Hidden in Your Mystery

Tell my children about My hiddenness in all things, as I surround them with My love. How I hide My mystery in people and places, whom I’ve shown you along your way.

You and I have so many stories. Recall them. Have the details at hand. Make them flow easily off your pen and your tongue. Find just the right stories. Let me help you understand them and how they might heal another’s heart or cause their demons to flee. Tell them. How else might they come to know about Me? About how I long for them?

Describe your heart. How it fills with a holy longing for Me. For My truth and goodness and beauty. For My love. Describe how it feels when I’m close.

+++++++

Oh, this holy desire. I have felt that. Haven’t you? This longing that Our Father placed in us. It’s like a hunger to know Him, to understand His Holy Spirit within us. To glimpse what lies just beyond the veil of our existence. To experience, if only for a moment, the eternal realm of His divinity.

Then, one day, by His grace, we search our hearts — just as the disciples must have experienced on the way to Emmaus — and we realize there’s a fire burning within us too, and we know He is there, present with us, in us.

You, by Your grace, Oh Lord,

Caused my heart to long for You.

To pray for Your presence in my life.

You caused me to realize my prayer is being answered.

My deepest longings fulfilled.

I’ve come to bask in Your light

And in the warmth of Your love.

When shall I pause in my rejoicing to say out loud,

“Glory and praise to You, oh Lord?”

Maybe during our walk, when I stopped to sit.

You made Your sun to beam down on me that day.

It danced in and out around some clouds as they rolled by.

I took several pictures of Your sky.

Only later did I realize the digital images revealed a shimmery shape,

like a golden dove, in the midst of the clouds.

And I was confirmed, knowing you’d been there with me.

Maybe one day You’ll allow me to hear Your voice.

“Mary.”

Will I look up, like Mary Magdalene?

That first morning, when You were hidden in a gardener?

Will I recognize You through my tears and call out, “Rabbouni?”

Will I fall at Your feet?

Then, will I obey You

and go tell the others You’ll meet them along the Way?

+++++++

Or maybe one day, like me, you’ll be sitting in adoration with our Lord, and a blinding light will find you through a stained glass window pane. You might have to shield your eyes, like I did. But when you glance up, you’ll see the light beaming brightest, right through the glass piece depicting the host.

And you’ll know that He is hidden there, too, present with you in that moment. And your mind will be filled, as you hear the Father’s voice.

‘This is My Son in whom I am well pleased. Listen to Him.’

+++++++

Or maybe He is right where He said we should always look for Him. That place where He asked us to be often, in memory of Him — in the Holy Eucharist at Mass.

As I process up with others to receive His precious body and blood, I realize this time, finally, my attention has not wavered from Him. In answer to my prayers and by His grace, I’ve not been distracted by the activity around me.

I bow and make one last preparation for Him, signing myself, my whole self, with His cross and I look up.

Our priest is acting now in the person of Christ.

He smiles and his eyes look deeply into my eyes.

Do they pierce my heart, with their offer of Christ’s passion?

Do they warn of a holy love that will be rejected by the world?

Do they foretell of the great and eternal truth,

which I am about to take into my body?

Finally, I turn my gaze to Our Lord. He’s hidden there in the host.

Just as he was hidden in the body of a newborn baby, once beheld by St. Simeon.

Remember Simeon? He was guided by the spirit to the temple where he encountered

Jesus and his parents.

Simeon recognized our Lord and he took our sweet Jesus into his arms,

“…and praised God, saying. Master, now you are dismissing your servant in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation, which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples…” (NRSV:CE)

Can you see Jesus now?

Has your heart been pierced?

Or, is Mary’s heart pierced by your heart?

As He is placed onto your tongue,

As you savor his flesh upon your flesh,

Is it sweet?

Does it melt into your body?

Does it fill your heart and satisfy your greatest longing?

Not yet?

Take time.

Stop for just a moment to adore Him

There on the cross.

+++++++

Oh My child,

Be stunned by Me and My love for you.

I am in you now. Be in Me.

As you walk back to your pew,

Abide with Me along the way.

Hold onto Me.

Focus on My goodness and compassion.

I am with you now. This is a holy time.

I’ve chosen you.

Now it is your turn.

Choose Me.

+++++++

As you kneel in your pew, remember Mary’s first words to the Archangel Gabriel, at the beginning of Our Lord’s life. Remember as she said ‘yes’ and agreed to cooperate with God’s will for her.

Does your mind overwhelm your heart momentarily? Do you feel yourself question, “How can you choose me, Lord? I’m not like Mary. I am a sinner. I’m too unworthy.”

Listen, as He pours His redeeming love into your heart. Then, finally, confess your love and humble obedience to Him,

“Behold the handmaid of the Lord; be it unto me according to thy word.” (KJV)

Let Him overwhelm you.

Choose to believe in His love.

Choose to cooperate and be saved by His grace.

+++++++

Does a wave of giddiness come over you?

A joy of knowing He’s found you?

Knowing, finally, you belong to Him?

Maybe you’re like me and tears break through each time,

as you realize the enormity of this gift.

I pray, oh Lord, that even if it takes a bolt of lightning,

You strike my soul with the full impact of Your body,

My humanity with the full force of Your divinity.

I pray, that Peter’s words erupt and cry out from my heart,

‘my lord and my God.’

And then, as the disciples did at Jesus’s Transfiguration,

Hear our Father’s words for you,

“This is my Son, my Chosen; listen to him.” (NRSV:CE)

+++++++

After as the room returns to focus, only our Jesus remains. Realize His presence has filled all those others in the sanctuary whom He has chosen to bless this day. Allow His grace to connect you with them.

All part of His body.

All members of His Holy Bride.

All part of His plan

to redeem the brokenness of our world.

All part of His kingdom.

All part of His heavenly family.

Pray we go forth rejoicing, united together in His promise of life eternal with Him.

Mary Adrienne has been a writer since her teens. After a

40-year professional career, she began in 2012 to share

her writing at www.WalkingWithMyBrother.net.

When asked why she writes and chooses to share her

spiritual journey she replied, “because, like the little

donkey, the Father has need of it.”