How God Is Speaking To You Every Day

Well, hey everybody, Jonathan Doyle with you once again for The Catholic Teacher Daily Podcast. Thank you for the pleasure of your company. I hope you’re doing well wherever you are in the world. We don’t normally date the podcast, but we’re heading up towards Christmas. How you all doing? Personally, I find this to be quite a stressful time of the year. There’s a lot going on. I remember last year I was sort of surprised. I don’t very often get sick, and I found I got pretty run down on those last few days because you’re trying to do everything, and then you get this sort of come down after Christmas Day. And that’s why Advent’s so important, isn’t it? It’s so important because it reminds us to take some time and some space to have some rest so that we are prepared and ready for this special, special thing that’s happening, this beautiful fullness of the incarnation, Christ coming as a little child. It’s a moment of hope. It’s a moment of breakthrough.

Listen, I want to make sure that you’re getting the daily email from us, so we do a little daily meditation for Catholic teachers all over the world. If you’re not getting it, do me a favor today. Email me, daily@beingcatholic.com.au. That’s D-A-I-L-Y. I want you to send me an email so we can make sure I’ve got you on that list. Listen, today’s quote that we put out on the email was a beautiful quote from Pope Benedict where he’s talking about the fact that during this time of Advent, God often just comes to us in the small circumstances of each day. This has been on my mind for a while. There’s a great book and I can’t remember the author. The title of the book is called Simply Open. It’s a book that I came across when I was on holiday a few years ago, and it’s just a really simple idea that, I don’t know if you do this, but so often we can feel that when we go to pray or that we’re maybe at mass that we are desperate for God to speak to us, and that He’s going to somehow suddenly speak in an audible voice and give us an exact answer to something.

Now, He may do that. That is possible. That does happen, but what this book’s premise was is that if we are simply open, if we are aware and present to all of what’s happening in our day, then God may be speaking to us in a whole range of different circumstances. It’s such a simple idea, it’s almost hard to explain, but Pope Benedict was talking about it in today’s quote as well. It’s that in all the little circumstances of our day, God may be trying to communicate to us. So as a Catholic teacher, I want you to think about as you go through your day today, as you go through your workday, look for those moments, both of struggle and beauty where God may be communicating to you. So the question is well, how do you filter that? How do you know what’s God speaking and what’s not? Look, I like to think that whatever moves us towards love, joy, peace, the fruits of the Holy Spirit, is almost always God interacting with our lives. And then so people would go, “Well, so if it’s not that, if it’s not those things, it must not be God,” and I go, “Well look, He wastes nothing, because even in the difficulties, even in unpleasant circumstances, He can still be using those circumstances to draw us closer to Him in moments of dependence and prayer.”

So all I want to do is get you to think today as you go through your day about the small interactions you have with people, moments of blessing, moments of friendship, moments of encouragement. Somebody might encourage you or just speak to you in a way that really lifts your spirit. You might just have a moment with a student that’s particularly beautiful. Let’s begin to pivot in this Advent season to realize that these can be moments in which God is really speaking to us. It’s a beautiful thing to move from, “Well, God never speaks to me and I’ve never really heard God speak,” to going, “He’s speaking everywhere. He’s speaking in the beauty of creation. He’s speaking in the privilege of teaching young people. He’s speaking in the friendships I have with other teachers. He’s speaking in the encouragement I might get from a parent,” all these different ways, so let’s be sensitive for those moments and trust that He is speaking.

All right. I hope that’s a blessing to you. Please make sure you’re doing some self-care in this Advent season. Please make sure you’re getting some time just to look after yourself and be in stillness and allow God to speak to you. All right, God bless you. That’s all I wanted to say. My name is Jonathan Doyle. This has been The Catholic Teacher Daily Podcast. Please make sure you’ve subscribed and I’d love it if you could share this episode with someone else. God bless you, friends. My name is Jonathan Doyle, and I’m going to have another message for you tomorrow.