In today’s first reading from Deuteronomy (30) we hear:

“Choose life, then, that you and your descendants may live, by loving the Lord, your God, heeding his voice, and holding fast to him. For that will mean life for you, a long life for you to live on the land that the Lord swore he would give to your fathers Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.”

I had started my morning prayer time reflecting on another reading, this one from Blessed Franz Jägerstätter, who I have chosen (or has chosen me) as my spiritual companion this Lent.

“When something difficult comes about, whoever remains in love will receive everything for the best.”

It seems to me that these two readings are linked. God is good all the time, yet we humans make life messy and sometimes difficult for ourselves and others with our choices.

It is good to remember, to quote a well-worn phrase from fictional character Anne with an e of Lucy M. Montgomery’s Green Gables, “Tomorrow is a new day with no mistakes in it.”

We can never undo what is done, but we can face today and the days ahead by holding fast to the truth of God’s love.

Holding fast … interestingly that phrase has come to mean more to me these days, as it is a definition of resistance.

I commit in these challenging times to hold fast to goodness, love, justice, human dignity, compassion, and mercy as I follow the God of Peace. I choose life. I choose to love always, fiercely, inclusively.

Franz Jägerstätter faced hard choices in a time of extreme social sin as he refused to fight for the Nazi regime. He held fast to his love for God, his family, and the people of God at great cost. In the end he was murdered by the Nazi government. In the end following the path to love did not lead to a long life for him on earth. His memory, indeed his very name, is blessed and his witness of a life of love lives on to inspire us today.

Pray for us Blessed Franz Jägerstätter, that we may hold fast to God’s love, that we may act in love and for love and with love. Always. Amen.