510th Meditation
“Time is in my hands, but with your zeal and love you can influence it” (Interior Word).
We can take this as an invitation from God that we can even collaborate in the history of salvation, because the times of His salvific action are not static and immovable.
How can we understand this?
St Peter tells us in one of his letters: “The day of the Lord will come like a thief, and then the heavens will pass away with a loud noise, and the elements will be dissolved with fire, and the earth and the works that are upon it will be burned up. Since all these things are thus to be dissolved, what sort of persons ought you to be in lives of holiness and godliness, waiting for and hastening the coming of the day of God” (2 Pet 3:10-12a).
So our ministry is part of God’s plan of salvation. Whatever we do with zeal and love for God is a cooperation in His plan.
In this way the Lord greatly honours us and opens up a wide perspective for us: We can and must cooperate in His plan of salvation! Perhaps we can understand this better by comparing it to our human reality: if we put all our efforts into something, without allowing self-imposed obstacles to get in the way, we will reach the goal faster and more surely.
Consider what happens when God calls a person to consecrate himself to Him, but he hesitates again and again. How much he could have done for the kingdom if he had responded immediately!
Thus the Lord calls us to cooperate consciously and attentively so that His plan of salvation can become a reality. He wants to reawaken our zeal and our love.
He means each one of us!