Seeking Consistency

By: Rick Hernandez

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“As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in Me” (John 15:4)
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Good wine comes from good grapes, and good grapes come from good vines, but a good vine can come from either good or bad terrain. The terrain helps determine how much effort the vine has to put in to be productive, and it also helps determine the characteristics of the grape the vine produces. In the Christian life, we often hear, “thrive where you are planted,” this is consistent with the metaphor of our lives as the branches of the vine. 

Christ can make something good out of our every situation, especially when we stay close to Him. That means that we have to embrace our life in Him, we have to become good branches of the vine wherever it is planted, and that means we want to grow to be consistent, for we do not want our fruit to vary much from time to time. We want to be able to produce good wine every time.
 
The good Christian strives to be consistent throughout. Let us think about food for a moment. Do you ever taste something unevenly seasoned without thinking something is not quite right? It is the same with us...

​“So then, my beloved, obedient as you have always been, not only when I am present but all the more now when I am absent, work out your salvation with fear and trembling. For God is the one who, for his good purpose, works in you both to desire and to work. Do everything without grumbling or questioning, that you may be blameless and innocent, children of God without blemish in the midst of a crooked and perverse generation, [I] among whom you shine like lights in the world, as you hold on to the word of life, so that my boast for the day of Christ may be that I did not run in vain or labor in vain. But, even if I am poured out as a libation[m] upon the sacrificial service of your faith, I rejoice and share my joy with all of you. In the same way, you also should rejoice and share your joy with me.” (Philippians 2-12:18)

We need to work on our interior life so that the person we are may be defined by our faith in the Most-High, and that our faith may permeate and infuse our external life with the Christ-like quality we receive from communion with our Lord. The mind does control the body, the same as thought controls the action. We must remember that our minds are forged by our experience. So what are the experiences that we seek? Do they bring us closer to Christ? Do we keep Him in mind when we go out into the world?
 
Our Christian consistency is built and maintained by those experiences we seek. We forge minds and spirits by seeking to experience Christ in the world. For us believers, Heaven is partially here, for we can find Christ in the Eucharist and each other, but only if we seek it as such and recognize it as such. What is our desire while on this Earth?
 
May we stay close to our Lord and bear good fruit. Amen.

Rick Hernandez

Rick Hernandez is a commonsense Catholic, Lay Associate of the Blessed Sacrament and a Director for Elisheba House. He lives in Trinity, Florida, with his wife Ivonne and their children. He also writes for the Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament's Daily Eucharistic Reflections and for Catholicmom.com.