The Great Difference between Living in the Divine WIll and Doing the Divine Will

The Great Difference Between Living in the Divine Will and Doing the Divine Will

Volume 3 - July 10, 1900

Difference between living for God and living in God.

While I was in the same confusion, He made Himself seen like a flash and made me

understand that I had not written everything He had told me the day before – that is, that the soul

must not only live for God, but in God. So, blessed Jesus repeated to me the difference that

exists between living for God and living in God, saying to me: “In living for God, the soul can

be subject to disturbances, to bitternesses, to being inconstant, to feeling the weight of

passions, to meddle in earthly things. But the living in God – no, it is completely different,

because the most important thing so that one person may enter to dwell inside another

person is to lay down all that belongs to him – that is, to strip himself of everything, to leave

his own passions; in a word, to leave everything in order to find everything in God.

Now, when the soul has not only stripped herself, but has slimmed down well, then will

she be able to enter through the narrow door of my Heart to live in Me, according to my way

and from my own Life. In fact, even though my Heart is immense, so much so, that there is no

end to Its boundaries, Its door, however, is extremely narrow, and only one who is stripped of

everything can enter into It. This, with reason, because since I am Most Holy, I would never

admit anything to live in Me which is extraneous to my sanctity. Therefore, my daughter, try

to live in Me and you will possess Paradise in advance.”

Who can say how much I understood of this living in God? But then He disappeared and

I was left in my same state.

Volume 12 - August 14, 1917

Jesus did nothing other than give Himself prey to the Will of the Father. Difference

between living resigned to the Will of God, and living in His Will.

As I was in my usual state, my sweet Jesus just barely came, passing by, and told me:

“My daughter, I did nothing other than give Myself prey to the Will of the Father. Therefore, if I

thought, I thought in the mind of the Father; if I spoke, I spoke in the mouth and with the tongue

of the Father; if I worked, I worked in the hands of the Father. I even breathed my breathing in

Him, and everything I did was ordered the way He wanted. Therefore, I could say that I carried

out my Life in the Father, and that I was the bearer of the Father, because I enclosed everything

in His Will and I did nothing by Myself. My main point was the Will of the Father, because I did

not care about Myself, nor did I interrupt my course because of the offenses I received; rather, I

kept flying more and more toward my center. Only then did my natural Life end, when I fulfilled

the Will of the Father in everything.

The same for you, my daughter. If you give yourself prey to my Will, you will no

longer have concerns for anything. The very privation of Me, which torments you and

consumes you so much, flowing in my Will, will find support, my hidden kisses, my Life in you,

clothed with you. In your very heartbeat you will feel Mine - burning and sorrowful; and if you

don’t see Me, you feel Me; my arms hold you tightly. How many times you feel my motion, my

refreshing breath, which refreshes your ardors! You do feel all this; and when you try to see who

squeezed you, who breathes on you, and you do not see Me, I smile at you, I kiss you with the

kisses of my Will, and I hide more within you, in order to surprise you again, and let you jump

once more into my Will. Therefore, do not sadden Me by afflicting yourself - but let Me do.

May the flight of my Volition never cease in you; otherwise you would hinder my Life within

you. On the other hand, as you live in my Will, I do not find any hindrance, and I make my

Life grow, and I carry out my Life as I want.”

Now, out of obedience, I want to say a few words on the difference between living

resigned to the Divine Will, and living in the Divine Will.

First: living resigned. According to my poor opinion, this means to be resigned to the

Divine Will in everything, both in prosperous and in adverse circumstances, seeing in

everything the Divine Will, the order of the divine dispositions which the Divine Will has over

all creatures, such that not even one hair can fall from our head if the Lord does not want it so.

