Disguised as Your Life
Jesus promised the disciples that he would reveal himself to them through the Holy Spirit. So, it is for us. Christ reveals himself to us through the Holy Spirit. Spiritual writer and storyteller Paula D’Arcy puts it this way, “God comes to you disguised as your life.”
So, think about it. If asked, what do you think it means when we say, “God comes to you disguised as your life”? If you want, take a moment to share that with someone near you.
As I think about that question a few things come to mind for me. It was Jan 31, 1996. It was between assignments. Good friends Jim and Nan Emmer had invited me out to visit their parish. It was the first time I ever thought about an assignment at St. Victoria. Jan 31,1996, that was the day I recognized Jesus coming to me disguised as my life.
I was Feb 15, 2000. It would be the last time I would be on a freeway without anyone else in the car. With my eyes suddenly going bad it would be the last time I drove a car, legally that is. Feb 15, 2000, that was another day that I recognized Jesus coming to me disguised as my life.
It was March 19, 2025, that was the day I first met Lee and Valiree Sondeno and their kids Elise and Miles. Little did I know then that a short time later Lee would be on our parish staff working with outreach to young adults and now with a support person that Lee would be stepping into Deacon ray’s shoes as parish business administrator. When I saw how that came together that was yet another day that I recognized Jesus coming to me disguised as my life.
If the God who walks with us is with us in every moment of our lives in both the good times and the challenging times then he will come to us disguised as our lives.
In today’s Gospel passage from John 14 when it came time for Jesus to leave his disciples, he promised them that the Father would give them an “advocate to be with them always.”
This meant that although Jesus wouldn’t be physically present to his disciples the way he was those three years that he walked with them on the dusty roads of Galilee that he would be with them in a new way. It’d be his presence working in them through the power of the Holy Spirit.
And so, for us, although Christ is not physically present to us the way he was those three years walking with his disciples on the dusty roads of Galilee that he is with us in a new way. It’s his presence working in us through the power of the Holy Spirit.
Though we may not have been there in person with Jesus like the disciples were Christ is no less real to us as he comes to us disguised as our lives. So, this week look for him. And then when you least suspect, you’ll see him standing there disguised as your life. and when you recognize that you’re life will be anything but boring.