In today’s first reading we hear the words: “If this endeavor or this activity is of human origin, it will destroy itself. But if it comes from God, you will not be able to destroy them; you may even find yourselves fighting against God.” (Acts 5)

After trying without success to put a stop to the spreading of the early Church by threats of death and imprisonment, the authorities of the day are at a loss as to how to stop the early followers of Jesus from spreading the news of his Resurrection and bringing new members into the Faith.

In a meeting, a Pharisee in the Sanhedrin named Gamaliel offered the above words, as recorded in the Acts of the Apostles. They ring true with respect to the early Church, for some two thousand years later the Church is thriving with an estimated 1+ billion Catholics.

From time to time, we need to remind ourselves of the thought behind Gamaliel’s words. How often — without any consideration of what God wants of us, and how God wants us to carry out his will in our lives — do we dream up our own ideas and seek to carry them out and either congratulate ourselves if our idea turns out to be a success or ridicule ourselves if our idea turns out to be a failure? When we find ourselves falling into this trap, we would do much better to take a step back and employ something that is very much a part of our Christian spirituality, namely “discernment.”

Discernment takes time. It takes prayer. It is trying to determine through the guidance of the Holy Spirit what God wants and how God wants it to happen.

So let us make a conscious effort to prayerfully consider what God wants us to do and how he wants us to carry it out.

And let us look not only to the words of today’s first reading from Acts, but also to Galatians 3:3. “After beginning with the Spirit, are you now trying to attain your goal by human effort?”

Not only do we discern what God wants us to do, but we rely on God to see it through to completion.

How well the words spoken by a bishop in bringing someone into ministry convey this idea: “May God who has begun the good work in you bring it to fulfillment.”