Saint Paul says that "all things work together for good to them that love God." And as this maxim is used very often, when we are treating of the spiritual life it is important that we should quite understand the meaning of it, that we should discern the reason of it and examine its consequences.
First of all, the Apostle says, "all things." He excepts nothing. All the events of Providence, whether fortunate or unfortunate, everything that has to do with health, or wealth, or reputation; every condition of life, all the different interior states through which we may have to pass desolations, dryness, disgust, weariness, temptations, all this is to be for the advantage of those who love God; and more than this, even our faults, even our sins. We must be resolved never to offend God willfully; but if unfortunately we do offend Him, our very offences, our very crimes may be made use of for our advantage, if we really love God. We have only to remember David, we have only to remember Saint Peter, whose sins only served to make them more holy afterwards, that is to say, more humble, more grateful to God, more full of love.
"All things work together for good" It is not a temporal good, not an earthly good. The Gospel warns us of that often enough. We are no longer under the dominion of the law, which promised temporal rewards to those who observed it; but we are under the rule of grace, which only announce? to those who wish to walk in the way of perfection crosses and persecutions, and only promises to their spiritual rewards. This is not difficult to understand: all things work together for the spiritual good of those that love God. Nevertheless, we must understand this good not according to our own ideas, which are often mistaken, but according to the designs of God. If there is one subject more than another upon which we are liable to be deceived, it is upon all that concerns our spiritual interests. We form the most false ideas about it, and often consider that as hurtful to our soul which is in reality most useful, and also that as advantageous which is in reality full of harm. Our self-love leads us on this matter into the strangest delusions. We must therefore believe but with a belief that is born of faith, and that does not rest on our own judgment that our true good and our true advantage is found in the events of Divine Providence, and in all the different interior states through which God makes us pass, although often we cannot understand what God means to do with us, and are quite ignorant as to what the end of these things is to be.
But all these Divine arrangements are only a good for those who love God, that is to say, for those whose will is united and submissive to the will of God those who in His service consider before all things the interests of God, the glory of God, and the accomplishment of His good pleasure who are ready to sacrifice to Him everything without exception, and who are persuaded that there is nothing better for a creature than to be lost in God and for God, because it is the only means of finding one's self again in Him: this is what I call loving God truly, and with one's whole heart. And this is what Jesus Christ meant when He said, "He that loves his soul shall lose it; and he that loses his soul for My sake shall find it in eternal life." Whoever loves God in this manner is quite certain, and certain with an infallible certainty, that everything that God wills or permits with regard to him will be for his good, and even for his greatest good. He will not see it at the moment, because it is essential that he should not see it, and the sacrifices he has to make would not be accomplished if he did see it, but he will see it at the proper time. He will admire the wisdom and the infinite goodness of God in the wonderful way in which He leads the souls which belong to Him entirely; and he will see with astonishment that the very things which he feared would be for his hopeless ruin are those which have made his salvation assured.
It is not difficult to understand upon what foundation Saint Paul based this maxim.
God alone has the right idea of what sanctity is; He alone knows, and He alone has at His disposal, the means which can lead us to it. He alone also knows what is in the secret depths of our souls, our sentiments, our natural character, and the obstacles which are to be found there against our sanctity; He alone knows what secret motives will move us, and how to bring us to the end which He intends for our sanctification without in any way constraining our free-will. He knows what effect such and such an event, such and such a temptation, such and such a trial, will produce upon us; and on His part all is prepared that it may have good success. God has loved us from all eternity; He loved us first before we could love Him, and there is nothing in us that is good, either in the order of nature or grace, which He has not given to us. He loves us with a love that is infinitely wise, infinitely enlightened; He loves us not so much with regard to this present life, which is only passing away, only a time of trial, but with regard to the future life, which is our destination and our final end. If then it is true that everything that happens here to the servants of God is over-ruled and arranged by infinite Love and Wisdom for their eternal happiness, it can only be through their own fault if the designs of God are not fulfilled; and if one single event happens which does not conduce to their spiritual advantage, it is most certainly through their want of love and trust, and their failing in conformity to the will of God. For, as long as they love God with a real, effective, and practical love, it is impossible for anything in the world to keep them back; on the contrary, everything will help to their advancement in perfection, and will contribute to it.
