“First of all, every time you begin a good
work, you must pray to Him most earnestly to bring it to perfection.”[1] There is no doubt that whatever we do, no
matter how noble what it is that we are doing, it is imperfect if it is not
done for the glory of God.
Even if you are
feeding the poor, that action is imperfect unless it is offered to God. You could be giving homes to the homeless,
but that action too would be imperfect unless it is offered to God.
Even
God, when He created us, created us in order to give glory to Himself. It may sound egotistical, when considered from
a purely human point of view, but the truth is that, if God had created us for
any other purpose, but to give glory to Himself, it would have been a less than
perfect act.
God
simply cannot act contrary to His own nature.
God is Perfection. God has created
us capable of sharing in his infinite love and happiness. By creating us capable of sharing in His
infinite love and happiness, God shows us His infinite goodness. It is this infinite goodness of God that gives
glory to God.
While we are
certainly all aware that we must be sure to offer all that we do to God, we all
face the challenge of busy lives. From
the morning, when we get out of bed, until the night, when we climb back into
bed, there is always so much going on.
We move quickly from one item to the other throughout the day, often
without ever consciously considering that we are stopping one and beginning
another.
There are of
course habits we can develop and practice to ensure that we are constantly
offering what we do to God. Saying grace
at meals, even when we are taking a quick snack, or popping out for a coffee in
the coffee shop, is a place to nurture the habit of offering all we do to God. Developing the habit of saying a brief prayer,
every time that we get into our car to drive, is another.
I recently
realised that we actually have another very effective means of helping us to
remember God throughout the day. Almost
everyone of us, particular those reading this Blog, will have access to
electronic gadgets, such as cell phones.
These phones rarely leave our sides, not even when we go to the loo it
seems. They also seldom get turned off,
at best being changed to vibrate mode during a meeting.
These cell phones
all come with built in electronic diaries.
These diaries offer the ability to set an alarm for an event. The alarm could be just a quick beep, or
whatever we would like the sound to be.
We could use these beeps, and many already do, to remind us to leave for
the next meeting, or to phone someone at a specific time, and so on.
However, why
should we not also use these cell phones to give us regular heads up during the
day about God. Why shouldn't they be used
to remind us to stop and offer whatever we are doing at that moment to God?
We could set
alarms for multiple times during the day based on our own day. The beep or vibration could be quiet, hardly
noticeable to anyone else, but sufficient enough to remind us, at that moment,
to say a Hail Mary or another prayer. It
could remind us to make our own simple utterance to God, like for example:
‘Lord, I am aware of your presence. Keep
me aware and bless what I am doing right now.
Help me to do it well. I offer it
to you for your glory.’
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