Through some personal struggles that happen to have coincided with Lent this year, I've come to understand at a deeper level something I think I have known for a long time: God doesn't have a plan for me. At least God doesn't have a plan for me in the sense of some clear path that God has designed for me and it's somehow up to me through prayer and faith and struggle to figure out what it is and then act in accordance with it.
Through the Lenten gift of repentance and some of what I have had to face in myself these last weeks, it's clear to me that God has far too much respect for me, for all of us, than to have some absolute plan that we are all meant to follow. God gives us our dignity and therefore God must take a certain pride in letting us make a plan for our lives. God must delight in the creativity and shrewdness of the choices we make, the plan we design for ourselves, and, I'm sure, there are times God wishes we had made other decisions for our lives. We are, in a way, out there all on our own making it from scratch.
Except, that is, for Easter. Except for Christ's victory over death and sin through his resurrection. That's the only plan God has for us as individuals or as the community of humankind. Because of Christ's triumph, according to God's plan, any choice and everyone is redeemed in him. No choice is final or unredeemable. This is the great hope the church holds out to the world.
I take great comfort in this Easter message because it gives me a confidence in my personal future and, indeed, the future of this whole world. This Easter, be open to this great choice God has made for you in the resurrection of our Savior. Happy Easter!
The Rt. Rev. M. Thomas Shaw, SSJE
Bishop
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