....I have constantly felt the
hand of God guiding me, throwing me into deep waters and reaching
out to save me....
Deacon Jivan Daniel,ofm
When it comes to birthdays, we all get to have a wish and we
normally wish for something good. It is the same with our life
journey, when someone asks us to describe how we wish our journey
ahead to be like, all of us dream of blessings and successes, peace
and joy and touch wood nothing bad may happen to us. This is our
preferred journey, the journey all of us would like to
experience.
In my third year of formation with the friars, someone forwarded me
a prayer that was witty. I cannot remember the exact words of that
prayer, but it went something like this: Disturb me, Lord, when I
am comfortable with life. Disturb me, when I choose to stand at the
shore of the sea, so that I may choose to be thrown into the deep.
Trying to be brave, I told myself that I will recite it. However,
after reciting it, I became frightened. What if this prayer is
answered, if God really chose to disturb me and if he throws me
into the deep waters? What happens, if I am unable to swim? So, I
decided never to recite that prayer again.
But I realized later, no matter whether I recite that prayer or not
there will be moments when I will be thrown into deep waters. This
has happened to me quite a number of times in my last 7 years of
formation with the Franciscan friars. Yet, when I look back at all
that I have gone through over this 7 years, the ones that I am
truly grateful to God for are the moments when I was thrown into
deep waters. Facing these moments with hope and trust in God has
allowed me to emerge a better person.
I am grateful today for our Franciscan spirituality, the fraternal
life, and our way of living the Gospel values to which I have been
called. It is within the community that I have constantly felt the
hand of God guiding me, throwing me into deep waters and reaching
out to save me. It is my involvement with the brothers in my
community that has enabled me to allow myself to be thrown into the
water, knowing that I have the support of my brothers and believing
that they are there to help me become the person God wants me to
be.
I am grateful for Francis who by his own example invited the
brothers to be always open to the workings of Gods spirit in the
life of individual brothers and the community as a whole. It is
this spirit of openness that has enabled me to face those moments
when I was thrown into deep waters with confidence and courage
knowing that the brothers are helping me face those moments.
3 weeks ago, I attended my personal retreat in preparation for my
diaconate ordination and the one sentence that I kept reminding
myself was to Remember how good God has been to me. Truly, God
has been good to me, because the moments he has thrown me into deep
waters, he has reached out and pulled me out. Certainly, not in
ways I wanted Him to or according to my time, but He has never
failed to pull me out.
At the end of that retreat, the retreat master prayed that I may
encounter many more deep waters in my journey in life. I accepted
his wishes for me in faith, hoping and praying that they will
continue to help me become the person God wants me to be.
For now, this has been my preferred journey: A journey which will
involve moments when I am thrown into deep waters.
Deacon Jivan Daniel,ofm
Bulletin of 20th/21st August 2005
Friar Jivan who was ordained a
deacon in our parish last week, is now serving his diaconate
ministry at the Church of Our Lady of Lourdes. His interest is in
working among the poor and the migrants at the parish. We wish him
a fruitful ministry!