It seems to me like a good son, who goes wherever his Father wants, and suffers

whatever his Father wants. Poor or rich, it is indifferent to him; he is happy just being what his

Father wants. If he receives or asks for an order to go somewhere to carry out some business, he

goes only because his Father wanted it so. But in the meantime, he has to take some

refreshment, stop to rest, have some food, deal with people; therefore he has to put much from

his own will, even though he goes because his Father wanted it. However, in many things he

finds himself in the circumstance of doing them by himself; so it may happen that he is far away

from his Father for days, for months, without receiving specification of the Will of his Father in

all things.

Therefore, for one who lives resigned to the Divine Will, it is almost impossible not to

mix his own will with It. He will be a good son; however, he will not have the thoughts, the

words and the life of his Father fully portrayed within himself, in everything. In fact, since

he has to go, return, follow and deal with people, love is already broken - because only a

continuous union makes love grow, and it never breaks - and the current of the Will of the

Father is not in continuous communication with the current of the will of the son. During those

intervals the son may get used to doing his own will. However, I believe that this is the first

step toward sanctity.

Second: living in the Divine Will. I would like the hand of my Jesus to write this. Ah,

He alone could say all the beauty, the goodness and the sanctity of living in the Divine Will! I

am not capable; I have many concepts in my mind, but I lack the words. My Jesus, pour

Yourself into my word, and I will say what I can.

Living in the Divine Will means being inseparable, doing nothing by oneself, because

in the face of the Divine Will one feels incapable of anything. He does not ask for orders, nor

does he receive them, because he feels incapable of going by himself. So he says: ‘If You

want me to do this, let us do it together, and if You want me to go, let us go together.’

Therefore, he does all that his Father does. If the Father thinks, he makes the thoughts of the

Father his own, and does not add one thought to those of his Father. If the Father looks, if He

speaks, if He works, if He walks, if He suffers, if He loves, he too looks at what the Father is

looking at; he repeats the words of the Father; he works with the hands of the Father; he walks

with the feet of the Father; he suffers the same pains of the Father, and he loves with the love of

the Father. He lives inside his Father, not outside of Him; therefore, he is the reflection and

the perfect portrait of his Father - which is not, for the one who lives only resigned. It is

impossible to find this son without his Father, nor the Father without him; and not only

externally, but all his interior is as though interwoven with the interior of the Father -

transformed, dissolved completely, completely, in God.

Oh, the rapid and sublime flights of this child in the Divine Will! This Divine Will is

immense; in every instant It circulates within everyone; It gives life and order to everything.

And the soul, wandering within this immensity, flies to all, helps all, loves all, but as Jesus

Himself helps and loves - which cannot be done by one who lives only resigned.

Therefore, one who lives in the Divine Will finds it impossible to do things by

himself; even more, he feels nausea for his human works, though holy, because in the Divine

Will all things, even the smallest ones, take on a different look. They acquire nobility, splendor,

Divine sanctity, Divine power and beauty; they multiply to infinity, and in one instant one does

everything. And after he has done everything, he says: ‘I have done nothing - Jesus did. And

this is all my contentment: that, miserable as I am, Jesus gave me the honor to keep me in

the Divine Will, to let me do what He Himself has done.’ Therefore, the enemy cannot

bother this child - whether he has done well or badly, little or much - because Jesus Himself

did everything, and he together with Jesus. He is the most peaceful one; he is not subject to

anxiety; he loves no one and loves everyone - but divinely. One can say that he is the repeater of

the Life of Jesus, the organ of His voice, the heartbeat of His Heart, the sea of His graces.

True Sanctity, I believe, consists only in this. All other things are shadows, larvae,

specters of sanctity.

In the Divine Will, virtues take their place in the Divine order; while, outside of It, in

the human order, they are subject to self-esteem, to vainglory, to passions. Oh! how many good

works, how many attended Sacraments are to be cried over before God, and to be repaired,

because they are empty of Divine Will, and therefore without fruits. Heaven willing that all

would understand true sanctity. Oh! how all other things would disappear.

