Forcing an issue can burn a hole in what we are seeking. It can break it. There are times that in His mercy, God grants that we can have something we have overly sought (just as we occasionally give in to a child), but usually He puts up roadblocks, especially if something is not in our best interests. If you think back on your life (the career you may have wanted as a teenager, the girlfriends or boyfriends you would have died to have had, the material possessions you so craved), you'll find that having your way would have been to your profound long-term detriment. As the saying goes, God’s greatest grace is in unanswered prayers.

Think back. Go through life and project what would have happened if you had realized some of your fondest desires!

When we die, we will see everything that happened on earth with the clarity of new eyes. Also, we glimpse pieces of this during Communion at Mass.

The senseless will make sense. We’ll see that God changes our plans for the better. He is perfect and knows perfectly well what is best for us. We won't see that whole picture until we are on the "other side" and we may go through life holding onto an old desire. But when we do see the big picture, we'll thank God for not answering many of our most passionate requests. We'll see how prayers that He didn't answer were not answered precisely because of His love. We'll also find that many were not answered because we were violating a spiritual law. Many requests are built on inordinate desire or lust. When we're in Heaven we'll see the many gifts that were hidden in our “misfortunes.”  

Do you have everything laid out? Are you too set in your ways? Have you decided that you know everything you need to know about what you need?

When you're rigid, you create a shell and grace bounces off of it.

Think of how many ways you may be restricting yourself by being too stiff.

Sometimes this is the sole reason for unanswered prayers:

God wants you to stop yearning so earnestly and to let things unfold in His timing. What you desire may be in His plan for you, but He may be waiting for you to stop obsessing over it.

Nothing inhibits the miraculous more than trying to entirely control a situation.

The solution, after sufficient prayer, is to let go and put it into God’s Hands. That’s easier said than done, but when we step back and let God direct our lives – when we stop striving, in the belief that we must be in control -- it's miraculous how life can unfold and how peaceful it becomes.

Do not seek what others have. God gives everyone equal gifts. Often we look around and think everyone has more gifts, more “talent,” more possessions, than we do, but in fact if we have the simple gift of making someone happy, if we can love with all our hearts, if we have patience, we have the greatest gifts of all.

[adapted from Michael Brown's The God of Miracles and Secrets of the Eucharist]

[resources: Michael Brown retreat in Baton Rouge, Louisiana, Retreats announced for Seattle, Portland, and Michael Brown pilgrimage, Medjugorje]

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