“God’s Love Affair With Us”
Shandra Emrich
When the Word speaks in Scripture He frequently likens the relationship between Himself and His people to a marriage. But what does the life giving human institution of marriage have to do with how God relates to us? How can this nuptial relationship with God grow and develop in a real and concrete way in our lives? Although it may seem too simple, the answer is primarily through the Sacraments! In our earthly exile, as we await heaven, Our Lord pursues us, romances our hearts and draws us always closer to His Sacred Heart through the Sacraments.
In the fullness of time, He came to us by indissolubly uniting His divine nature to our human nature in the hypostatic union. No longer a distant deity, He is now close to us, intimately near us, able to draw us to Himself through His sacred humanity. At the end of His earthly life, His desire to remain with us was not abated, so when He ascended into heaven, He had a plan to stay with us always. In His tender, gentle generosity, He stays with us by means of the Sacraments. It reminds me of a powerful and lovely firework! Just as a firework ascends into the sky and explodes into a million fiery sparks that slowly descend, His Heart, burning with passionate love for each soul, ascends into heaven at the Ascension. But He does not stay distant from us, high in the sky and unreachable! He comes back to us, showering His burning love and graces on us in a billion sacramental encounters in which His fiery love enters the depths of our souls.
Jesus first begins to pursue our hearts before we are even Catholic though the gratuitous gift of prevenient grace. He captivates and attracts us in so many ways, showing us glimpses of Himself in truth, beauty and goodness. If we are open to His advances, we cannot help but be drawn into a desire to be more deeply intimate with Him. We begin to respond to Him by allowing Him to move our hearts and show us Who and where He is. He leads us to His Body, the Church, and He reveals more and more about Himself when we are catechumens. The more He reveals about Himself, the more lovable and attractive He is!
Baptism is like a wedding with the One Who has enamored our hearts. He purifies us in the Baptismal waters so we become a spotless bride, wearing a white garment to signify our purity, just as a bride wears a white wedding dress. Our Beloved comes into our souls in sanctifying grace, His own divine life dwelling within us. He elevates us from mere paupers to members of His royal family, adopted children of the King. He transforms us from a lowly status to one fit for a marriage to royalty.
The romance continues is Confirmation, when a character is again imprinted on our souls. This conforms us even more closely to Jesus, and our souls come to look even more like Him. Just as human lovers spend so much time with their beloved that they begin to take on the habits and attitudes of each other, so we begin to have a greater likeness to Jesus as we grow in intimacy with Him through Confirmation.
Yet even after this, our Beloved longs for a still more deep and perfect union with His bride. Each time we enter His Eucharistic presence in a church He is like the groom at a wedding, waiting at the altar for His bride. His heart thrills with joy once His bride finally appears at the back of the church, when He sees us walking in. He desires the consummation of this marriage, a physical and spiritual union of persons. So He humbly, lovingly, and gently gives Himself to us in Holy Communion. He holds nothing back, but gives Himself entirely to us, Body, Blood, Soul and Divinity in the most intimate embrace possible. While He is physically present within us He is very close to our heart, as close as He can get, so as to love us not from a far distance – but as near and dear as can be. And He does not desire this consummation only once, but again and again! He wants to unite Himself with us, every day if we let Him!
We cannot destroy His love and desire for us by our weakness and sinfulness. If we separate ourselves from Him by sinning, He waits for us in Confession, longing to forgive our unfaithfulness and bring us back to full intimacy with Himself by His indwelling presence through sanctifying grace. His voice calls to us through our conscience, inviting us to return to Him. His mercy is irresistible! He wants nothing more than to reconcile with us, shower us with His mercy and restore our relationship to fullness again. As we live this relationship of love through the Sacraments, we live in ever closer communion with the One Who is pursuing us. Everyone wants to be desired, and Christ desires us passionately, drawing us to Himself with His enamoring perfumes.
Frequent reception of the Sacraments constantly draws us into higher and higher levels of union with Him. Inevitably we find ourselves desiring frequent conversation with Him, and this is called prayer. Since He is present within us, we can easily converse with Him during dedicated prayer times and throughout the day as well. Our ever deepening relationship with Him can even lead to mystical experiences of our Beloved as He gives us foretastes of heaven and the perfect union we will share with Him there.