Each New Day: An Occasion to Live for God
O how happy and blessed are you, who still live on the earth because of the many blessings you can merit. If only a person knew how much he could merit everyday, his heart would fill with great happiness … each morning as he rose, because of the new day in which he could live for God. (OOCC, X, pp. 122 - 123; STA, 179)
St. Vincent Pallotti believed that life here on earth is a blessing God bestows on every human person. All those who are living on the earth are blessed. For the world and its situations provide each person with many opportunities to do good actions and obtain great merit. Therefore, he asks everyone who lives in this world to accept his everyday living with a sense of gratitude to God, just as our Blessed Mother Mary lived. Each day of a person’s life here on earth is an occasion to live for God. This thought filled St. Vincent’s heart with great happiness. He woke up each morning with great gladness in his heart because he knew that the new day presented him with countless opportunities to reach out to others in God’s name, to speak to others on behalf of God, to proclaim the word of God, to assist those in need, and to bring peace and joy to the sorrowful. If a person approaches his life on earth with this attitude, his life’s goal becomes serving God by serving all those in need. With this goal to guide him each day of his life, his life here on earth becomes more fruitful and meaningful, because he becomes the means through whom others experience the loving presence and touch of God.
Do I consider my life on earth as a blessing or a burden? Am I happy that God has placed me in this world? Am I grateful to God for my life here on earth? Do I believe that each new day is an opportunity to live for God? Do I plan to spend each day fruitfully and meaningfully? Does “serving God by serving those in need” become the goal of my life each day?
For to me, living means opportunities for Christ, and dying – well, that is better yet. But if living will give me more opportunities to win people to Christ, then I really don’t know which is better, to live or to die! … But the fact is that I can be of more help to you by staying! (Phil. 2: 21-22, 24)