Delight in God alone; Angels: Day 363

Last updated on: July 21, 2017 at 3:30 am by Pete Socks

Delight in God alone; Angels: Day 363 2017-07-16T10:05:17-05:00 Pete Socks

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Continuing his meditation on holy angels and people, St. Augustine says that what we enjoy in someone who is holy is God himself, the only true source of happiness.

But when you have joy of someone in God, it is God rather than that person that you enjoy. You enjoy God who makes you happy, and you rejoice to have come to him in whose presence you place your hope of joy.

This is why Paul says to Philemon, “Yes, brother, I want some benefit from you in the Lord” (Philem. 20). For if he had not added “in the Lord, but had only said, “I want some benefit from you,” he would have implied that he fixed his hope of happiness upon him—although even in the immediate context “to have benefit” is used in the sense of “to use with delight.” For when the thing that we love is near us, it is a matter of course that it should bring delight with it.

Now, if you pass beyond this delight, and make it a means to that which you are permanently to rest in, you are using it, and it is an abuse of language to say that you enjoy it. But if you cling to it, and rest in it, finding your happiness complete in it, then you may be truly and properly said to enjoy it. And this we must never do except in the case of the Blessed Trinity, who is the Supreme and Unchangeable Good. –St. Augustine, On Christian Doctrine, 1.33

IN GOD’S PRESENCE, CONSIDER . . .

How much do I allow myself to pin my hopes on other people? Do they lead me beyond themselves to God?

CLOSING PRAYER

Father, give me rest all the days of this life, so that all the inhabitants of the earth may know that you are the only true God the Father, who sent our Lord Jesus Christ, your only Son and your Beloved, to teach us purity and holiness.

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A Year with the Angels

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Angels as oxen; Angels: Day 362

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