Curiosity and Knowing the Other

When we ask others to share more about their lives with us, we are forcing them to become closer to us and attached to us; if we share with them, we are forcing them to become closer to us and attached to us. It does not matter if you are enemies or lovers. We must be careful not to use this to manipulate another, especially if we are attracted to them and may enter into or are in courtship. We must be certain that what we are sharing is truly something that God has asked us to share with the other.

Our relationships are meant to mirror our relationship with God. So let us meditate on how our relationship with Him unfolds. How has God let you into His mysteries? Did He let you learn all at once, or by a marathon of reading or prayer? Did He reveal you to yourself all at once? or in bits and pieces as they were relevant and necessary for the growth of your relationship with Him (we can only reveal ourselves to God as much as He has revealed us to ourselves)? God shares with us what is important and relevant to our growth at that stage of intimacy. He will often reveal the same things over and over, with slightly different deliveries or contexts containing just a little deeper insight into Him or ourselves. And some things, in fact most things, will be mysteries until we are with Him in heaven. Ultimately, His goal is to bring us to fulfill His call for us. That is His focus. Extraneous material is left out.

If a man really wants to love a woman, he has to let her remain a mystery even to himself until eternity. The same is true in reverse. Curiosity is a dangerous thing. It is good in that it leads us to discover those things that are necessary to fulfill God's call for us. It is bad it that it can lead us right past God's call into extraneous things that keep us from fulfilling His plan. Curiosity which seeks to know people to an extent that is beyond what God deems necessary to know, is a very self-centered prideful thing and will always end with us outside His plan.

Fascination vs. Obsession

Fascination is an incredible gift from God. We are meant to be drawn to each other. The beauty of fascination is is that it goes deeper than attraction because it recognizes the infinite nature of the other. It is our infinite soul seeking out that of the other. However it is also a very dangerous thing, for Satan twists everything that is from God, and the greater the gift the greater the perversion.

Fascination inverted is obsession that leads to possession. This is seen in young couples today who spend hours and hours online, on the phone, every moment together. Spending that much time turns fascination into obsession because everything is blotted out except the object of fascination. We were created to be in the world; not of the world, but in it. God puts love between two people so that they can then bring it to the world. If they do not do this, if they do not allow their love to bring them to something greater outside of themselves, then their fledgling love will slide to obsession and soon thereafter possession.

In a true love, each seeks to bring that love for the other into the world to fulfill whatever God has called him or her to do. God will only give you another person to love as yourself if you can then give that person back to Him while still giving yourself entirely to Him through the other. True love will not spend every second with the other, because it sees that the education, job, and other relationships are in fact necessary to serve it's subject. True love sees its subject as the reason to do its studies or be committed to and succeed at its job. It's counterfeit sees the subject as the reason to ignore its studies and job. True love develops and expands its heart so that it spills over to fertilize other budding friendships. It's counterfeit withdraws nutrients from other friendships and shrivels them.

We must pray to God that He will protect and guard the gifts that He grants us, most especially the gift of fascination, that it may cause us to love beyond ourselves and catch us up into His Trinitarian Love.

Discernment and Detachment

When we are discerning a matter, but especially vocation, we must pray for detachment. Usually the faithful will pray for detachment from the world, from the person they are attracted to, etc. However what we really must pray for is detachment from self.

Detachment from self includes those attachments to the world and over-attachment to whomever we are attracted to. But it also gets the heart of the matter: why are we so unsettled and unable to hear God's voice? Because we are attached to ourselves. Perhaps this shows as too much curiosity, or as a perverse enjoyment of being in a tough situation. We must spend time asking God to show us where we are attached to ourselves, that we may be granted the grace to detach and give ourselves ENTIRELY to Him.

Circumcision of the Heart

In Genesis 34, we meet a man named Shechem. He defiles the daughter of Jacob, and sins against God and man. However he has stirrings in his heart, and comes to love her so much that he asks Jacob for her hand in marriage. Jacob tells him "Only on this condition will we consent to you: that you will become as we are and every male of you will be circumcised." And the bible tells us that "the young man did not delay to do the thing, because had delight in Jacob's daughter."

What man today would willingly-- eagerly-- undergo adult circumcision in order to marry the woman he claims he loves? Not many.

We see here in Genesis the first story of a man converted for love of a woman. A man who would willingly suffer and sacrifice in order than he could love her more perfectly, as she deserved. Today, men would shy from such a sacrifice; they also shy from the sacrifice of circumcision of the heart, which is what Jesus asks of us. Circumcision of the heart is also very painful and demands sacrifice, some may say more so than physical circumcision. But if a man is not willing to do this for the woman he claims he loves, then he does not love her. For men are meant to love their wives as Christ loved the Church, to give his life for her that she may be without blemish and undefiled.

"So Jacob served seven years for Rachel...

... and they seemed to him but a few days because of the love he had for her" Gen 29:20

Today, our love usually does not reach this depth. We love enough that years seem like DECADES, but we do not love enough that years feel like DAYS. Oh, that God would grant us the pure love of Jacob!!

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth...

... The earth was without form and void, and darkness was upon the face of the deep; and the Spirit of God was moving over the face of the waters." Gen 1:1-2

The Spirit of God is always moving over the face of our souls, seeking to recreate us without blemish, that His Kingdom may come to earth.

The father of lies

The devil is indeed the father of lies. Beware of his deceit!!

Adam and Eve were made in the image and likeness of God. They were like God. But what was it that the devil tempted Eve with? Becoming like God! The devil tempts us by convincing us that we lack the very thing that God has given to us.

When we are tempted to think we lack something-- be it purity, patience, peace, confidence--let us be assured that in fact it is one of the treasures that God has already given to us. It is written: "Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavens, as He chose us in Him, before the foundation of the world, to be holy and without blemish before Him." (Ephesians 1:3-4) God is constantly granting us EVERY SPIRITUAL BLESSING IN THE HEAVENS!!!!!!!!! All we must do is open ourselves to His grace.