I really liked this passage from Father Bede Jarrett, a Dominican priest from England, because it takes the pressure off of me to figure out my life and calling and therefore loosens the harness of my self-expectations. On the other hand, it makes me a little nervous that Fr. Bede uses the analogy that God is an architect because all of the architects I know right now are unemployed. Can we say God is a pharmaceutical sales rep? I think they still have jobs and are doing quite well (if enough people like me keep on taking their meds).

Sorry. Enough of me. Here’s what the holy man says…

With regard to the word we may be called upon to do, and each one of us has some special work to do for God, God made his plans for us before we came into the world at all – for the work is of primary importance, it comes first in God’s thought, and we follow as instruments. When an architect is commissioned to build a house [prior to 2009 of course], he has to know first its destined use, its locality, and the weather conditions, etc. Every detail must be taken into consideration. Only then can he collect his materials and begin to work. The foundations are very slowly made, with pain and trouble and much work if the building is to endure… 

God is the architect. He has made our souls a certain size and shape, to fit certain holes, so to speak. It is not for us to say that we are incapable, or unfitted for the work given to us. He has placed us in a certain position, and if he wants us to do a certain work, we shall do it. If he doesn’t, we shan’t. In any case, it is not for us to judge, but to obey his will. The doing of his will is not only the reason for all our Lord’s life, but of our life, of all life. In its accomplishment lies the fullness of life.

“Now this is eternal life–that we may know thee.” The will of God is made known to us through the interplay of our own interior impulses and desires, and our exterior circumstances…. Nothing is ever quite what we anticipated. There is the interplay of circumstances on our desires. It makes known to us what is God’s will for us; and so we give up in our desires what does not fit in with God’s plan for us, content to do as he wishes.

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