***Our Ultimate Quest*

        I used to chase after music. I would spend a lot of time at various Tower Records stores searching for records and CDs. I found great pleasure in listening to music and collecting recordings. I also subscribe to a number of magazines such as Fanfare, American Record Guide, Gramophone, etc. Looking back, I see that I was unknowingly looking for God. Although I already knew God at the time, I had not completely submitted myself to him yet. All of you who are doing all kinds of things, good or bad, to please or satisfy yourselves are, you may not realize it yet, basically searching for God, because without him life is empty. How do I know? Well, once you truly know the God of Christ, all your other desires just fade away. You are not obsessed with any of them anymore. Compared to the joy and freedom you experience in God, all your old pleasures are now "boring." You finally know that the Lord God is the real thing, that he has made us in such a way that we won't be truly happy until we have him! 

*One Christian Failure

        The world is full of unhappy people living unhappy lives. Here we have Christ who can make us anew and change our lives. Of course, many heard about him and choose not to accept him. But there are many more who have not even heard about him! It's a case of "the harvest is abundant but the laborers are few." Sadly, Christians in general have not taken the Lord's last command "Go into the whole world and proclaim the gospel to every creature" seriously. They need to know the Lord more to feel the urgency of bringing him to others. Otherwise, they'll have to answer to the Lord one day.

***Key to Perfection

        From Hebrews 4, today's second reading: Son though he was, he learned obedience from what he suffered; and when he was made perfect, he became the source of eternal salvation for all who obey him. Jesus' perfect obedience to the Father showed that he was perfect. Surely, if we humble ourselves and obey God, he will exalt us and make us perfect.

***Words to Set Us Free***

        Luke 23.46, today's Psalm response: Father, into your hands I commend my spirit. This was what Jesus cried out from the cross before he breathed his last. These parting words of his are words that can actually set us free! When we say them to God the Father from our very heart, we abandon ourselves completely in him and we are free!

**Fulfilling the Prophecies

        Today is Good Friday of the Lord's Passion. Isaiah 52.13–53.12 is the first reading. I confess that I am not that familiar with the Old Testament, but what Isaiah had prophesied about Christ's suffering 700+ years in advance was amazing! Here are some of the verses from Isaiah 53 I have lumped together. 

        

         It was our pain that he bore, our sufferings he endured. He was pierced for our sins, crushed for our iniquity. He bore the punishment that makes us whole, by his wounds we were healed. We had all gone astray like sheep, all following our own way; but the LORD laid upon him the guilt of all. Though harshly treated, he submitted and did not open his mouth, like a lamb let to slaughter. Seized and condemned, he was taken away, though he had done no wrong, nor was deceit found in his mouth. But it was the LORD's will to crush him with pain, by making his life as a reparation offering. My servant, the just one, shall justify the many, their iniquity he shall bear.

         There are many other prophecies in the Old Testament which Jesus fulfilled, down to a specific detail in some cases. The Lord God had made the prophets foresee the coming of Christ as our Savior, surely he can make us believe in him as our Savior now that he had already come.  

***Loneliness, Begone!

        Each of us is basically alone in this vast universe. If there is no God, our existence becomes meaningless. Deep down, we know that there must be a creator. The fact that we understand good and evil shows that we have a spiritual God. We may belong to a huge family and living among billions of other human beings, but if we don't have a personal God, each of us is still alone, for no one truly knows us thoroughly. Then Christ came and became one of us, giving us the great news of salvation. We can even become one with him in spirit through receiving him in the Holy Eucharist! Being our creator, he knows all about us. Violà, we are no longer alone! He is the only one who can take away our loneliness and the feeling of being lost. (I am not even mentioning that he can make us go to heaven easy too—whoops!) 

Only What God Thinks Matters

        If you are still affected much by what people think about you, good or bad, you still have an ego problem. We should care only about what God thinks about us. When God praises us, we rejoice. And he would never say bad things about us. When we fail, he gently reminds us. We then repent and are forgiven and back to rejoicing. Let the Lord dwell in you fully and there will be no room left for ego.

*Two Versions of Tea for Two

        This post kinda ties in with the previous one. As you know, I have an interest in music (but not obsessed with it anymore as I was once). In the morning, I usually watched the news a little bit on YouTube and if I see any music videos interesting I watched them also. This morning I heard both Pierre-Yves Plat's "Tea for Two" and Art Tatum's version played. If you read scores, you can follow the playing. Pierre-Yves Plat is a living French pianist, very talented in both classic and jazz playing. His arrangement of the song is cleverly worked out and quite impressive. Art Tatum was probably the greatest American pianist who ever existed. I found his arrangement to be more spontaneous, coming more from the soul, and his talent truly amazing. I would say that, of the two, Tatum is more like a reservoir and less like a canal. The videos follow below.

