Just Like Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego

 

Hello from the West Vicariate! My name is Olivia Wetter and I’m from Sacred Heart Parish in Colby. I am currently a senior at Colby High School. At school, I’m involved in tennis, band, NHS, StuCo, Cosmic Crayon, and Young Humanitarians. I am also involved in many church activities including CYO. I have been raised Catholic, but I wasn’t until high school that I really started learning about my faith.

    I was confirmed as an eighth grader and when my freshman year rolled around, I decided to continue going to faith formation on Wednesday nights. However, this was really the extent of my faith. I wasn’t really in it and by sophomore year I had stopped going to almost everything. This decision took a toll on my relationship with God. Which means there really wasn’t one. That summer, my friend Morgan convinced me to go to Prayer and Action. Prayer and Action was definitely the turning point in my faith. I saw people who loved God and I wanted that too. I knew I needed to change. My junior year brought me back to my Catholic faith. I made sure to attend Mass, as well as CYO events. We met on Wednesday nights as a small group of junior and senior girls. Along with this close relationship with the other girls, my relationship with God grew stronger too. Now, I am in my senior year of high school and still trying to strengthen that relationship.

    During this last year I rediscovered a story in the third chapter of Daniel in the Bible. The story goes like this: King Nebuchadnezzar built a huge gold statue. He ordered everyone to bow down and worship the statue when music was played. Anyone who disobeyed these orders would immediately be thrown into a blazing furnace. Now, Daniel had three friends: Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. Due to their Jewish beliefs, they refused to bow down to the false idol. The king brought the men before him and told them if they continued to refuse to worship the statue, they would be thrown into the furnace. Then he asked them, “Do you think there is any god that can save you?” (Daniel 15) They answered, “Your Majesty, we will not try to defend ourselves. If the God whom we serve is able to save us from the blazing furnace and from your power, then he will. But even if he doesn’t, Your Majesty may be sure that we will not worship your god, and we will not bow down to the gold statue that you have set up.” (Daniel 16-18) With this statement, King Nebuchadnezzar ordered the men be thrown in the furnace.

These guys were incredible!!! They had so much faith in God and because of this faith, they were going to worship Him no matter what happened. They knew God had the power to save them, but even if He didn’t, they would still praise Him. Isn’t that how we need to be? Trusting in God, no matter what circumstances we are in. These men are the perfect example of how we need to live our lives. They led their lives the way God wants us all to. He knows we may face hard times, but He hopes we turn to Him and trust in His plan for us regardless. Personally, I like to turn to this passage when I’m struggling in my life. It helps reassure me that God has a plan and I just need to be patient and trust in that plan. He has a plan for all of us. Whatever may happen, just remember to trust that God will help you through it.

God Bless!

Olivia

Also, if you’d like to find out what happened to Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego, open your Bible and turn to Daniel 3:19!

Expecting the Unexpected

Hello readers of our Gentle Wisdom blog! I am Mika Ptacek from Ellsworth, KS. I am a senior at Ellsworth High School who participates in tennis and a lot of music activities! I am also a part of St. Bernard's CYO and I represent the East Central Vicariate. As most of you probably don't know me, I will tell you part of how I've come to be the person I am and one of the important lessons I've learned.

I have lived in Ellsworth all of my life and have gone to the same church for all of those 17 years. The crazy part of this though is that I have grown to love this church and our universal church more and more as I've grown older. As a kid, going to church was just something I had to do every Sunday. When I got to middle school though, I finally started to change my tune. I went to Jr. CYO Camp for the first time ever and was exposed to all of those holy people. I had never really thought about what I could do for God. I had always thought of Him as a guardian over my shoulder, someone I didn't really need to think about because they were always there. However, I saw my counselors leading lives full of devotion and love for God and it made me realize something.....I wanted more from life. I wanted what they had.

Sometimes though, we get glimpses of what we have yet to do but are not ready for it. And that is what happened to me. I wasn't quite ready to take the steps I needed to make my leap of faith. However, I didn't just stop growing in my faith. I continued to learn more about our catholic faith in my religion classes and still went to church every Sunday. I took part in all of the church activities and ministries that I could, and I think that is what helped prepare me for the experiences I would gain as a catholic in high school.

Now there are people who have wonderful stories of how they had their specific 'come to Jesus" moments, but I don't really think I am one of them. In fact, the way God revealed Himself to me was not contained in a moment. It was over time, extremely beautiful, and in a way I had not expected. When I became a high schooler, I automatically joined the high school CYO and loved it from the git-go. It was the perfect way for me to practice my faith and meet others who share the same faith. I got to experience CYO convention and meet some of my catholic friends that I have today; people who inspire me and whom I love dearly! I kept going to CYO throughout high school and all the activities involved, but it would take NCYC my junior year for me to finally understand part of the message God had been trying to send me.

As I previously explained, I had learned so much about the catholic faith from the people around me and all the things I had been a part of, but NCYC just blew all that I thought I knew out of the water. I had finally matured enough to understand what the speakers I listened to were talking about, and I started to realize that I didn't really know what I was supposed to be doing after all. I realized that I had been sharing my life with God in all the things I did, but I wasn't sharing all of my heart. After reflecting on this for awhile and going to confession, I started new and decided from then on that I was going to step back and let God take the reigns of my life, because let's face it. He has the reigns anyway so why not watch Him work His magic? 

At the next group session in the Lucas Oil Stadium where the whole convention was gathered, I saw how many young catholics were there and thought of all the similar experiences we must have in common and all our experiences that are different. There are people who have had rough lives, who come from nothing, and rose to the occasion and turned their lemons into lemonade. There are people who are blessed specially to be God's handmaids and just don't know it yet. And there are so many more who don't know what's ahead, but what all of these people had in common was that they took the time and spent the money to come to NCYC. They made the extra effort to grow closer to God. I thought of all of this in that one session and realized that each and every one of the people there was inspiring to me. I realized that in opening my heart to God, I was opening my heart to love so much more and appreciate all of the people around me.

After this experience at NCYC, I began to pray more to God and to really participate in celebrating my love for Him in the mass. I got to experience CYO convention as a whole new catholic and I am now experiencing a whole new side of our diocese's youth program as part of the DYC. It's super exciting to spend  more time with my fellow council members and plan things for our diocese's youth!! I know none of this would have been possible if I had kept myself closed off from God. I now see the world with a new set of eyes that have really helped me to continue to grow even more in my faith. I can honestly say my life is so much more rich now that I have taken a step back to let God lead me where He will. (although that is not to say that I don't sometimes try to take back some control hahaha) At the end of the day though, I have learned that part of growing as a person of faith is to let God do what He does best and to understand that you can't always expect the unexpected. God's will will find you when you're ready.

I hope this made sense to you readers and that you continue to grow on your journey towards Christ!

Here's to expecting the unexpected! :)

-MIka