Amazing possibilities are all around us, there, everywhere. God is constantly wanting to unveil amazing possibilities to us. Very often we don't see them. We don't see them because we're like the blind man, like the blind man.
I love the blind people in the gospel. You know, the blind people in the gospel. They come to Jesus and they say, you know, Lord opened my eyes so that I may see and we read the gospel. We think, wow, you know, I'm glad I'm not blind or that it must be really difficult to live being a blind. Yes. But the reality is, you and me, we are in every single person in the scriptures. The reality is you and me, we are the blind man.
And so maybe that's our prayer this week. It's like Lord opened my eyes so that I may see your amazing possibilities open my eyes so that I can see the amazing possibilities that you want to lay before me at this time in my life. Is it a difficult time in a world? Yes. Anyone who tells you otherwise is not to be trusted, just lying to you. It is a difficult time in the world. Is it a time of incredible dehumanization and and soul denial?
Yes. How do we reverse the tide one person at a time? That's how God works at the heart of God's plan for the world. Is transforming one person at a time. So why not? Let's start with you and me, because if not you and me, then who and when? And how will we humanize civilization one person at a time without kindness, with our generosity, with our compassion and empathy by bringing Jesus into the world?
As the world has rejected Jesus, as the world has rejected Christianity, as the world has rejected our great faith, the world has become more and more dehumanized. For thousand years, the primary force of humanisation. On the planet has been our great faith, it's time to rediscover that again, it's time to bring that back.
How do you and I do that against such enormous odds, how do we do it and and not get discouraged? How do we do it and and stay joyful? There's a beautiful passage in myCar that reminds us of our place in it all. Central to the idea is understanding our circle of influence when we're in our circle of influence, when we're focused on our circle of influence. This is why these places, people where we can actually have an impact, we tend not to get discouraged.
It's when we get beyond our circle of influence, we think, oh, our country is in a mess. What can we do about that, we're outside our circle of influence, and so we do feel helpless and we fall into victim mode and Christians should never be victims. Christians should be people of possibility. Christians should be people of initiative. So we need to focus on our circle of influence and effect, what we can affect, because that's when we have an effect, that's when we're most impactful, the world wants to draw us outside of our circle of influence because then we're useless.
We can't do anything outside of our circle of influence. And then we become victims and then we become discouraged. And then and then nothing changes. And so to work out where is your circle of influence and then to come into focus on Michael's beautiful passage, the passage in Majka says. You know what God asked of you, you know what got off of you. That you live justly.
That you love tenderly. And that you walk humbly with your God. We need things like this to focus us when you get discouraged, when you feel hopeless, when you feel things are too out of control. We need things to focus us and say, OK, am I living justly, am I loving tenderly? Am I walking humbly with my God?
Because we can complain about the injustices in the world, but the injustices in the world are a call for us to live more justly. We can complain about abuse and the lack of love in the world, but at the end of the day, we have to ask ourselves, are we loving tenderly? We can complain about the arrogance and self-centered ness and self-referential nature of our culture, but at the end of the day, we have to ask ourselves, am I walking humbly with my God?
This is what Iowa use of you, that you live justly, that you love tenderly, and that you walk humbly with your God, because in all of that, what do we find? Find goodness. We find goodness, what's the secret to the good life, no secret at all, goodness is at the center of the good life. There's no good life without goodness. You know, when you're doing good, you know, when you're in good, you know, when you're spreading good and you know when you're not. So do I.
So do I. But this is what I know for sure. There's always been times of darkness. There's always been times of discouragement. But the good we do. The good we do never dies. The good we do it, it lives on forever. In other people. In other places. In other times, the ripple effect of every good action is impossible to calculate.
So let's sit with our God, allow him to fill us with goodness, to hydrate our souls, to show us the amazing possibilities that are before us, and then let's go out into the world and spread that goodness with everyone we meet.
Matthew Kelly
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