Only God Saves

Invite others to pray with you this Lent. Share the Rosary and win a pilgrimage with School of Faith!

One

Do we really believe that God will make us perfectly happy?

One of the things that’s really hard to remember is that only God satisfies.

If we really remember that union with God, beginning here in contemplation and perfectly completed in Heaven, meant the fulfillment of every desire, that he’s our only hope for ultimate happiness, well, then we’d actually be able to focus on Him. We’d never let Him out of our sight, and we’d make sure everything we did brought us closer to Him. Just like castaways in a lifeboat would keep their eyes and their energies focused like a laser on the first sign of land they spotted.

But how do we remember that God is our ultimate happiness? How do we keep in mind that He is the satisfaction of every desire? How do not forget that God alone satisfies?

Two

What do we desire?

One way to meditate on how God is the fulfillment of all desire is to actually stop and think about our desires.

At the end of the day, all human desires can probably be boiled down to just a handful of desires. There are certain things we all want. These are the motives that drive all our actions, every decision. 

So what do you want? What are all the things you want? If you list them, you might find that God is the one who satisfies them all.

Three

The goods we desire

You could probably make a lot of different lists of all the things you want and they might look a bit different but the important thing is to capture every basic human desire and motivation. 

For example:

We all want physical goods. We all want things like health and rest and nutrition and hydration. That’s one. 

We all want beauty. That’s why we watch movies and listen to music and are attracted to people of the opposite sex and why we decorate and clean our houses. That’s two. 

We all want to achieve something. That’s why we compete in sports and try to do something worthwhile in our work, and why we form families. We want what we do to matter. So that’s three. 

We all want to know things. We want truth, which is why we read the news and watch informative videos and listen to podcasts, and value education generally. So that’s four. 

We all want inner peace. We want to not be conflicted, or anxious, or depressed. The search for inner peace is why we go to therapists, and why some people do yoga or practice mindfulness. So that’s five.

We all want loving relationships with other human beings. That’s why we want friends and family, why they’re so important to us. We are social animals, and other people mean so much to us. So that’s six. 

We also all want some relationship with persons that are beyond the human. This is why there are so many religions, and why even atheists are so desperate to try to make contact with aliens. Because we all want to believe that there is a world of persons beyond the human, and that we can somehow access that world.

Now, obviously, there are going to be lots of things that include more than just one of these goods, like reading a novel with a friend will give you beauty and friendship. Making a family will give you love and achievement and the physical goods involved in reproduction. 

But, basically, everything everything we do is for one of these basic goods. And, it turns out, that union with God in contemplation here on earth and finally in Heaven is the satisfaction of all of them.

Four

God as the satisfaction of all desire

Union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire for physical good. Jesus is the resurrection and the life. He offers us a new, perfect, immortal, glorified body, no more hunger or disease or weakness or death. 

Union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire for beauty. God is pure beauty, we can gaze in wonder at His astounding rightness for eternity, and never get bored. Plus, He will show us the intricacies, the plot twists, and the surprise endings, of the supreme story that contains all stories – the story of the world. The story of the world He has made, tat He has invented for our delight. 

So, Heaven is sheer beauty. 

Union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire for achievement. Here on earth, we can doubt whether any of our projects or successes were ever really worth anything. But when you hear God say, “Well done, good and faithful servant,” you will know without a doubt hand forever, that you have really achieved something of eternal value. 

Union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire for truth. God is pure truth, just as He is pure beauty. He has the answers to all our questions. Why did this happen? Why was this allowed? What good could have possibly justified this evil? Who was right? Who was wrong? How did everything work out in the end? The truth will be wonderful, it will be delightful, and it will be yours when you are with God. 

Union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire for inner peace. The Lord says, “Come to me, all who labor and are weary, and I will give you rest.” Rest from our neuroses, and our guilt, our agitation, and our troubled minds and memories. Everything inside us will be put to rights by the Divine Physician. 

We will be well when we hear Christ say, “Peace be with you, my peace I give you.” 

Inside us then, finally, there will be peace. 

Union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire for loving relationships with human beings. God Himself became a human being, He became our brother, our friend. We will look on the divine nature, but we will also look on the human nature of Christ, and we will bow down before Him, and we will embrace Him. And we will embrace the saints, and all our family who have come before us. And we will never be lonely or isolated or misunderstood again.

Finally, union with God is the ultimate satisfaction of our desire to go beyond humanity. We will reign with those mysterious beings, the angels. And we will look on the face of God, the Creator of the Universe Himself.

Five

The Fulfillment of All Desire

Castaways set adrift at sea on a lifeboat, when they finally get land in sight, they don’t lose sight of that land, and they make sure everything they do helps them get there because all their hopes depend on getting to that land.

So too, the fulfillment of every desire we have, ultimately, depends on us getting to God. 

So, let’s not let Heaven out of our sight. And let’s make sure everything we do gets us closer, and not farther, from the fulfillment of all our desires.