Paradoxes Yet Again

Life is paradoxical and full of contradictions.
Like, life is a precious gift to me; and yet I cannot just live it for myself.
A fruitful and consequential life is meant to be lived in the love and service of others.
And sometimes that would mean giving up my life,
or at least some or a part of it,
so that others my live.

In my life, I have been endowed with freedom and choice.
It is what distinguishes me from all other living things on earth.
And yet, the fulfillment of my freedom is in surrendering it to God’s will.
I am free but I am often enslaved by my passions and sin.
I become free again by surrendering to Him
who has freed me from my passions and sin.

I am an embodied consciousness, living in this world.
This world is the only reality I know.
And yet, there are stirrings in me
that say that I do not belong to this world.
Paradoxical and so contrary to reason it might be,
I know there is another existence waiting for me,
beyond the present time and space I see,
for all eternity.

Sometimes, I truly wonder:
Have I gone mad, having lost all my rationality?
When I encounter in prayer the Person
who said all of these things to me
that is when everything makes sense
and I see the rhyme and the reason in my life
and the world around me.

Sing to God, O Kingdoms of the earth.
~ Psalm 68

Lifting up his eyes to heaven, Jesus prayed, saying:
“I speak this in the world
so that they may share my joy completely.
I gave them your word, and the world hated them,
because they do not belong to the world
any more than I belong to the world.
I do not ask that you take them out of the world
but that you keep them from the Evil One.
They do not belong to the world
any more than I belong to the world.
Consecrate them in the truth.
Your word is truth.
As you sent me into the world,
so I sent them into the world.
And I consecrate myself for them,
so that they also may be consecrated in truth.”

John 17:11-19
 
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