[Faith-talk] Daily Thought for Saturday, April 26, 2014

[Paul]

Hello and good day to you all, whether today is April 26 or, for you in Australia and New Zealand, April 27th.  Whatever day or time of day it is when you read this, I hope that you all are doing well, by God's matchless grace and His providential care.

We continue the spiritual discourses with today's being "Of the Union of the Soul With God," rendered as follows:

There are three kinds of union--the habitual, the virtual and the actual.



1.  Habitual union is when one is united to God simply by grace.

2.  Virtual union is when one begins an action whereby one is united to God, and remains with Him by virtue of that action for such time as it continues.

3.  Actual union is the most complete, and, being entirely supernatural, the most powerful:  for the soul is not passive as in the other two states.  Rather is she intensely active, her movements kindling more warmth than does fire and creating more light as does the clear sun.  Yet our feelings can deceive us as to this union, for it is not merely an emotion, as when our hearts urge us to exclaim:  "My God, I love You with my whole being," or such-like words.  It is of an indefinable something of the soul, beauteous, peaceful, unearthly, reverent, humble, loving and very simple:  it lifts the soul up to God, impelling her to love Him, to worship Him, even to embrace Him with caresses which cannot be expressed and which only experience can make us understand.

4.  All who aim at union with God should know that whatever can divert the will towards Him is also welcome and pleasing to it:  the will makes it so.



Everybody must admit that the ways of God are past our understanding, and, therefore, to become united to Him the will must be deprived of all its tastes and pleasures, spiritual and material.  Then, being thus stripped, it is free to love God above all things; for if the will is able in any degree to know God, it can only be through love.  There is a great difference between the tastes and fancies of the will and the workings of the same will; for its preferences and conceits are within the soul as in their bounds, but its operation, which is love, has its end in God.

And there you have Brother Lawrence's words of wisdom for today.  I don't know about you, but I have some difficulty in working out one of these things that he wrote, namely, how does one deprive oneself of one's spiritual will? Maybe it's our 21st century mentality or something, but I just don't get what he is driving at.  Another thing I don't understand is the difference between the "tastes and fancies of the will and the workings of the same will." Yes, I understand that "tastes and fancies" speak of materialism, but what of the "workings?" Again, maybe it's my 21st century mentality that prevents me from understanding this concept.  Maybe others have the same questions in mind.  Thanks for any elucidation on this matter.

And now may the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob just keep us safe, individually and collectively, in these last days in which we live.  Don't forget that tomorrow we will have our weekly Bible game, so prepare your thinking caps for hopefully the correct answer.  Your Christian friend and brother, Paul