40 Days to Living Your Mission with Christ

Conclusion

Responding to Christ’s invitation to love God with all our heart, soul, mind, and strength, and to love our neighbor as ourselves, is a lifetime adventure. It is a journey that will never end. Every time we think we have reached the limit, we suddenly turn a corner and discover new horizons, new depths in our own being as well as new wonders in the inexhaustible mystery of God. God is infinite, and infinitely lovable. Even after our earthly pilgrimage concludes and we find ourselves — please God — face-to-face with the Lord, loving him will continue to surprise and delight us in new, fresh ways for all eternity.

This is the only adventure that is worth living and dying for. It is the adventure that we were each created to experience. And each one of us will experience it in a unique way; no one else can love God, or discover God’s love, the way you can.

Likewise, God gives each of us a unique call, a unique way in which to share his love. While we are here on earth, there is work to do for Christ and his kingdom, and the Lord has invited each one of us to join in it. No other work can ever be as meaningful. Yet we do not build the kingdom alone, but in cooperation with God and each other. This is why it’s especially important to recall that our love for God never comes first; it is always a response to God’s love for us. He is the vine, we are just the branches; as we have seen various times during this book, without him we can do nothing (see John 15:5).

Keeping that in mind is the secret to being a deeply joy-filled Christian, in spite of our many faults and failings, in spite of the twists and turns of the Christian road, and in spite of the reality of evil in this fallen world. By remembering day in and day out that God is the one most interested in our growth in love, and that he does 99 percent of what needs to be done, we can learn to welcome St. Paul’s otherwise puzzling exhortation to “rejoice always. Pray without ceasing. In all circumstances give thanks, for this is the will of God for you in Christ Jesus” (1 Thessalonians 5:16–18).

This introductory explanation of how to begin living the greatest commandments was not meant to be exhaustive. And it was not meant to provide a connect-the-dots kind of formula for Christian living. Love is too personal and surprising and vital for that kind of thing. But if it has helped you understand a little bit better the common characteristics of the path that every disciple of Christ must somehow follow, and if it has stirred up or reinforced your desire to keep following that path, and if it has provided one or two (or maybe even three) new insights or suggestions that will help you turn that desire into day-to-day decisions that give glory to the Lord and overflow in love, then we can both be grateful to God, the giver of every good gift.

We hope this journey through Lent, discovering and living your mission in Him, has been fruitful for you. If you are able, we invite you to include Regnum Christi in your almsgiving in this holy season through a donation, helping us continue to create and bring these free resources to you and to others around the world.

We pray you have a blessed Holy Week and an Easter Triduum lived profoundly close to our Lord through his cross, death, and glorious Resurrection.