It was a usual Wednesday morning. I was half awake, half asleep while I was saying prayers. All of a sudden, one verse strikes me:
“As a bridegroom rejoices in his bride
so shall your God rejoice in you.” Isaiah 62:5
I think how beautiful that is! I have witnessed bridegrooms rejoicing in their brides and brides rejoicing in their grooms. Such freshness of love! How beautiful it is when somebody rejoices in me, when it gives another joy to see me.
Then I am looking at myself, thinking: it was 33 years ago that I entered the monastery with butterflies in my stomach. But now? Not so much. At least while I am praying, I succeed in lifting up this longing to God, although I feel myself far away from this state. I share with God that I would like to be loved this way again, as the prophet Isaiah says: God rejoices in me. I want to feel it, to experience it, while knowing that all spiritual and mystic traditions say that experiencing and feeling it is not as important as believing in it. I end my prayers by starting my daily work and schedule with a new kind of curiosity: Would I see God today, in fact, rejoicing in me, in my being?
I was surprised how my day changed with this simple prayerful question! I felt peace, I felt joy. I saw good things happening around me. I did not pay too much attention to the bad things. It is a truth: God is happy with me and he rejoices in my being—and that changes everything. Often we don’t like ourselves—and for good reasons. Still, God loves each of us, and is happy to see us, to have us around him, to talk with us.
Lord, don’t let me forget how much you love me. “You did not choose me, but I chose you”, I hear you saying (John 15:16). I don’t know how I merit this kind of love—but it just fills my heart with great joy, serenity, and gratitude.
Wilde Monk 
It is reassuring to hear that also in holy man‘s life there might be moments or times where God just seems so far away. Rationally I do understand that there are times in my spiritual life that feel deserted. I do also understand that like in any other relationship there are times of intense partnership and times where relationships seem to run in parallel, or even ways are deviating.
But yet sometimes there is this strong urge and need to just feel God in my life, physically.
So, thanks for sharing your experience with us. It encourages me to go further…. and to lift my head in expectation of something that touches me and makes me smile.
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Great getting your post Fr. Still struggle from time to time with Gods Love & ifs it’s actually alive & current for me & my loved ones. Life can be both beautiful & difficult ( sometimes the same day ) ha ! Good to focus on your post & be grateful. Hope your still sending up some prayers for me. Thanks ! Peace & love. Steve Mitchel
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Thank you very much for this wonderful post!
Just before I read it I had a lesson in “I want to be loved by whom?”.
I have a difficult situation at work; my colleague is a huge challenge for me. Teamwork would be so much easier, if she weren’t so negative about everything. And I just noted that I wished to be appreciated by her at least. Suddenly I recognized that I was longing for appreciation in the “World”. It came to me that Jesus says: “Seek MY Face first”. And I really just thought how much more important and desireable it is to be loved by Jesus and that this should be my first longing. …And so I continue to believe in HIS promise: that all these things I need in my life will be given to me, if I seek HIS Face/Kingdom first. Maybe this is all we
have to care for that God will rejoice in us.
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What a beautiful post! Thanks for sharing your faith and your doubts. It is always easier for me to look at another and believe that God rejoices in them, but could he possibly rejoice in me? I’m not so sure. As Thomas Merton says, my desire to please God, hopefully pleases God. To see ourselves as God sees us and believe that we bring joy to his heart – perhaps that is the beginning of faith.
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This is a wonderful reminder, Mauritius. I too, wish to feel and hear God in a concrete way. It is one thing to know it and quite another to really feel it deep in the bones. I think the attitude of expectation is what I will wish to hold onto and try to cultivate more each day.
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