Conversion isn’t easy. We don’t like to change our minds or to do and see things differently, especially when there is a cost involved. I have come to believe that deep conversion comes mainly from the experience of love.
If you can remember a time when you were in love, you may also remember willingly doing things that you could not have imagined doing. You may have driven a long distance to spend a short time with that person; taken up an activity you weren’t previously interested in because it is important to them; spent time with their family - even though you didn’t naturally warm to
them.
A friend’s teenage daughter has been in and out of hospital for the past two years with an undiagnosed illness. This mother would never have imagined living within four walls of a hospital. This is her daughter whom she loves and there is nowhere else she would want to be at this time..
Love shapes us and our lives powerfully. Ignatius’s love for God created the desire in him to do whatever would please God.
Something changes when we spend time talking and being with God. Our love for God deepens and we start to understand what breaks his heart: the destruction of the planet, the pain of violence and abuse, starving children. We come to share God’s pain and concerns because the experience of love opens our eyes to what he sees. We rejoice with God in experiences of love, beauty and gratitude. And
in seeing people reaching out to help others. We want to be with the God we love, doing what makes him happy. Our values become more like God’s and our priorities change. As we hear in a song: ‘love changes everything!’
Remember a relationship in your life that changed you for the better.
Ask God that the love between you may cause you to see as God sees and to desire to respond.
