This is not a veering away or a block in the road. This is the road. Come to think of it, if you haven’t changed a bit, if your values and principles have not yet been challenged, and if your old self is still intact, then what were you doing all this time? You’ve prayed to God before to form you into a stronger, wiser person—to make your heart like His! This could be it. Maybe the process has already started. Or did you think it would be a comfortable procedure, requiring no blood nor sweat? I don’t think so.
You already know this. To aspire to follow and imitate Jesus means not to shy away from suffering as He did. Your model is one pinned on a cross: abandoned, humiliated, misunderstood, accused, mocked, troubled, and in pain. And no disciple is greater than the Master. The pain and the confusion you are feeling now is a gift. Many great people and saints drew their greatness from the rough patches in their lives, moments that became springboards for conversion and clarity.
As Paul assures in his letter to the Romans (8:18): “…the sufferings of this present time are as nothing compared with the glory to be revealed for us.” Past this darkness, you’ll learn something new about yourself. Your prayers will become more piercing. You’ll be more resilient. You’ll start living more consciously. Exactly the wiser, stronger version of yourself you’ve always prayed for. In the school of the Divine Master, God is the Formator par excellence, and his module is always more nuanced, complex, and mysterious than standard human structures (I think sometimes we should let Him surprise us).
Wendell Berry, in his poem “Our Real Work,” says:
It may be that when we no longer know what to do we have come to our real work, and that when we no longer know which way to go we have come to our real journey. The mind that is not baffled is not employed. The impeded stream is the one that sings.
So when you feel lost and hopeless for having wandered entirely off the road, check again. Maybe your real journey has just begun. Maybe you’re perfectly where you’re meant to be. All you need to do is submit to His “unfathomable design” and carry on like you always do — full of trust and full of wonder.
I wrote this in my journal during Holy Week 2023. I cannot remember what prompted me to write it. Maybe I felt that I would need these words someday. Now, a year later, I found myself “lost” in the middle of nowhere, and it feels like there’s no way back. Browsing through my notes and finding this helped me get back on track—or at least reminded me that this moment of “being lost” IS THE TRACK. And the only way is forward and through.
Essay by Keneth C. Gadian
By SPSF Staff
A government-recognized private higher education institution, Saint Paul Seminary Foundation integrates faith and communication, offering degrees in Communication and Philosophy and a Certificate in Philosophical Studies in Silang, Cavite.