**Be More like a Reservoir

        This morning I watched Marcus Grodi interviewing Keith Nester on his EWTN The Journey Home show on YouTube. Marcus quoted the saying "We aren't supposed to be channels, we are supposed to be reservoirs." This spoke to me and I searched online and found that St. Bernard of Clairvaux actually said this. I am quoting him more fully below.

        "The man who is wise, therefore, will see his life as more like a reservoir than a canal. The canal simultaneously pours out what it receives; the reservoir retains the water till it is filled, then discharges the overflow without loss to itself.... Today there are many in the Church who act like canals, the reservoirs are far too rare.... You too must learn to await this fullness before pouring out your gifts, do not try to be more generous than God."

       It was beautifully said. While we feel that it is our duty to serve the Lord, it's equally important to know that God wants us to become holy ourselves first. The best way to achieve that is again to go deep, deep into the Lord. 

     I am posting the Keith Nester interview here in case you are interested in watching it.

**WHY We Need Christ

        Not a single person in the world has the power to understand us fully, know our true feelings, tolerate all our errors, remove any guilt we have, or heal our wounded souls except Christ who can not only do all the above, but also set us free, make us clean, and lead us to heaven. He is not called our Savior for nothing.

*God Be Our Defender

        When you are one with God, if you are ever wrong, you would know instantly and repent of your sin. And if you are right, you would know that your are, for God is always right. Now, even if people say bad things about you, put you to shame, or oppose you, it doesn't matter anymore, for he Lord is your instant help and will defend you.

***How to Know God's Plan for You

        First, you must know God well. Attain union with God is the perfect way to know him. Once you know him most intimately, you'll know his will, and his plan would be for you to follow his will. Beware that if you sin, you ruin his perfect plan for you, for you have gone against his will. So, remain in union with the Lord to know his plan and remain holy to know that you are following it. 

*Predetermined & Undermined Events

        In today's Gospel reading from John 13, Jesus predicted Peter's denial by saying to him, "Amen, amen, I say to you, the cock will not crow before you deny me three times." Later, this truly happened. The Lord knows all the things that must happen. His Second Coming has to be on of them. Of course, not everything is predetermined, for we have our free will and how we exercise that will affects how things will turn out. For example, if we all repent to the Lord and beg for his mercy, the coronavirus crisis can be quickly over. On the other hand, if we continue to sin against the Lord, worse chastisements will surely come. For each of us, we only need to follow the Lord faithfully according to the plan he has for each of us and leave the rest to him. 

***How Jesus Captured Me

       Of course, the might works and great miracles Jesus performed were most impressive, but what moved my heart and touched my soul and made me want to worship, praise, and adore him were his humility, his meekness, and his perfect obedience to the Father. Jesus said, "Whoever humbled himself will be exalted." Now it makes perfect sense to me.

***Tragedy in the Making

        Dying from the coronavirus must be a terrible experience, as the victim cannot breathe normally anymore. But if you have not reconciled yourself to God yet, this experience is nothing compared to what you might experience after you die and face God. The wise always think ahead and plan for their eternity first. Most people think only about this life and consider death only when they are threatened by it. They hardly think about life after death—it's as if they are content to let the unknown be unknown. This unwillingness to face eternity is a tragedy in the making, for they might miss the greatest possible reward God wants to give you.

***Our Last Hope!

        Jesus the Lord God himself has come to us in person to give us the good news of salvation. There is not another savior and there will be no one greater than he to come. He is our last hope!

**A Christian's Sole Mission

        From today's first reading from Isaiah 49, we read The LORD said to me, You are my servant, in you, Israel, I show my glory and I will make you a light to the nations, that my salvation may reach to the ends of the earth. Here it's made clear the mission of a Christian. We are to show God's glory by being a light to the world, spreading the good news of his salvation. Nothing less and nothing more. In other words, a Christian must be a soul saver. It's easy to remember and completely doable through the personal power of our Lord Jesus Christ and the Holy Spirit, if we simply obey God.

***How to Be Set Afire

        God has to be more important to us than anything else for obvious reasons. So we must take him seriously. I do see Christians who live a rather casual Christian life. To please God, being lukewarm is not good enough. You must set your heart afire, and the only way to achieve that is to let the Holy Spirit fill you to the brim, for you cannot do it on your own. By the way, to be evil, you don't need God's help; but to be holy, you need all of his help. It all comes down to how willing you are to let God rightfully be your God. In this "game," if you want to win, you lose; but you are willing to lose, you win. Let God take charge of you and he'll set your heart on fire with the Holy Spirit.