Thread--Holy Spirit

May His grace be with you!
This past weekend, I went on to “Choices of the Heart” Retreat at Seton Provincialate in Los Altos Hills. I hadn’t seen such a beautiful place in a long time. It reminded me of Serra Retreat House in Malibu but there were much more wild lives and flowers. I was blessed with new friends and old ones. The hospitality was an exceptional one and “The Thread” written by Denise Levertov reciting by Josephine Burns D.C. touched me during reflection time:

“Something is very gently, invisible, silently, pulling at me-

a thread or net of threads finer and cobweb and as elastic

I haven’t tired the strength of it.

No barbed hook pierced and tore me.

Was it not long ago this thread began to draw me? Or way back?

Was I born with its knot about my neck, a bridle?

Not fear but a stirring of wonder makes me catch my breath

when I feel the tug of it when I thought it had loosened itself and gone.”

Reflecting on my life’s events, I imaged God’s spirit is like an invisible, fine, and elastic thread. He is calling and calling and calling me into the deep. I don’t exactly remember when He first did but one day I realized it was there. I responded, I freely gave myself, and I was drowning in the ocean of human faults including mine. When I was near death, His hands reached out and saved me. I asked God not letting me be a victim again and God kindly smiled. I moved on in life. Since then, life has given me many possibilities to do well in the world. However, His spirit keeps dragging and dragging and dragging me. So, I keeps running and running and running away. It doesn’t matter how far I can run. I just can’t seem to hide from His spirit. No matter what I have done wrong or others have harmed me, nothing can stop the strength of it raising me up again. Because I’m wonderfully made in his image, His spirit is forever calling me to be the best for the world. If I forget, His spirit will stir up and I give the better good of myself for the world.
To certain people I’m just a problematic person and can’t be anything else. As St Paul said, “If the spirit of the one who raised Jesus from the dead dwells in you, the one who raised Christ from the dead will give life to you.” (Rm 8:11) So, I rest my case in the past and rejoice in what God has given me now.

Take care and until next time...