“When I consider Your greatness and beauty, O my God, I rejoice exceedingly that the Lord I serve is so great. With love and joy I carry out His will, and the more I come to know Him, the more I desire to love Him. I burn with the desire to love Him ever more and more.”. Divine Mercy in my soul # 525
Building upon the freedom Divine Mercy offers the new soul, the souls needs to strive to keep itself in a state of Grace. How does one do this when there are so many temptations and challenges that seem against the soul’s sanctity?
Getting to know God better and drawing closer to Him are key to understanding His Love and Mercy. The more one understands Who God is in truth, the more the soul will not fall into temptation or sin. When a gentleman is dating a woman he really likes he spends a lot of time and effort to learn as much as he can about her. He strives to spend more time with her and doesn’t stop thinking about her when they’re apart. The more he learns about her and is around her, the more he wants to be with her. Someday that relationship would move to marriage when they become ‘one flesh’.
This is the same way we should be with God. Studying His Holy Words and teachings in the Gospels and throughout the Bible are necessary to understand how God thinks and what He wants from you and for you. Spending time with His ‘friends’, aka the Saints, can give you great insight to His thoughts and desires. These ‘friends’ are close to God and have known Him a long time, so why not seek their guidance to know Him better? For me, St. Faustina and St. Therese of Liseux have both given me tremendous tips on Who God is. St. Faustina’s diary has opened the heart of God to me more than almost anything else.
I think of St. Faustina’s words in paragraph 525 as a wedding ring. This thought came clear to me in the Sacrament of Reconciliation several years ago. I confessed that I wasn’t living the 1st Commandment; how could I love God with all my heart, soul, mind, body and strength when He tells me to love my wife as I love myself, or even more because I should die for her sanctity? Jesus spoke to me through the priest, He told me, “look at the ring on your hand. This is a symbol of your love and commitment to your wife. But, it also ties my love as well. The ring is unbroken, without beginning or end. It is a circle of love. The more You love Me, the more your capacity to love your wife will increase. The more then that your heart grows and you draw deeper into your love for her, the more you will return love to Me. The more love you return to Me, the more you will see the infinite capacity of My Divine Love and then grow in love for me. As you see My love more clearly, you will pour that love through your heart and soul to your wife. This circle will always continue and always grow.’
The more we get to know Who God is, the more we will see His love for us. As He opens our eyes to His Love for us, we will understand the strength of His Love and Mercy. This will armor us in trust. As we see the small piece of what we can understand of the love of the Father for each soul, the more we will understand that He will never abandon us and will always pour His Love and Divine Mercy upon us.
As we grow in understanding of God, we will grow to trust Him and in turn, we will more easily resist temptations and sin. In time, some of those temptations or sins may vanish in a sense, simply because we are strong enough in Christ that they don’t even get near us to tempt.
“Love the LORD your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your strength.” Deuteronomy 6:5
PS, not a bad idea either to set a reminder to repeat Deuteronomy 6:5 during the day. Let it become your mantra ‘Lord, I will always strive to with all my heart and with all my soul and with all my strength. Help me to love you more”