Elijah the prophet reaches the mountain of God and enters a cave. Elijah is on the run; he is afraid for his life.
Then he is told to go out and “stand on the mountain before the Lord”.
This is like us, baptised to be Prophets, we have come to the mountain, the place of encounter with the Lord but we are still in our caves.
We are on the heights but essentially in a hole, but we are being told to stand before the God.
Very truly, in a very real way we stand before God in the Mass.
Being in His presence, offering ourselves in gratitude for what has been done for us.
In the presence of God offering ourselves to the Father in union with Christ and entering into communion with Christ through reception of the Sacrament.
But there is a barrier to our encounter, the encounter which will make us truly grateful to God, truly united with Christ.
The barrier is feeling the love of God.
If we don’t feel the love of God, we won’t trust and if we don’t trust we are robbed of the salvation that God offers.
The term “faith in Christ” can be reworded to “trust in Christ”
This brings salvation as it frees us of fear and allows us to turn outwards towards others, to become Christ like and draw creation into unity with Christ.
But knowing God loves us is not only an intellectual thing.
We need to encounter God in our daily lives.
In all the goodness we encounter and all the difficulties.
That’s why Christ sent His disciples ahead, knowing they would encounter difficulties in their journey, but also that they would see Him coming to them through the difficulties.
But as the first reading points out, we need to be preceptive because God comes in the gentle breeze.
He is there but His presence is subtle.
Realising this will help us notice and come out of our caves.
Our caves are our fears and insecurities.
All the things we fear, all the ways in which we feel inadequate or insecure.
It’s a well-known fact that people project themselves on others.
So, if we don’t really see ourselves as a person of great value, we will expect others to see us in the same light.
A lot of young people when they meet someone they are interested in will say, oh no he / she won’t be interested in me.
A classic example of how we don’t see ourselves as loveable and project this on others.
Well, God assures us that to Him we are of great value. He loves us.
In fact, if each one of us here was the only person to have ever lived, Christ would still have died for you.
So, in the Gospel we see Peter’s faith flounder when he sees the waves, feels the motion of the wind and water.
In the Old Testament water or the sea is seen as something foreboding, evil, disordered.
The disciples are travelling at night, against a heavy head wind on a rough and stormy sea.
That’s us. We live in a world of evil influences, of disorder, injuries, threats and our own weaknesses.
In the face of difficulties our faith flounders.
We turn to human means to resolve issues without first turning to God.
Why don’t we trust God, why don’t we have faith?
Because we don’t feel how much He loves us.
We don’t perceive how valuable we are to Him.
Like the Jewish people that St Paul laments over we don’t perceive what we have been given by God.
We, the Israel of God, have through the death of Christ received the Holy Spirit which allows us to relate to God, to cry out Father!
We are the adopted Children of a truly loving and caring Father
When the going gets hard don’t run away but run towards Christ.
Open your hearts and minds and embrace Him, He won’t let you fall.
He longs to welcome you into His arms.
In His arms the Holy Spirit will flood us and allow us to communicate with the Father through our deepest, inner most desires, pains, dreads and sighs.
So, let’s look around us. Let’s live in the present moment and experience the Love of God in our daily lives, moment by moment.
Let’s read and contemplate on who Christ reveals and what that means for us.
So that we can start to understand He is always there, Always, loving us.
Always telling us we are of great value.
And having lived the experience of the love of God we will believe in Him.
We will trust Him.
With this trust, we can be one with Christ, who we unite with in the Eucharist, and become the light of dawn that comes with the fourth watch, the darkest, coldest part of the night and reach out, not our hand but our hand which has become Christ’s hand to draw others out of their struggles into the light.
The light of unconditional positive regard which is love and draw them from their caves into the presence of God.
Deacon Alan Skofic serves at the Catholic Parish of the Upper Blue Mountains.