So, many find themselves on the false way of sanctity. Many place it in the pious

practices of piety - and woe to those who move them! Oh, how they deceive themselves! If their

wills are not united with Jesus and transformed in Him - which is the continuous prayer - with

all of their pious practices their sanctity is false. And it shows how these souls pass very easily

from pious practices to defects, to amusements, to the sowing of discord, and other things. Oh,

how dishonoring this kind of sanctity is! Others place it in going to church, in attending all the

services, but their will is far from Jesus. And it shows how these souls have little care for their

own duties; and if they are hindered, they get angry, they cry that their sanctity goes up in the air.

They complain, they disobey, they are the wounds of families. Oh! what a fake sanctity. Others

place it in frequent confessions, in scrupulous spiritual directions, in having scruples for

everything; but they do not have any scruple if their will does not run together with the Will of

Jesus - and woe to those who contradict them! These souls are like inflated balloons: a little

hole is enough for the air to come out, and their sanctity goes up in smoke, and falls to the

ground. These poor balloons always have something to say; they are mostly inclined to sadness.

They live always in doubt, and therefore would like to have a director for themselves, who would

advise them, give them peace and console them in every little thing. But they are soon more

agitated than before. Poor sanctity, how forged it is.

I would like the tears of my Jesus in order to cry together with Him over these false

sanctities, and make everyone know how true sanctity is in doing the Divine Will and in living

in the Divine Volition.

This sanctity puts its roots so deeply that there is no danger that it may oscillate, because

it fills Heaven and earth, and finds its support everywhere. This soul is firm, not subject to

inconstancies or voluntary defects. She is attentive to her duties; she is the most sacrificed and

detached from everyone and everything, even from spiritual directions themselves; and since her

roots are deep, she rises up so high that the flowers and fruits bloom in Heaven. She is so hidden

in God that the earth sees little or nothing of this soul. The Divine Will keeps her absorbed

within Itself; only Jesus is the author, the life, the form of the sanctity of this enviable creature.

She has nothing of her own, but everything is in common with Jesus. Her passion is the

Divine Will; her characteristic is the Will of her Jesus, and ‘FIAT’ is her continuous motto.

On the other hand, the poor and false sanctity of the balloons is subject to continuous

inconstancies, and while it appears that the balloons of their sanctity swell up so much as to seem

to be flying in the air at a certain height, to the point that many, and even their directors, are

amazed - soon they are disillusioned. One humiliation, one favor of the directors toward

someone else, is enough to deflate these balloons, because they see this as a theft against them,

considering themselves the neediest. So, while having scruples for silly things, they then reach

the point of disobeying. Jealousy is the woodworm of these balloons, which, consuming the

good they do, keeps sucking air from them, and the poor balloon deflates and falls to the ground,

reaching the point of dirtying itself with earth. Then the sanctity that was in the balloon appears.

And what can one find in it? Love of self, resentment, passions, hidden under the aspect of

good, almost to have occasion to say: they have become the amusement of the devil; so, of all

their sanctity, nothing was found but a mass of defects, apparently disguised as virtues. But then,

who can say everything? Only Jesus knows the worst evils of this fake sanctity, of this devout

life without foundation, because it leans on false piety. These fake sanctities are spiritual vines

without fruit - sterile, and cause of who knows how much crying for my lovable Jesus. They are

the ill feeling of society, the worry of very directors, and of families. One can say that they bring

with themselves a noxious air that harms everyone.

Oh! how so very different is the sanctity of the soul who lives in the Divine Will! These

souls are the smile of Jesus. They are far away from everyone, even from the very directors.

Only Jesus is everything for them; therefore, nobody worries for them. The beneficial air

which they possess embalms everyone; they are the order and the harmony of everyone. Jesus,

jealous of these souls, becomes actor and spectator of whatever they do – there is not one

heartbeat, breath, or thought which He does not regulate and dominate. Jesus keeps this soul so

absorbed in the Divine Will that she can hardly remember that she is living in exile.

L. Bauer