An artist painted an interesting painting of a young person in front of a board on which he had written a several zeros, 12 zeros more or less, one after the other. At his side is an angel who is writing the number 1 at the beginning of the zeros, transforming them into a trillion. The name of the painting is “the good intention.”
The meaning of the painting is this: all the works, all the words, all the thoughts of our life are like those zeros, they can be more or less, but they are absolutely worthless if they come from vanity, from selfishness, from comfort, from having the best possible time in this life, in short if they are focused only on this life.
However, the same actions, words or thoughts can be valuable if the 1 of the good intention is added at the beginning. In order to add that 1 we must do everything according to the will of God, for the greater glory of God, in short, thinking of eternity, because every action, word and thought has an eternal weight.
The Lord’s silent coming teaches us this as well. Jesus came to this world in silence: for while gentle silence enveloped all things, and night in its swift course was now half gone your all-powerful word leaped from heaven (Wis. 18:14-15). In fact, ‘infant’ means the one who does not speak, and Jesus in Bethlehem speaks with His silence.
I am not talking about a material silence, but rather a spiritual silence, the silence of our intentions. Our intentions are not silent when they talk about ourselves, when they manifest our selfishness. Our intentions are silent when they talk about God and His Will.
We must silently do our good deeds.
We must silently love God and our neighbors.
We must silently accomplish our duties.
We must silently accept God’s Will.
We must silently rejoice in the happiness of our neighbor.
We must silently suffer others’ defects.
We must silently bear our crosses.
We must silently make sacrifices for God and our neighbor.
We must silently go to heaven.
