Day 25 Reflection –

The Gift of Understanding

Catechism cf. #687 – No one comprehends the thoughts of God except the spirit of God. Now God’s spirit, who reveals God, makes known to us Christ, his Word, his living Utterance. But the spirit does not speak of himself. The Spirit, who “has spoken through the prophets”, makes us hear the Father’s Word – but we do not hear the spirit himself. We know him only in the movement by which he reveals the Word to us and disposes us to welcome him in faith

Understanding gives us the ability to see beneath the surface; to perceive holistically the different dimensions that exist in the concrete situation and relationship we encounter in the context of eternity. It enables us to look at what has gone before the current situation, at what has contributed to it, at what all the influences have been.
It is not merely intellectual. It is also effective. Its expression is not just verbal but flows to our gestures of love. When we say, “I understand”, we press his hands to make him feel we want to share what he is going through.
The Holy Spirit’s gift of understanding is defined as comprehension or dimension rooted in the gift of wisdom. He inspires and empowers us with in-depth understanding and strength to grapple with the ever new problems and challenges of daily life. He creates and ‘opens us’ to face surprising new possibilities for fuller and deeper human life, both personal and communal as experienced.
Meditation is an excellent path to understanding. It brings peace and depth to our personality. It involves an inner journey to the core of our being not in order to concentrate on ourselves but on the presence of God who alone fully understands us.
The Bible is the key to understand dynamically our concrete life-setting.

A friend once remarked to Mark Twain:
“I get worried because there are so many things in the Bible I do not understand.”
With a knowing twinkle the great humorist observed:
“It is not the things in the Bible that I do not understand which give me difficulty.
It is the things I do understand which give me great difficulty!”

Scripture (1 Kings 4:29) – And the man must love God with all his heart and with all his mind and with all his strength; and he must love his neighbor as he loves himself.

Prayer:
Holy Spirit,
“Slow me down. Ease the pounding of my heart by the quieting of my mind. Steady my hurried pace with a vision of the eternal reach of time. Give me, amid the confusion of the day, the calmness of the everlasting hills.
Break the tensions of my nerves and muscles with the soothing music of the singing streams that live in my memory. Help me to know the magical, restoring power of sleep.
Teach me the art of taking minute vacations – of slowing down to look at a flower, to chat with a friend, to pat a dog, to read a few lines from a good book.
Slow me down, Lord, and inspire me to send my roots deep into the soil of life’s enduring values that I may grow towards the stars of my greater destiny.” Amen.