Drinking the Chalice to the Last Drop

I can't tell you how glad I am that tomorrow is a holiday. Not that I am so desperate for some time off, but I will take what I can get. It always seems like something infringes upon my day off, like a funeral or another church event. The only bad thing is that it is really cold here. I mean, it is Florida and since we have been back from Texas, we have had two hard freezes. Below freezing in Florida? I remember commenting on this phenomenon and someone reminding me we did not live in Miami. And is it interesting at all how often we hear "interesting" discussions about the validity of such a holiday when it is the only American holiday that celebrates a Christian minister, who just happened to be black? Well, that is a question for another day.

I have been reading the book Mother Teresa~Come Be My Light, and I must admit that it is a difficult read for me. I have found so many of my own questions within her early writings. After she had moved to Calcutta, but shortly after she became a Loreto nun, she wrote the following:

Surely you want some news also about me. One thing, pray much for me--I need prayer now more than ever. I want to be only all for Jesus--truly and not only by name and dress. Many times this goes upside down--so my most reverend "I" gets the most important place. Always the same Gonxha [Teresa's Albanian name]. Only one thing is different--my love for Jesus--I would give everything, even life itself, for Him. It sounds nice but in reality it is not so easy. And just that I want, that it not be easy. Do you remember once you told me in Skopje: "Gonxha, you want to drink the chalice to the last drop." I do not know if at that time, I thought as I do now, but now yes, and that joyfully even without a tear . . . . It does not go so easily when a person has to be on one's feet from morning till evening. But still, everything is for Jesus; so like that everything is beautiful, even though it is difficult.

And shortly thereafter she wrote:

Why must we give ourselves fully to God? Because God has given Himself to us. If God who owes nothing to us is ready to impart to us no less than Himself, shall we answer with just a fraction of ourselves? To give ourselves fully to God is a means of receiving God Himself. I for God and God for me. I live for God and give up my own self, and in this way induce God to live for me. Therefore to possess God we must allow Him to possess our soul.

Maybe one day I will be there, but not today. I am longing for a day when I will be able to give over all control to God, so that I can be fully His and allow Him to live for me. I wonder what freedom lies in drinking the chalice to the last drop?

I heard this great line from the movie My Big Fat Greek Wedding: "Don't let your past dictate who you are but let it be part of who you become." I am still looking for the day when I will not allow fears from the past to dictate who I am now. I am encouraged that one day the problems of today will not dictate my future. And maybe that day will be the day when I can drink the chalice to the last drop . . . and be satisfied with just Jesus. Pray for me much.