The consequences of this maxim of the Apostle extend to everything, and embrace every moment of life. The first is, that if we wish to make sure of our salvation, as far as it is possible to do so, we must give ourselves up, we must abandon ourselves to God without reserve and for ever; we must not wish to dispose of ourselves in anything; we must foresee nothing, arrange nothing, determine nothing, except in the most entire dependence upon God's good pleasure; we must not make one step or one single movement to take ourselves out of the actual situation where we are placed by the order of God; we must not even desire to come out of it; but we must allow ourselves, so to speak, to be drawn by the thread of Divine Providence, and submit to every event as it happens: and as to what regards our innermost soul, we must remain quiet, and without having any fears about the state in which God chooses us to be, without wishing for the change or the end of this state, however painful it may be to human nature.
The second conclusion to be drawn is, that when we have contributed nothing to bring about a certain event, either exterior or interior, we may be quite sure that this event or this disposition of soul is the will of God for us, and consequently that it is the very best thing for us at the present moment. Thus we ought to be very careful not to have a contrary opinion, nor to think that such and such a thing is unfortunate for us, or that it will do harm to our spiritual progress, or that God has forsaken us and will take no more care of us. We are very apt to judge in this manner when we find no more pleasure in our spiritual exercises, when we feel no longer that sweet peace and tranquillity of soul which we once enjoyed, when we are attacked by violent temptations, when God takes away from us all exterior support, even when He separates us from a person in whom we had placed all our confidence. Then we think all is lost, because we see ourselves alone and without a guide. But we are quite mistaken. God never acts so efficaciously as when He acts by Himself, and when He takes away all external and sensible help; and His grace is never more real and strong that when we have no sensible proof of it. And our cause for assurance is never greater than when we think we have lost all assurance. But the chief thing is to know how to put our trust in God alone, in utter abandonment, in bare faith, without any reasonings or reflections, confiding ourselves and our interests entirely into the hands of God. It is then that, hoping against hope, we must say to ourselves, "Yes, I believe most firmly that all this will be for my good, and that if I abandon myself entirely to God I shall not be confounded."
The third conclusion to be drawn is, that when we have once given ourselves to God we must expect all kinds of sacrifices, and above all the sacrifice of our own will and our own judgment; we must expect to meet with many things in God's dealings with us which will strangely try our reason, and will oblige us not to listen to its voice at all. We must expect all sorts of things that are most displeasing to our senses and most mortifying, all sorts of sufferings and humiliations, all sorts of interior and exterior disturbances which we could never foresee, which pass all our conceptions, and of which neither spiritual books nor the experience of others could ever give us the least idea. Finally, we must expect that God will carry fire and sword into the very depths of our hearts, that He will root out and burn up our self-love entirely, and that He will leave us nothing of our own. This is undoubtedly very terrible to human nature; but the love of God, if it is what it ought to be, and if we allow it to do with us as He pleases, will dispose us for all these sacrifices, and will not allow us to omit one. How could the maxim of Saint Paul be true, if among all the things which God requires of a soul, there was one single one that was not for her spiritual and eternal advantage, and which therefore she thought she might refuse to God? No: the Apostle says, "all things;" and that great and noble soul who, following the example of Jesus Christ, wished that he might even be accursed without however any fault on his own part for the sake of the salvation of the Jews, his brothers, never thought that such a wish, so glorious to God, and so in conformity with the sentiments of Jesus Christ, could do otherwise than turn to his own advantage. However great our sacrifices may be, they can never come up to those of our Divine Master; and if His immolation of Himself, which was perfect, has procured for His Sacred Humanity a glory and happiness above all that we can express or imagine; we may believe with a firm faith that our immolation, imperfect as it may be, will procure for us a glory and happiness in proportion to the extent and the generosity of the sacrifice.
- taken from Manual for Interior Souls, by Father Jean Nicolas Grou