A Road To Die On
20 desires of a life well lived to enjoy a death worth dying (A Reflection)
I am young. Only 34. I have seen many men and women snatched away in the most unlikely of times. Life here is a vapor and then I stand before Christ. So, I ponder the path of my life up to that day and I hope you do, too. What are my desires? What am I doing? What am I proclaiming as I’m here? Is it only myself that I want flaunted around like something to admire? Or do I really love Christ more than all? Very important questions. So I hope that the 20 desires below follow me up to my last breath. I hope you consider your own life and take it serious. One day, it will be returned to God.
Delight in the word of God as much as possible
Enjoy Christ and aim to savor him over everything
Live a life against sin, not complacent to it.
Be the same in my private life as I am in my public life.
Love my wife authentically and consistently with what I’ve been given in Christ love for me.
Love my Children in such a way that makes them see Christ as most desirable in all the world.
Love my brothers and sisters in Christ with my full affection.
Love my neighbors with grace and humility.
Work diligently
Be very generous with all I have.
Not end in a life filled with shame. A ship-wrecked life given in to sinful passions.
Live in a willingness to stand and die for Christ sake, if he calls me to that end.
Don’t live a life that is absorbed with trinkets and toys.
Don’t be consumed with desire for riches or fame.
Be open about my weaknesses, never pretending to be someone important, but to be someone needing and loving the grace found in Christ.
Keep my life clean of all desires and lust for the opposite sex, that would bring shame and contempt on my wife and children. Let my eyes be used in such a way that they turn from anything that robs them from their joy in Christ and what his grace has provided me.
Not spend the time given to me in pointless scrollings and mindless entertainment.
Use my mind and senses for the knowledge and enjoyment of Christ.
Live a life that pleases Christ and gives him the most glory through my enjoyment of him.
When my days are closed and I am minutes from meeting Christ, I pray that it will be a day of joy. I pray that in all I do or try to do, Christ will be clear to all.
These are a good start! Much like a code of chivalry 😀
Many of these are negatives, which is fine and laudable to avoid them, however, it will be easier for you to avoid them and you will advance faster and better in the spiritual life if you try to love and seek each virtue for its own sake and out of a love of God. The rules, avoiding negatives, are like putting bumpers in the gutters when you go bowling. You can bowl with no bumpers but you better be really good and on target all the time or you’ll end up in the gutter. In neither case though are you as likely to get a strike if you focus on not hitting the bumpers or going in the gutters, instead you want to aim at the pins. You can extrapolate the location of the pins by observing the gutters but it is much easier to just aim at the pins. If you don’t understand or like one of the virtues, do not reject it, instead, accept it with trust in God and you will come to learn more about it later. A good Rorschach test for this is what is contained in the litany of humility. There is an old analogy or visual device or whatever you call such a thing, called the “tree of virtues” which shows some of how they connect. It has been helpful for me in even identifying what all the virtues are, since few really seem to teach that anymore, comprehensively. I hope you find this helpful and fruitful.
Seek truth always, and may the Divine Assistance be always with you,
LiveLifeNotBehindGlass