Appreciating God’s Grace
WHY do you look for rest when you were born to work? Resign yourself to patience rather than
to comfort, to carrying your cross rather than to enjoyment.
What man in the world, if he could always have them, would not readily accept consolation
and spiritual joy, benefits which excel all earthly delights and pleasures of the body? The latter,
indeed, are either vain or base, while spiritual joys, born of virtue and infused by God into pure
minds, are alone truly pleasant and noble.
Now, since the moment of temptation is always nigh, since false freedom of mind and
overconfidence in self are serious obstacles to these visitations from heaven, a man can never enjoy
them just as he wishes.
God does well in giving the grace of consolation, but man does evil in not returning everything
gratefully to God. Thus, the gifts of grace cannot flow in us when we are ungrateful to the Giver,
when we do not return them to the Fountainhead. Grace is always given to him who is duly grateful,
and what is wont to be given the humble will be taken away from the proud.
I do not desire consolation that robs me of contrition, nor do I care for contemplation that leads
to pride, for not all that is high is holy, nor is all that is sweet good, nor every desire pure, nor all
that is dear to us pleasing to God. I accept willingly the grace whereby I become more humble and
contrite, more willing to renounce self.
The man who has been taught by the gift of grace, and who learns by the lash of its withdrawal,
will never dare to attribute any good to himself, but will rather admit his poverty and emptiness.
Give to God what is God’s and ascribe to yourself what is yours. Give Him thanks, then, for His
grace, but place upon yourself alone the blame and the punishment your fault deserves.
Always take the lowest place and the highest will be given you, for the highest cannot exist
apart from the lowest. The saints who are greatest before God are those who consider themselves
the least, and the more humble they are within themselves, so much the more glorious they are.
Since they do not desire vainglory, they are full of truth and heavenly glory. Being established and
strengthened in God, they can by no means be proud. They attribute to God whatever good they
have received; they seek no glory from one another but only that which comes from God alone.
They desire above all things that He be praised in themselves and in all His saints—this is their
constant purpose.
Be grateful, therefore, for the least gift and you will be worthy to receive a greater. Consider
the least gift as the greatest, the most contemptible as something special. And, if you but look to
the dignity of the Giver, no gift will appear too small or worthless. Even though He give punishments
and scourges, accept them, because He acts for our welfare in whatever He allows to befall us.
He who desires to keep the grace of God ought to be grateful when it is given and patient when
it is withdrawn. Let him pray that it return; let him be cautious and humble lest he lose it.