Deciding to say YES to an invitation is not always easy…particularly if it is not an invitation you are expecting or have desired to receive. If you are like me, you prefer to make decisions based on having all the facts clearly laid out…with the list of pros and cons fully completed and pondered over.
Decisions come easy when we can see as if standing at the top of a mountain…where the vista is clearly visible before us…where all the pitfalls or potential dangers can be seen and assessed well beforehand. If not a mountain-top then perhaps from a level plain with nothing to obscure the view of the landscape lying ahead, so there are no surprises lurking in the undergrowth.
However, if we think of Mary and her YES at the moment of the Annunciation or perhaps Joseph when he was approached by the angel too – they were not well prepared in human terms, they did not really know how their lives would change, would be affected, by their YES to God.
And so it is for us – we cannot always know the full picture…sometimes we have to have the courage to trust that it is God’s call, heard somewhere deep within that asks for our response. We will not have the full picture of the future but we will have the Lord as our guide, our friend, our mentor if we choose to set out on the journey and see where it leads.
So as we celebrate the Feast of the Annunciation this year let us be open to the invitation…open to the possibility that lies ahead…open to the future designed by the hand of God…
Karen OSU