Over the weekend, this is a phrase I spent time praying with: “through the deserts where our souls starve for your presence- lead us in your ways, O Lord.” Now that we are in the season of Lent, it is even more fitting. This prayer and desire is that Jesus would show us the places in our lives where our souls are starving for His presence.
Each of us has a longing for God. For many, this longing is not yet realized. For some, this longing has been forgotten. There is a place within our hearts and lives that only Jesus can fill, because this is how we were made. And each of us finds ourselves in the desert at various times, a place where we must recognize our lack of faith, trust, and love. It is in the desert where we experience starvation and thirst, a longing and desire for more. What matters in those moments is how we respond. Do we satisfy the hunger and thirst with Jesus? In our broken and weak humanity, we often try to satisfy our hunger and thirst with everything except Jesus. But everything and everyone who is not Jesus cannot fill the place that is meant for Him.
Jesus walked through the desert for forty days. Will we follow Him there to acknowledge the areas where we need to let Him in? Will we take time to recognize the areas that are dry and barren?
Sitting in adoration, Jesus fully present, my soul has experienced being fed and filled by His presence. This time spent in a chapel brings out an acknowledgement of the desert areas in my life and the ways in which I need to know and love Jesus more deeply. As I sat there, I prayed that each of the men on the retreat, and everyone, would walk through the desert, recognizing that their souls are starving for the presence of Jesus and allow Him to lead them.
Jesus, you make yourself fully present to us. We have the gift of being able to sit before you, to receive you at mass, and be filled by your love. Satisfy our starving souls and lead us to walk with you through the desert in these forty days and always.
Faith and The Good Stuff 