At times it will seem we are asked to play a more active role in the work. More often, our role will be more passive, allowing the Divine Artisan a free hand: Not my will but yours be done. It will be a long task, a lifetime task. There will be much sanding and scraping. We will have to let go of all the apparent beauty of the paint job. This is the death to self, the false self, which our Lord spoke about.
As the work progresses there may be encouraging moments when the Master Artisan allows us to get some glimpses of the beauty he is uncovering. Most of the time we will have to respond in faith.
— M. Basil Pennington, Listening: God's Word for Today