Thursday of Week 1 in Ordinary Time (Year I)
Hebrews 3:7-14 | Psalm 94(95):6-11 | Mark 1:40-45
Every day, as long as this ‘today’ lasts, keep encouraging one another so that none of you is hardened by the lure of sin, because we shall remain co-heirs with Christ only if we keep a grasp on our first confidence right to the end. (Hebrews 3:13-14)
In yet another fact-stranger-than-fiction moment, the word “confidence” triggered a memory of a long-lost commercial jingle for Rexona antiperspirant from my childhood days, which featured that word prominently. My brain naturally wrote a parody:
Confidence, every day, that special feeling faith in God will give you
Confidence, all day long, Jesus is beside you day and night too(spoken) Trust in God to illuminate the right path
Leading you with confidence from death to new lifeIf you want life, God is with us
Or you want comfort, Christ saved us
Confidence, new life, the Spirit just won’t let you down!
Yeah, it looks really weird in writing, but it sounded a lot better in my head. I guess “jingle writer” won’t be added to my CV any time soon.
✞ ✞ ✞ ✞ ✞
It just occurred to me that our baptism day is like New Year’s Day. In both cases, we’re all fired up with enthusiasm, and make all sorts of resolutions to improve our spiritual/physical fitness.
Then Real Life rudely butts in with its distractions and temptations. One by one, each resolution to remain faithful to God/our exercise plan falls by the wayside. “Whatever happened,” we wonder as we reflect at year’s end, “to that ‘first confidence’, that fire we had at the beginning?”
I think we all know the answer to that question: That was a firework, the kind that flares in celebration like a supernova, then disappears quickly into the darkness of humdrum life. What we need to be at the outset is a candle, which gives off less light but burns steadily.
When it comes to physical fitness, that means eschewing fancy high-intensity exercises that make us feel real good one day and real pain the next, in favour of a slow ramp-up from daily walks to daily jogs to daily runs, building confidence that we can sustain this effort over the long term.
In the spiritual realm, it means “showing up” every day, consciously reminding ourselves to pray a daily rosary, or to contemplate daily scripture and (in my case) pen our own thoughts about it.
And in both situations, it helps to have a “coach” or “buddy” along for the ride, someone to keep our spirits up and our legs pumping, physical or otherwise. This blog is my own effort to run the spiritual race alongside you, dear readers, the one that St. Paul meant when he wrote to Timothy:
I have fought the good fight to the end;
I have run the race to the finish;
I have kept the faith (2 Timothy 4:7)
As a good antiperspirant gives us confidence in the sweltering heat of the moment, so may our collective faith give us confidence to stand fast against the pressures of secular life.
Lord, let each day that passes be another day that we draw ever closer to You. Help us find the strength to fight the good fight of faith, and support each other in remaining steadfast against the Evil One, so that in the fullness of time, we will all be reunited with You and the Father, singing one united song of praise and glory. Amen.