the Fourth Week after Easter
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Daily Devotionals
John Gossner's Treasury
And the Lord direct your hearts unto the love of God, and into the patient waiting for Christ. 2 Thessalonians 3:5. In all things approving ourselves as the ministers of God by love unfeigned. 2 Corinthians 6:4-6.
The most beautiful attachment of the heart, and one which St. Paul desires all to have, is that which has the love of God and the patience of Christ as its object. Any other inclination of the heart is perverted. Examine yourself to find what the object of your heart is. What do you wish the most and most intensely? What things do you busy yourself with most and oftenest? Who is it that really lives in your heart? What, as a rule, goes in and out of your heart? What causes your heart the keenest sorrow, and what causes it to rejoice the most? Ask your heart often these questions in prayer and supplication. Then you will learn, to know its true bent. You will understand if it is turned to the love of God and the patience of Christ or to the love of the world, love of self, love of money, love of honor or of carnal lust. If you are aware of a false inclination in your heart, a perverted disposition to objects aside from God and Christ, then weep over your misery, and pray incessantly to Christ that He may give your heart the predilection for His love and cross. The patience of Christ is His willing suffering and death for us, His obedience unto death, which should make us patient and obedient. Do not paint your love in fine colors, that is, do not plume yourself with a hypocritical love of the tongue, but pray God for an unpainted, unfeigned, honest love, which shows itself no less ardent and active inwardly than outwardly and which in a straight course is directed toward God and Christ alone.
Uphold me in the doubtful race.
Nor suffer me again to stray;
Strengthen my feet, with steady pace
Still to press forward in Thy way,
That all my powers, with all their might,
In Thy sole glory may unite.
