This is the work of God

This is the work of God, that you believe in the one he sent.

As a young priest from Pennsylvania, Father Walter Ciszek was eager to do God’s work as a missionary in the Soviet Union.  But things did not go the way he anticipated.  Soon after he entered Russia, he was falsely accused of being a spy and spent years in captivity, first in the infamous Lubyanka prison, and then in various Siberian labor camps.

One day, exhausted by the harst interrogations, Father Ciszek came to the end of himself, ” I lost all sense of hope.  I saw only my weakness.”  Desperate, he asked the Lord to help him.  As he prayed, he began to see that doing God’s work did not mean performing heroic deeds as he had once thought.  Pondering the example of Jesus in the garden of Gethsemane, he saw that the “work” of God was to cooperate with his grace every day, no matter what his situation.

Jesus says that the “work of God” is to believe in him, “the one” the Father sent.  Now, of course we believe in Jesus, so there must be more here.  And there is!  Think back on the difficult moments in your life – perhaps an illness or a financial setback.  Maybe you saw the need to exercise your faith in a new way.  That is where the “work” comes in.  When you face a challenge, it can take some effort to figure out how to cooperate with God’s grace in that situation.

In fact, the “work” of believing is not limited to times of crisis.  Every day God gives us numerous opportunities to apply our faith to whatever situations we find ourselves in.  Even mundane tasks can become gifts from God if we bring them to him and talk about them with him.  God loves these casual conversations!  He uses them to teach us, to encourage us, and to build up our faith.

That is what Father Ciszek learned.  He came to see God in each person he met and treated them accordingly.  He came to see each painful and grueling task before him as a way to say yes to God.  You can do the same!

-word among us