May God Enlighten Your Innermost Vision
by Fr. David M. Knight
Saturday, October 19, 2024
Twenty-Eighth Week of the Year
Memorial of Saints John de Brébeuf and Isaac Jogues, Priests, and Companions, Martyrs
Lectionary 472
Eph 1:15-23/Lk 12:8-12
Ephesians 1:15-23: Paul tells us that seeing with faith strengthens the hope that sustains love. He asks God to give us “a spirit of wisdom and revelation to know him clearly.” Hallowed be thy Name! Everything we think, desire and do as Christians depends on our knowledge of God. This is a loving knowledge that comes from wisdom (the gift of “taste” or desire for spiritual things). If religious instruction does not excite love, it may do more harm than good.
And it is a knowledge from “revelation” (the same Greek word as “apocalypse,” the old name for the Book of Revelation). It is an insight into the character, mind and heart of God that comes both from God’s revealed word and from the inner light of the Holy Spirit. Any “study” of Scripture or doctrine that is not at the same time prayer is like reading the words of a song without hearing the music.
Paul prays: “May God enlighten your innermost vision so that you may know the great hope to which he has called you.” We need to appreciate “the wealth of the glory” of the “inheritance” we will enter into. He wants us to know God, not just in himself, but as the truth, goodness, beauty, joy we will possess in heaven. It is one thing to know what God is; another thing to know what he will be for us, as given to us, forever.
Realistically, our hope depends on knowing “the immeasurable scope of his power in us who believe.” We begin, act and persevere in grace (the life of God) only by God’s power, which “is like the strength he showed in raising Christ from the dead and seating him at his right hand in heaven.” God showed his power to triumph over sin and death. In doubt, we need to remember this.
He has put all things under Christ’s feet and made him head of the Church, which is his body: the fullness of him who fills the universe in all its parts.
That is an image to ponder. It is the victory promised to us who strive to be faithful stewards of his kingship.
Luke 12:8-12: Our efforts to establish God’s reign can lead to persecution and momentary defeat. Not all accept Christ. If they reject him just as “Son of Man” speaking through his human instruments in ways at times more human than divine, or discredited by the human failings of his body, that is not fatal. They have not yet encountered Jesus as he is. They can still be converted.
But if the Holy Spirit is speaking to their hearts, and they reject Jesus precisely as the all Holy and Good—Jesus himself, not Jesus unrecognizable in his members—that is blasphemy. It can “never be forgiven,” because there is nothing better to arouse faith or motivate repentance. But we can never judge that this has taken place.
Initiative: Attach new importance to “knowing God.” As given and promised.
Reflections brought to you by the Immersed in Christ Ministry
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