My Task, O Lord, is to Live your Word (Ps 119:57)

Our vocation in the Movement of the Incarnation is to be livers of the word of God. This grace must be rediscovered again and again, and taught to others. "It is not those who say Lord, Lord who will enter the kingdom of my Father, but those who do his will" (Mt 7:21). The disciples of Jesus must not limit themselves to teaching, but above all to bearing witness to their faith. “Be doers of the word, and do not merely listen to it” (James 1:22). Such are the signs that accompany those who have believed (Mark 16). These are works that show that the disciples live what they preach. Indeed, the ‘Didache’ and the ‘Shepherd of Hermas,’ writings of the first Christians, deal with discerning a false prophet. The emphasis is placed on the practical life of the prophet. “Not everyone who speaks under the movement of a spirit is a prophet, but only if he has conduct that the Lord approves. By his conduct, we will tell a false prophet from a true one. Every prophet who teaches the truth, but does not live what he teaches, is a false prophet.”

What is said here explains the fact that the truth of the prophet’s teaching is not enough for him to be a true prophet, but that he must live what he teaches. Indeed, Jesus is very severe on this point when he speaks to the Pharisees in Matthew 23. “They say and do not do what they say; woe to you. You ask people to do difficult things and you do not lift a finger.” In fact, I must live what I proclaim. Evangelization is the sharing of a life that I experience. It is like saying to others: “Come and taste a wonderful life that I am living.” Saint John says it: ‘We proclaim to you what we have seen and touched of the Word of life’ (1 Jn 1:1-4). It is not merely a matter of uttering words. But if we are not careful, living the word can become a burden. We risk growing weary of living the ‘exercises of the Word lived’ each day. Living the word then becomes a difficult and heavy routine, like a law. Yet it becomes easy when I realize that living the word is a matter of love for Jesus. I must live the word out of love for the one I love. It is because I love Jesus that I do what he tells me, what pleases him. What I do out of love for someone is different from what I do under constraint.

The month of May is a month dedicated to the Virgin Mary, and we are encouraged to pray the rosary. The Virgin Mary is the one who said “yes” to God, and Jesus became incarnate in her. Through this event we rediscover our vocation, our calling in the Movement of the Incarnation. We live the vocation of the Virgin Mary: to live the word of God and give it to the world. She is the icon of the Movement of the Incarnation. The one whom we must resemble, for she incarnated the word of God. ‘Whoever hears my Word and keeps it, that one is my mother’ (Lk 8:19-21). Let us pray the rosary throughout the month. ‘Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death, amen.’

Henri Bayemi