***Christ Our Standard*

        From today's first reading from 1 Corinthians 1, we have "We proclaim Christ crucified, a stumbling block to Jews and foolishness to Gentiles, but to those who are called, Christ the power of God and the wisdom of God." By Christ we are divided. It logically follows that we have the dualities of good and evil, God and Satan, and heaven and evil.

**Crying to the Lord*

        Today's entrance antiphon from Psalm 86: Turn your ear, O Lord, and answer me; save the servants who trust in you, my God. Have mercy on me, O Lord, for I cry to you all the day long. Do we need to cry ro the Lord all the day long? Yes! Here, cry doesn't mean shedding tears; we simply yearn for the Lord, beg for his mercy, and want to share all that's in our heart with him—motivated by our love for him. So the crying goes on all the day long.

**How to Experience Peace*

         We lose peace when we don't listen to God. So obey him and we have peace. It's elementary.

***Most Satisfying Project***

        Anytime time we finish a worthwhile project, we feel good about it. For example, I used to design and build pieces of furniture for my own home, using basically one radial saw. Looking at the finished product is always a joy. Do you know that it's even a lot more satisfying when you give the Lord God full freedom to work on you as his project and finish up with a most beautiful piece of work that's you? Think about it.

**Refining the Spiritual Life

        We do so many things in life, but how many of them draw us closer to God, to be blunt about it? I myself find it easy to go on YouTube to watch some news and end up watching many other videos that are either entertaining or give useful information on various subjects. Then I realize that time is limited and precious, and if we spend time doing things that do not make us better Christians, we are wasting our time here. So I've decided to bypass all activities that are unnecessary in following Christ, thus making my life purer and more productive.

***Relating to the Lord

        God has created us in his own image so we can get to know him. He loves us to death, wishing to save us from sin so that we may have eternal life in heaven. Meanwhile, he is sustaining us on earth every second and shielding those of us who love him from evil. Know all these truths so that we may relate ourselves to him dearly, as we are no strangers nor outcasts. 

**Connecting with God*

        To know the God of Christ, just keeping our eyes and ears open won't do much good—we need to soften and open our hearts to connect with him! Let giving our hearts to the Lord God be our ultimate goal.

***Going Beyond Our Limits*

        As finite humans, we are limited in every way, but we can be unlimited in loving God! For in loving God, we receive power to love him even more, exceeding all limits. Now the Lord carries us, making living exhilarating.

*****Our Best Treasure***

         Communion experience. The Lord is all mine! He is the only treasure you want everyone else to possess too—he's that good!

**Need to Accept Jesus*

        If what Jesus says inspires or makes sense to you, you should accept and believe in him even if it's demanding or hard to swallow. As a matter of fact, the difficulty you encounter only exposes your need to accept him. The Lord knows our hearts!