Aug 13 Sun
Fight, correspond to Jesus’ friendship. In weakness, in fatigue, in the most difficult situations, Jesus never fails his friends. He does not pass us by.
When Jesus came to them over the waters, the Apostles were filled with peace. Then Peter addressed to Jesus a request full of boldness and courage: "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water". And the Master, who was still a few yards away from the boat, answered him, "Come". Peter had great faith, and exchanged the security of the boat for confidence in the Lord's words: getting out of the boat, he began to walk on the water towards Jesus. It was an impressive moment of firmness and love.
But Peter stopped looking at Jesus, paid more attention to the difficulties around him, and when he saw that the wind was so strong, he was frightened. He forgot for a moment that the strength that sustained him over the water did not depend on circumstances, but on the will of the Lord, who dominates heaven and earth, life and death, nature, the winds, the sea.... Peter began to sink, not because of the state of the sea, but because of his lack of trust in the One who can do all things.
And he cried out to Jesus, Lord save me! And immediately Jesus, stretching out his hand, held him and said to him, "O man of little faith, why did you doubt?" Christ is the firm handhold to which we must cling in moments of weakness or tiredness… when we see that we are sinking. Steadfast in our prayer, we will tell him “Lord save me,".
Sometimes the Christian stops looking at Jesus and fixes his attention on other things that take him away from God, and put him in danger of losing his faith in Jesus, and of sinking, if he does not react promptly.
From the moment someone begins not to see clearly his faith or the Christian vocation received from God, "let him examine himself sincerely. He will discover that, for some time, his life of piety has become somewhat relaxed, his prayer has been rare or less attentive, and he is less demanding of himself. He no longer fights against his passions with energy, and even indulges himself in them with complacency. He keeps some resentment against another; his honesty is not total. He maintains a friendship too absorbing, or that awakens his low instincts. All these, if are not promptly rejected, raise a dark cloud between God and us. And faith becomes obscured" (Chevrot).
There is a danger, then, of blaming this guilty situation on external circumstances, when the evil is rather in one's own heart.
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