Being on the Way

These two quotes converged for me this morning.
Both of them remind me that I (and we) are part of something beyond our present situation. I hear invitations to trust the unfolding future.
"Trust in the slow work of God.....prophets of a future not our own."

By Pierre Teilhard de Chardin

Above all, trust in the slow work of God.
We are, quite naturally,
impatient in everything to reach the end without delay.
We should like to skip
the intermediate stages.
We are impatient of being on the way
to something unknown,
something new,
and yet it is the law of all progress
that it is made by passing through
some stages of instability
- and that it may take a very long time.
And so I think it is with you.
Your ideas mature gradually - let them grow,
let them shape themselves,
without undue haste.
Don’t try to force them on,
as though you could be today
what time (that is to say, grace
and circumstances
acting on your own good will)
will make them tomorrow.
Only God could say what this new spirit
gradually forming within you will be.
Give Our Lord the benefit of believing
that his hand is leading you,
and accept the anxiety of
feeling yourself in suspense and incomplete

Oscar Romero
A FUTURE NOT OUR OWN
It helps, now and then, to step back
And take the long view.
The kingdom is not only beyond our efforts,
It is beyond our vision
We accomplish in our lifetime only a tiny fraction of
The magnificent enterprise that is God’s work.
Nothing we do is complete,
Which is another way of saying
That the kingdom always lies beyond us.
No statement says all that could be said.
No prayer fully expresses our faith.
No confession brings perfection…
No set of goals and objectives includes everything.
This is what we are about:
We plant seeds that one day will grow.
We water seeds already planted,
Knowing that they hold future promise.
We lay foundations that will need further development.
We provide yeast that produces effects beyond our capabilities.
We cannot do everything
And there is a sense of liberation realizing that.
This enables us to do something,
And to do it very well.
It may be incomplete, but it is a beginning, a step along the way,
An opportunity for God’s grace to enter and do the rest.
We may never see the end results…
We are prophets of a future not our own.


The first quote is from the inward/outward entry of the day. The Romero quote is cited in Brian McLaren’s The Secret Message of Jesus