You will be hated by everyone because of me, but the one who stands firm to the end will be saved. Matthew 10:22
“In His kindness, our Lord wished to strengthen your faith… He also wished to listen to your prayer, and so He ordained that you experience poverty, distress, abandonment, weariness, and universal scorn… God alone knows the reason for all this, yet we cannot recognize three causes. In the first place, our blessed Lord is telling you that He desires to include you among His beloved sons… for this is the way He treats His friends and makes them holy. The second reason is that He is asking you to grow continually in your confidence in Him alone and not in others… So if you have been endowed with faith and hope, He will do great things for you; He will raise up the lowly… Now there is a third reason. God wishes to test you like gold in the furnace. The dross is consumed by the fire, but the pure gold remains and its value increases… If then you remain constant in faith in the face of trial, the Lord will give you peace and rest for a time in this world, and forever in the next.”
Gerolamo Emiliani (1486-1537) in Letter as recounted Milton Walsh in Witness of the Saints: Patristic Readings in the Liturgy of the Hours (San Francisco: Ignatius Press, 2012) 684.
Today’s Scripture represents one of those verses we don’t tend to think much about. Jesus promises that we will experience hatred because of our association with Him.
I appreciated today how Emiliani approached this in his letter. He explains that this scorn has a purpose which is our continued growth and the strengthening of our faith.
Do you feel like you are being tested? I know I feel this way, often. Faith is like a muscle: the more we use it the stronger it gets, but also the bigger the challenges get.
Stand fast. This ensures that your generosity will stand the test of the refiner’s fire. “But He knows the way that I take; when He has tested me, I will come forth as gold.” Job 23:10
Why reference this verse? It’s not if you will be tested but when. Jesus neither needs nor wants you and me to do good things for Him. He wants us to let go of everything else and everyone else.
Remain constant. Put your trust in the One who raises up the lowly. He will do great things for you. And you will come forth as gold and find peace and rest, now and forever.