Pulling Our Temperaments in the Service of God
Our temperaments-whether flamboyant, phlegmatic, introverted, or extroverted-are quite permanent fixtures of our personalities. Still, the way we “use” our temperaments on a daily basis can vary greatly. When we are attentive to the Spirit of God within us, we will gradually learn to put our temperaments in the service of a virtuous life. Then flamboyance gives great zeal for the Kingdom, phlegmatism helps to keep an even keel in times of crisis, introversion deepens the contemplative side, and extroversion encourages creative ministry.
Let’s live with our temperaments as with gifts that help us deepen our spiritual lives.
Spiritual Dryness
Sometimes we experience a terrible dryness in our spiritual lives. We feel no desire to pray, don’t experience God’s presence, get bored with worship services, and even think that everything we ever believed about God, Jesus, and the Holy Spirit is little more than a childhood fairy tale.
Then it is important to realize that most of these feelings and thoughts are just feelings and thoughts, and that the Spirit of God dwells beyond our feelings and thoughts. It is a great grace to be able to experience God’s presence in our feelings and thoughts, but when we don’t, it does not mean that God is absent. It often means that God is calling us to a greater faithfulness. It is precisely in times of spiritual dryness that we must hold on to our spiritual discipline so that we can grow into new intimacy with God.
The Door Open to Anyone
Jesus is the door to a life in and with God. “I am the gate,” he says (John 10:9). “I am the Way; I am Truth and Life. No one can come to the Father except through me” (John 14:6). Still, many people never have heard or will hear of Jesus. They are born, live their lives, and die without having been exposed to Jesus and his words. Are they lost? Is there no place in the Father’s house for them?
Jesus opened the door to God’s house for all people, also for those who never knew or will know that it was Jesus who opened it. The Spirit that Jesus sent “blows where it pleases” (John 3:8), and it can lead anyone through the door to God’s house.
Sharing the Abundant Love
Why must we go out to the far ends of the world to preach the Gospel of Jesus when people do not have to know Jesus in order to enter the house of God? We must go out because we want to share with all people the abundant love and hope, joy and peace that Jesus brought to us. We want to “proclaim the unfathomable treasure of Christ” and “throw light on the inner workings of the mystery kept hidden through all ages in God, the creator of everything” (Ephesians 3:8-9).
What we have received is so beautiful and so rich that we cannot hold it for ourselves but feel compelled to bring it to every human being we meet.
~From Henri J.M. Nouwen, Bread for the Journey: A Daybook of Wisdom and Faith
