Homily

So today Jesus enters into Jerusalem knowing that He is heading straight towards His passion and death. It is there, on that Thursday night in the garden of Gethsemane, at the rock which some of you saw pictures of here at church on Friday—it was there that He prayed in agony. St. Luke tells us He said “Father, if you are willing, take this cup away from me; still, not my will but Your will be done.” Jesus bows to the will of His Heavenly Father. In John’s Gospel He also makes it very clear about following His Father’s will when He says, “I came down from heaven not to do my own will but the will of the one who sent me.” He places Himself under the will of His Father. Today as we celebrate the Annunciation we see one who, as the perfect disciple she will become, answering the message of the angel with complete obedience. “Let it be done to me according to your word.” She only desires to follow the will of God at this moment, and she will continue to do so for the rest of her life.

Bishop Benedict speaks often about following the will of God and how important it is to seek out His will and then obey it. The Father only desires what is best for us. He did not create us out of any motivation except for His overflowing love. So it should be no surprise for us that to follow His will for us will bring us into the best possible life we can live. This was true for the Mother of God. This was true for all the apostles, this was true for all the saints down through the ages. In this we only follow the example of Jesus, Who, though equally divine with the Father, He still sought to do the Father’s will. Now does following the Father’s will for us lead us into a life that is always free from hardship and pain? Absolutely not, as the garden of Gethsemane and the rock of Calvary teach us. But these hardships and suffering in following the Father’s will lead to the glory of the resurrection for Jesus, and the same for us, in the end. To place our own wills under obedience to the Father’s will for us is an act of faith, love and hope in God. It is not so easy to do, because in our weaker faith, in out less active love, and in our misplaced hopes, we seek to protect ourselves by following our own ideas of what is best for us. We struggle even to seek the Father’s will, much less to follow it. Adam and Eve suffered from the same self-centeredness even though God had made His will plainly known to them. In their desire to be free from God’s will, they also distanced themselves from their Creator and the results were disastrous. That pattern continues on throughout history in the life of every person. “Who shall I follow? Myself or my God?”

Jesus teaches us in the prayer He gave us to say, “Our Father Who art in heaven, hallowed be thy name. Thy kingdom come, thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven.” But, in fact, I suspect we probably do not seek our God’s will for us very often. We go our way, in the belief we’re doing well most of the time. But if we do not live out God’s desire for our lives, how much good we are missing. If we do not ask the Lord to show us His plan for our lives, we end up following our own plans. Do we think our plans are better than God’s?

How do we follow God’s will for us? In many ways we know what we should do, even if we don’t always do it. We should keep the commandments, strive to love God and our neighbor. Love and honor our spouses, obey our parents, raise our children in health and faith. Many things are a given. But other things are very particular to the lives of each one of us. How can I be a better Christian? Should I take this job? How can I do better as a mother or father? Should I be worried about this thing or that thing, and how should I decide what to do with this problem in front of me? What is it, Lord, that you want me to do?

I suspect we don’t ask the Lord to show us His will for us very often, because we fool ourselves into thinking we have it all covered and there’s nothing more or better that God can tell us. Right? Maybe Jesus prayed to follow His Father’s will but we don’t feel that same need. That cannot be good, of course it can’t.

So imitating our Savior as we walk through this week, in our daily prayer let us beg the Lord to show us His will for us, and to give us the wisdom to see it and the strength to obey it. It is not an easy thing to always know what He wishes us to do, and it’s only by the power of the Holy Spirit that we can discover where He wants us to go and how we should get there. There are no Facebook messages or Snapchat texts that will lay it out so clearly that we absolutely know what the Lord is saying to us all the time, BUT if we ask Him to show us His will, He will not fail to do so, even if sometimes it takes us longer to see it. The road we are on TODAY may not be bad, but surely we want to travel the road that is best for us, and also for our family and friends. We need to ask Him to show us His will and help us to follow it, all the time, every day. Our lives are too short to spend them out in any other way and we have already wasted many opportunities because we have neglected to seek God’s counsel. Let’s not continue to do the same. Especially this week, let us ask for the Lord to show us His will and plan for us every day. Let us ask Him on Monday, and then again on Tuesday, and on Wednesday let us say we will do as He shows us. On Thursday at the Mystical Supper and at the Rock of Agony with the Lord in Gethsemane let us pray as He did that we will follow the will of our heavenly Father. And on Friday at the trial and crucifixion may the cross give us strength to follow, and at the tomb of Jesus before His lifeless body may we commit ourselves to God’s will in faith. In the quiet of Saturday may our hearts be open to what He is asking us to do. On the day of Resurrection may we experience the joy of all those who put their trust in the Lord. May we claim that joy as did Mary when she obeyed and declared after her assent to God’s plan, “My soul proclaims the greatness of the Lord, and my spirit rejoices in God my Savior.”