July 11, 2005  

"I Thirst!"

A beautiful grace that will start to come here (Illuminative Way of Proficients), more than the other stages up to this point, is that we will begin to have a deep desire now for the salvation of souls.  We're getting interior lights from God, and now we want God to begin to receive the glory.  Psalm 63 is a beautiful psalm to pray that's about the thirst for God that begins to develop.  "My soul is thirsting for God.  I thirst for Him in the tabernacle.  I long to see His face."  Even though you have been fed, you will still be hungry.  Even though you are drinking, you will still thirst for more.  God makes sure in this life we are not totally, fully satisfied because He keeps telling us that it is a journey and there is always more.

Our focus is starting to change somewhat to God's interests and God's work.  We might even begin to think of reaching out to others in apostolic work, getting involved in other things, maybe even becoming Companions of the Lamb or Intercessors, or getting involved in some beautiful Church work.  We want to reach out to others because we are being filled without any effort on our own.  We have more energy now. 

We begin to live the First Commandment of loving the Lord our God with our whole heart and our whole soul, but at this stage we do not yet love God with our whole strength and our whole mind.  That happens only after the next level of purification, which we'll be talking about later.  But right now, we can love the Lord our God with all of our heart and all of our soul and that's what we want to do.  We start to reach out.  The new commandment becomes so real to us now and our heart is on fire and we just love.  We're free because of love.

Some virtues start to come forth in a more dominant way.  These virtues keep coming at deeper and deeper levels because we're growing in a deeper way.  Jesus is always saying, "Learn of me" so we'll see His humility as it went into His life.  Paul said, "Have the same attitude of Christ.  Put on the mind of Jesus Christ" (Phil 2:5-8).  Paul said, "He lowered Himself.  He became one of us."  It is that servant mentality.  We know that as pride starts getting removed, and it does because we are now getting more infused knowledge, we're getting infused gifts here.  That pride will start to go.  We want to have the mind of Jesus and this is going to start to happen more and more.  There are other virtues that also start to come forth and you'll begin to experience and see them.  These are the deeper graces of Baptism, deeper dimensions of Faith, Hope, and Love. 
 
Faith will come forth with a deeper understanding.  This is enlightenment.  "Oh, now I see!"  Faith helps us to see.  Again, I go back to the risen Jesus on the road to Emmaus when He opened their minds.  Remember there was also that beautiful time when Scripture tells us, "They recognized Him in the breaking of the bread."  In fact, some translations say, "They knew Him in the breaking of the bread."  The word "know" always means experience.  What a gift they got!  They experienced Him in the breaking of the bread.  Why?  Not just because it is a reenactment of what had happened at the Last Supper.  I used to think that was why they recognized Him.  "Oh, there He is doing the same thing He did before Calvary."  That is what I used to think until I got enlightened myself one day.  They knew Him.  That is Faith.  Jesus gave them, then, this tremendous gift of faith to see, to understand.  He enlightened them and they knew Him.  They experienced Him.  This is one of the beautiful graces that comes forth in this enlightenment time.

We come into that beautiful zeal for the salvation of souls for God's greater honor and glory because we are getting enlightened that His tremendous heart beats constantly for souls.  We are getting enlightened to what really happened on Calvary and the cost of souls.  We are getting all kinds of lights.  We are changing.  God is changing us with His love and with His light. This is where the gift of discernment of spirits really starts to get active because we have the light now to see the "angel of light."  His light will look so dim now compared to the light that we have of God.  Jesus says at Mass every day, "This is My body given for you."  We have a light to understand that now, and we can respond also, "Lord, this is my body given, now, for You as well." 

It is a beautiful journey to constantly experience New Life.  I tell you this because He so wants His joy to be in you, in all of us.  He wants our joy to be complete.  He wants us to live this New Life, which He came to give "in abundance."  He has enough for everybody.  So let us continue our journey together up the mountain, the mountain of love, the mountain of life, and receive the fullness of His joy!

Excerpt from Mother Nadine's "New Life," NE, 2004.