The Search is Over: Love is Here!

The desire for joy, peace and love is deep within the human heart. Most of us have sought it. And most of us are left frustrated.

Many think that joy can be found in the ungodly. And so we try all the ungodly stuffs thinking it would make us happy. We commit one sin to the next hopping the next one would bring us happiness. In our search for joy, we have left ourselves miserable.

Many of us also believe that the world can give us peace. We presume that material wealth will automatically bring peace in our lives. We think that temporal security is the key to peace. But our effort in accumulating and preserving material wealth has only made us more anxious and fearful (of losing them.)

And our search of love, we have jumped from one wrong person to the next. Our desire for perfect and lasting love has only caused us to be heartbroken, again and again. We have sought the perfect in frail and weak creatures.

We have sought the divine in the human and in the world.

And we are disappointed.

Real lasting joy, peace and love can only be found in its Author.

“I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.”  John 15:11

“Peace I leave with you; my peace I give you. I do not give to you as the world gives. Do not let your hearts be troubled and do not be afraid.” John 14:27

"For God so loved the world that he gave his one and only Son, that whoever believes in him shall not perish but have eternal life.”  John 3:16

They can only be found in Him who is joy, peace and love Himself… Jesus.

"The desire for God is written in the human heart, because man is created by God and for God; and God never ceases to draw man to himself. Only in God will he find the truth and happiness he never stops searching for:

The dignity of man rests above all on the fact that he is called to communion with God. This invitation to converse with God is addressed to man as soon as he comes into being. For if man exists it is because God has created him through love, and through love continues to hold him in existence. He cannot live fully according to truth unless he freely acknowledges that love and entrusts himself to his creator." (#27 Catechism of the Catholic Church)

We Are All Called

I Wanna be Free, I Wanna be Me

There are a lot of people who have the “I-wanna-be-free-I-wanna-be-me” mentality. Their ultimate goal in life is “to be themselves”, whatever that means.

This is can be very problematic in our “fallen” world.

There are two big problems in this mentality. First is the word “free”. What most of us consider freedom is actually abuse of freedom. Modern man’s idea of freedom is doing anything you want. That is not freedom that is license. Freedom has boundaries. You are not free to murder or steal.

Many people like to use the word “freedom” so they can be free to be selfish. They like to do whatever fancies them, at all cost. Like a father or a mother who wants to be “free” from his/her family. So they leave their families to pursue their personal happiness. That is not freedom that is abandonment.

Another problematic part of that mentality is the “me”. Modern man in general has no clue who he is. He is fashioned by his environment, especially by the media. It is the same media who educates the masses that being a fallen human being is normal. And to strive to be the human God created us to be is psychologically problematic.

Our idea of “me” will be probably egoistic. Our “me-attitude” can be sum up to “It is all about me and to hell with the rest.”

Our idea of our humanity is very selfish. It is all about getting what we want.

But that is not who we are.

We were created to love. To forget ourselves in love. God created us to have a “We” attitude and not a “Me” attitude. Selfishness is the total opposite of our humanity.

It is same with freedom. God gave us freedom not to be selfish, but to love. Only free people can love. A selfish person is not free to love because he cannot love anyone else but himself. It takes great freedom to love, for most of us are slaves of our fears and selfishness.

“Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” -Pope John Paul II

Jesus was the freest man who ever lived, for He was God. But Jesus spent His life doing the Father’s will and not His own.

“Yet not my will, but yours be done.” Luke 22:42

If we want to be really “free” and to be really “me”, we must start defining freedom and ourselves by God’s standards and not of the world’s.

So how do we do it?

We must love God with all our being, and love our neighbor as ourselves.

The ultimate act of freedom is to love.

The fulfillment of our humanity is love as well.

So be free to give your “me” to love.

By Daxx Bondoc

2 Love or 2 Lust?