How we are instruments
of God's blessing

	Word to Life  Sharon K. Perkins

I belong to a small prayer group composed of women, mostly fellow graduate students, who have been meeting on Sunday nights for well over a year.

When the discussion last week turned to the ways in which we felt that "God had been made glorious through us," we sat in silence. Later, each of us sheepishly confessed that we didn't feel as comfortable "boasting" as we did recounting our failures before God and focusing on the ways that we needed to improve!

February 17, 2008 Second Sunday of Lent Genesis 12:1-4a Psalm 33:4-5, 18-20, 22 2 Timothy 1:8b-10 Matthew 17:1-9

With that admission behind us, we then were able to share quite a few stories of how we had been instruments of God's blessing that week. We were not only free to marvel at God's goodness but also to celebrate how we had been instruments of it.

The readings for this Sunday disabuse us of false modesty and remind us of God's great pleasure in not only granting us blessings, but making us blessings. The caveat, of course, is that our greatness, like Abraham's, is all gift. God grants it "according to his own design," through the "grace bestowed on us in Christ Jesus" and not by our own merits.

It was this same sort of magnanimity that prompted the Father in today's Gospel to say of the transfigured Jesus, "This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased."

And when Peter, James, and John cowered in fear at the enormity of God's glory revealed to them, Jesus lifted them up with the admonition, "Rise, and do not be afraid."

Sometimes I find it easier to retreat from the idea that God could actually take great pleasure in revealing himself through me. The notion is too overwhelming, my shortcomings too apparent, for me to accept it. Yet the doctrine of the Incarnation, the historical fact of God taking on human flesh, requires me to believe nothing less.

	For reflection: • When have you been aware of God's goodness flowing to another through you? • Meditate this week on how much God takes pleasure in you, his beloved son or daughter.

The Gospel passage ends with the words, "And when the disciples raised their eyes, they saw no one else but Jesus alone." May we surrender so completely to God's gracious love that when others see us and the good that we do, they see only his Son.

This column is offered in cooperation with the North Texas Catholic of Fort Worth, Texas.