Grace bank

By: Francis B. Ongkingco April 25,2015 - 12:44 AM

Today’s culture of mobile gadgetry has most of us getting battery conscious. Connectivity for professional, social and leisurely reasons is highly prized. One can no longer afford to have his gadgets running low during critical moments like a call closing a business deal, sending a message or video to a loved one across the world, or playing one’s favorite online game on a smartphone.

Despite recent advances to improve battery life, consumers will always want greater power capacity. And even though it is unlikely we will run low on power in the middle of some tropical forest or mountain, our mobile restlessness will never be satisfied by the millions of power outlets civilization affords us. The solution to this restless power-hungry mobile trend? The power bank!

A power bank is nothing more than a glorified rechargeable battery to charge digital devices. These storage devices are prized for how much power they can store or how many gadgets they can fully charge before needing to be charged itself.

When our gadgets signal low power levels, we confidently whip out our banks to whimsically recharge on the go.

Similar to power banks, our souls receive and store grace and we have a mission to gracefully charge others. But before that, we must be grace-charged ourselves. Now, what indicators would help us know that we are running low on the much-needed power of God’s grace? First, we must understand what grace is, and second, how to increase our ‘grace capacity.’

Grace is obviously not a material resource like engine fuel or electricity.  Fortunately, it cannot be mathematically measured, otherwise, it would reduce us to simple machines incapable of loving. Grace is an indispensable reality for man. His life here on earth and one day life in communion with God, the angels and the saints depend on it.

The peculiarity of grace is that only God can give it. Nothing in man’s personal qualities or strength, nor anything in the world is able to give grace. To this we add that the efficacy of grace cannot be quantified because of its infinite quality.

Even the ‘tiniest grace,’ for example, in faithfully making the Sign of the Cross, can have tremendous effects on the person. The only measure for grace is found in two possible attitudes towards it: either we open ourselves to it and grow or we don’t.

We are ordinarily and first ‘charged’ by this supernatural gift in baptism. The grace proper to the sacrament has one purpose: removing original sin. Only baptism can remove this sin which is transmitted through human nature from the sin of pride and disobedience of the first man and woman. Simultaneously, baptism activates the soul by endowing it with sanctifying grace and the theological virtues of faith, hope and love.

From this point onward, what is left on the part of the soul is to grow in its capacity to receive and correspond to God’s grace. Like energy packs with certain limits of how much power they can store, the only limiting factor of the soul depends on the person’s openness to this marvelous supernatural gift of God.

So how do we maintain ourselves so that we aren’t only charged but actually increase the quality of our response to it? In the first place, let’s make sure not to drain ourselves and lose the state of grace. The ‘state of grace’ is not a ‘static state’ but one meant to receive and channel more grace. There are many who are sadly satisfied ‘being simply in this static state’ but never grow in the quality of their love and self-giving to God and neighbor.

The danger of passively being in a ‘state of grace,’ which I like to call a ‘dormant or lazy state of grace,’ is precariously only waiting for critical signals or drastic symptoms before recharging spiritually. For example, only when one has difficult trials, temptations or challenges upon his faith and convictions. Or worse, when one falls into mortal sin which totally drains grace from the soul and separates it from God, and leaves it inactivated from meriting anything from God.

Fortunately, unlike power banks, one can spiritually recharge quite rapidly by going to a sincere and contrite confession. This doesn’t mean, however, that one can take mortal sin casually because one can go to confession anyway. One cannot take short-circuiting-grace-to-zero lightly, especially since this reveals an unloving and ungrateful attitude towards God and His gifts. And most importantly, because one cannot foolishly risk playing with an indispensable ingredient that could in a second forever seal our destiny between now and eternity: union with God or losing Him forever.

But rather than focus on how to prevent losing ‘grace’ it is better to know how we can grow constantly in it. Since grace only comes from God, our attitude should be a constant desire to receive whatever grace He may send, be grateful for it, correspond to it and share it to the extent possible with others. Moreover, unlike electrical energy where giving means losing, in the spiritual perspective, the more we channel grace, the more charged we are with it.

So how exactly do we maintain ourselves in grace and grow in it? Here are a few ideas:

a) Always plugged. Keep a daily plan of grace. This is a set of norms, devotions, work and formation that we reasonably commit ourselves to. Remember, a day without having prayed is having lived the day like an animal or a stone.
b) Go for grace boosters. Take advantage of the booster sources of grace: the Sacraments! Frequent confession and if possible, going to Mass –where the author of grace Himself is received– more than the usual weekly obligation.
c) Economize. Less for self, more for God and others. Strive to use time well and always for the glory of God and neighbor. A good measure of this is to end the day and to be able to say, as St. Josemaría used to pray, “Thank you Lord, because today I have not thought about myself.”
d) Rewiring. Examining our conscience and sincerely detecting areas where we might lack refinement in some pious practice, virtues or apostolic commitments. More than seeking where we have sinned seriously, seek where to put more love in what we are doing.
e) Grace evaluation sessions. Consult someone who can wisely and prudently evaluate how we ‘render’ the gift of grace. This can be done by regularly seeing a spiritual director or coach, with whom we can also take up the abovementioned points.

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