“Until you know deep inside that Jesus thirsts for you - you won’t begin to know who He wants to be for you. Or who He wants you to be for Him.”
The following meditation is meant as a way of sharing in Mother Teresa’s deep experience of the goodness of God. This prayer experience became the “secret fire” she carried within, her light in darkness, and her strength in times of crisis.
We may all know that we are saved by God, but few of us realize how much we are cherished. Few have experienced, as Mother Teresa did, the true dimensions of God’s heart. And so we doubt; we question; we fail to draw near. In His interior communications with Mother Teresa, Jesus would lament, “They don’t know Me, so they don’t want Me.” It would become her mission to help the world know Him — to show even the least among us how much we are treasured, just how good God is, and so to stir up our own longing for Him in return.
In the joining of His longing for us and ours for Him are the seeds of paradise. Every human heart needs to hear this message and enter into this experience. In the timeless words of St. Augustine, “Deus sitit sitiri”: God thirsts to be thirsted for. . . .
How to Use a Guided Meditation
Meditation is a way of entering into a state of prayer where we can encounter God in a deeply personal way. In a Guided Meditation, you read or listen to words that help you have a realistic experience through the graced use of your imagination. In this meditation, you will be imagining Jesus with you, speaking these words directly to you. You can read them silently, but even better is to read them aloud. One way is to read them slowly into a tape recorder and then play them back. However you use it, this meditation is designed to bring you face-to-face with the mystery of God’s longing for each one of us — here, in the present moment —and to help us face whatever challenges we may encounter in these difficult times.
The meditation that follows was written by Father Joseph Langford, MC, co-founder of Mother Teresa’s priests’ community. It is excerpted from his book, Secret Fire: The Encounter That Changed Her Life and How It Can Transform Your Own (© 2008, 2016, Published by Our Sunday Visitor).