In today’s reading, Paul encourages Timothy to stir up among his flock “the grace of God that is within you.” What is this grace? In the prayers that follow my reflections, I often pray that God would grant us an “abundance of grace.” I don’t use that phrase lightly. I always pray that God would infuse us with an abundance of grace.

But, once again, what is grace? Luke writes in his Gospel that the angel Gabriel’s salutation to Mary at the Annunciation was “Hail Mary full of grace.” We repeat that expression every time we say the Hail Mary. Mary was full of grace because she was so in tune with God. She was the mother of the Redeemer because she lived her whole life in the reality of the Trinity.

But we, too, as Paul exhorts, live our lives in tune with “the grace that is within us.” Grace is God’s gift to us. That is a great realization. When I was growing up in the 1950s, there was much focus on how we could “earn’ grace. If we said specific prayers, attended 7 First Friday or First Saturday Masses, wore a Scapular or a Miraculous Medal, or made certain novenas, we “earned” specific “promises’ from God.

We don’t earn grace. We are gifted with grace. It is grace, the very life of the Trinity, freely bestowed on us, that calls us to prayer, to get up early for a morning Mass, to spend our time and treasure in directly serving those incarnations of the person of Jesus who are hungry, homeless, lost in sorrow at the death of a loved one, a refugee who feels unloved and fearful, the sick and dying, the elderly among us who live lonely lives. The Spiritual, “T’was grace that brought us safe thus so far and grace will lead us on.” should be our mantra.

Let Us Pray:

O God of all kindness, mercy, love, and forgiveness, fill us with an abundance of your grace that we might be your eyes, your heart, feet, and hands as we minister to those most in need of hope, love, kindness, tenderness, and understanding, They are all you incarnate and, as we worship you, we serve and love them. Amen.