feel at our weakest. And even as I write this I know that it here that I will be able to receive the strength that God always gives.
Today I thank God for Eugene and for the love he sends to us through this work that Frank does. I have spent the last couple of weeks listening and learning more of the work God carrries out through and with our Oblates and indeed all members of this family. I find in it truth and humility (for those two go together). And I count myself as blessed to be a part of it all, not for any great works that I do, but to be a witness to all that others are doing. And for some reason there is great joy in being able to see that. As Eugene says; “The conversion of souls is his work alone and it can only be obtained by the grace of Jesus Christ, and that grace is given only to the humble, to those who are forgetful of themselves and give back all the glory to God.” Surely this is what I need to be constantly reminding myself of, for I seem to get in the way of myself so often.
“….let us seek nothing but God’s glory and the salvation of souls, let us count ourselves fortunate to have been chosen to be the instruments of God’s mercy, and the Lord will work all things to our great consolation.” There we have it – and the Lord will work all things to our great consolation. Isn’t it awesome how his words are still relevant today, 200 years later – well they are to me. I give thanks.