Encountering Christ Gives Our Service Its Soul

Adriana Wolf considers how her own soul was nourished when she ventured out of her comfort zone to help victims of a recent flood. 

In recent weeks, parts of West Virginia have experienced severe flooding. Sadly, flooding is not an unfamiliar event in our state. A year ago, an area near where I live also experienced devastating flooding. For reasons I did not fully understand, I felt a strong desire and a persistent nudge to go and help. It was something I had been unable to do the previous year for a variety of reasons.

Finding a Way to Help

The opportunity came when we received an email from our diocesan office. A Catholic church in the affected area was asking for volunteers. I packed my car with a few supplies I hoped would be useful and drove a little over two hours to see how I could help. When I arrived, cleanup efforts prevented me from parking near the church. I parked on a nearby parallel street and walked toward the church to find out where I was needed. Along the way, I met a mother and her two older teenage children who had also come to help.

When we entered the narthex, I stopped to use the restroom after my long drive. The family went into the church to pray before getting their assignment. I would have liked to pray as well, but I didn’t want to keep anyone waiting on me, and wanted the benefit of their company to find my way. We found our way to the gym where we received our volunteer assignments.

I was assigned to help a lady in her home. I located the home where I would spend the next several hours shoveling mud, and something that smelled very much like manure, out of a garage and woodworking area that had belonged to the homeowner’s late husband.

The homeowner was a sweet lady who was a widow and active in her Catholic church. I also met Bob, Jay, and a family of four who had come to help as well. Together, we carried everything out of the two areas, shoveled the mud, power washed and swept the floors, and returned the surviving belongings to their places.

As I said goodbye to her at the end of our day, she thanked me and told me she would keep me in her prayers. The way she said it made me certain she truly meant it. She was grateful for the help. At that moment, I realized how much her promise of prayer meant to me. Even though we didn’t know each other before that day, we were connected in some way as a result of our interaction.

Feeling God's Presence Through Encounter

Although I have been involved in service before, I tend to naturally gravitate toward prayerful contemplation and liturgical service at the altar. It is there that I have experienced God’s presence in a special way. At different times in my life, I have identified more closely with either the roles of Mary or Martha with which we are familiar from the Bible. This time, I felt God’s presence through this encounter in a much-needed way. On my drive back home, I kept wondering about the story of Mary and Martha. What was the connection between these two approaches to loving God?

When I have spoken with family about being engaged in service or attending church, I have reminded them that it is not an either/or dynamic. My mind easily thinks of how the Church embraces both cloistered contemplative communities and active apostolic communities. Cloistered religious serve the world through their prayers and serve each other through their sustained labor while living in community with one another.

In the same way, apostolic religious communities serve others through their work outside their convents, but they begin and end their days with prayer and serving one another in community. Their different vocations reminded me that prayer and service are not competitors. They are complementary expressions of love for God and our neighbor.

That day, prayer surrounded our work. The family I met prayed before beginning to serve. Before I departed, the widow promised to pray for me. I had arrived thinking primarily about what I could do for someone else, yet I left strengthened by the prayers of the woman I encountered. More importantly, I was strengthened by Christ through her.

Within the days of this encounter, I finished reading The Soul of the Apostolate. One of the book’s central themes is that Christian service becomes fruitful when it flows from a deep interior relationship with Jesus Christ. Our exterior works cannot replace our interior life with Him. Similarly, our external works need the interior life centered on Christ to radiate His love. Prayer and worship give our service its purpose, strength, and soul.

God does not ask us to choose between living out the examples of Mary or Martha. He invites us to sit at His feet so that we will recognize Him in others when we are nudged to rise and serve. It is no wonder that I need both of these expressions of love. I feel incomplete without them. Sometimes we are called to remain with Jesus in prayer. At other times, He nudges us to pick up a shovel and encounter Him in those in front of us.

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Copyright 2026 Adriana Wolf
Images: Canva