***Becoming Perfect the Effortless Way*****

         In today's Gospel reading from Matthew 5, Jesus advises us to be perfect, just as our heavenly Father is perfect. How can we achieve this? Since nothing is impossible for God, let's do it the effortless way by surrendering ourselves to him completely. With us out of the way, God can perfect us easily!

***Finding God the Effortless Way*****

        In today's reading from Psalm 118, I read the verse "Blessed are they who seek the LORD with all their heart."  So I ask myself how I should seek the LORD. Here is what I have learned. I seek him by letting him find me. This is what I mean. I remain open to him completely so that he may enter freely and do whatever he wishes. Voilà, we are one! The smart, effortless way of finding God.

***Most Dependable Lord

        People break their word all the time, but not our Lord. You can trust in him absolutely. That's why I believe in all his promises. First thing you need to do is secure your eternal life. This is not being selfish; this is precisely what he wants you to do, for he loves you. It's so good that we have him to rely upon. The reality with our God is better than anything we can dream about!  

Symbolic of the Holy Trinity

         In 1985, I walked into this building with a dome overhead in Paris, France, and saw these three shafts of sunlight on the entrance doors. To me they symbolized God the Father, God the Son, and God the Holy Spirit.

*****Repent Now or Perish!*****

        From yesterday's first reading from Jonah 3, we learned that Jonah went to Nineveh according to the LORD's bidding to announce to the people that forty days more and their city would be destroyed. The people believed in God and proclaimed a fast and all of them put on sackcloth. Even the king and his nobles joined in. The king decreed every man to turn from his evil way and from the violence he had in hand. God saw all that, relented and withheld his wrath so that they should not perish. Good for the people of Nineveh. Looking at our own nation, my guess is that no even half of the population would repent when asked by God to do so. Whether this would be good enough for the Lord to change his mind, I do not know. In the Gospel reading from Luke 11, Jesus condemned his generation seeking a sign as an evil generation. I'd like you to hear Fr. Mark's talk in this video about our generation. It is his most powerful presentation to date. It climaxes as it ends. Don't miss it and pass it around. It's wake-up time!

*****Letting the Lord Reveal Himself to Us

        As we get to know the Lord, the Lord reveals many things to us for our edification. The great saints receive great mysteries and teachings; the great prophets, evens to come; various seers, special visions and messages. I see myself at the kindergarten level, so the Lord makes everything elementary for me to understand. So far what he has revealed to me is just himself, nothing more—already filling my cup to overflowing and rewarding me aplenty. I just enjoy his holy presence every moment of my life.  Psalm 23.1: The Lord is my shepherd; there is nothing I lack.

***Jesus, Heaven, and Hell

         We need to hear these three subjects preached the most, for Jesus is the absolute truth and heaven and hell are real. Knowing that heaven and hell exist can definitely make us want to know our Lord. But we rarely hear the Lord preached with any fire or passion. Heaven is once in a while mentioned, and hell—what is that? Here is Fr. Altman's passionate talk on the reality of hell. I am not saying that you must know Jesus to enter heaven, for there are good people who have not heard about Jesus. But I know for sure that if you believe in him, you will go to heaven and not hell for sure.

**Let Nothing Embarrassing Happen to You

        I get a lot of scam phone calls at home which are annoying. I am saddened by the fact that this is such a big business with so many people engaged in swindling others. What if right in the middle of trying to swindle someone, you die and face God—wouldn't you be embarrassed about being caught? I certainly wouldn't be caught dead doing anything like that in my life. Remain holy and blameless so that you'll be ready to face the Lord at any time.

**Loving the heavenly Father First

        Since our heavenly Father is perfect and loves us with an infinite love, we should do our utmost to please him, as we even try to be nice to our earthly father who is often far from being perfect and may not even love us that much. The perfect way to please God the Father is to obey him. Obey your heavenly Father first and you'll know how to love all your neighbors.

***Requisite for Setting Yourself Free

         In yesterday's Gospel reading from Matthew 6, after teaching the disciples how to say the Lord's Prayer, Jesus added, "If you forgive men their transgressions, your heavenly Father will forgive you. But if you do not forgive men, neither will your Father forgive your transgressions." Since forgiving those who have transgressed against us can be most difficult, we sometimes honestly tell the Lord, "Sorry, I can't do it," and not do it. Now we have committed the sin of disobedience and he'll deal with us exactly the way we deal with others on judgment day. Bad move on our part! What if we had turned to the Lord and said, "You know that it's most difficult for me to forgive my enemies, but I know that you are right and I must obey you. So help me, Lord"? Now we've made a smart move. When God sees that we are humble, he will help and not condemn us. The bottom line, rebelling against God is being foolish to the extreme, while yielding yourself to him is being truly wise. I am sure that most of you already understand this, but some of you might need to hear it again. To set yourself free, you need to set all others free from your heart first.

**Upon Whom Shall I Depend?*

        In this life, should I depend upon my government? If you've read my last post, you would know my answer already. Should I depend upon my family or friends? Maybe, it would depend upon their relationship with me. I'll try to depend upon myself as much as possible, knowing that one day I'll be completely helpless. So that leaves God last to consider. But I should have considered him first and only, for he is the only one most powerful and forever dependable. So I'll put myself completely in his hands and rest from now on. This is an insight, a foresight, and being wise and smart. I am speaking a truth, not trying to pat myself on the back, although I do feel good about it. God is love and equally a joy!

***Heavy Burden in Dark Days

        The world is in darkness. This country is in darkness. I've never felt this burden this heavy on my heart. If I were someone who doesn't know Christ, I probably wouldn't feel it so intensely. Despite the repeated warnings God has been giving us through Mary our Holy Mother and other saints and mystics since the mid 19th century to this day about how we need to turn to him and repent or face chastisements (and some of the prophecies had already been fulfilled), we humans just tragically do not pay any attention and keep on sinning. The darkness began accelerating in the 1960s. We started seeing sexual liberation, divorce becoming common, unmarried couples living together, indecent fashions, immoral movies, legalization of abortion, increase in violent crimes, support of same-sex marriage, Satanic worship, etc. After more than half a century later, thanks to the complacency of the weak, lukewarm Church and people in general, the immoral ways have become acceptable to most of the world. It's in the last four years that the people of this country finally woke up to realize that evil had already infiltrated every segment of this nation except for those who live mostly outside of the big cities, work hard for a living, and are still honest, patriotic, and God-fearing. Although they still form the majority, the money and power are unfortunately not in their hands. The evil ones in control are the various governmental departments (with the exception of the military), courts at all levels, the majority of the news media, the academia, the entertainment industry, and the giant tech companies. The United States, known to be a staunch enemy of Communism, now appears to be on the way to becoming communistic! (This was warned by Mary too.) The burden is heavy on many of us. But don't despair, for God and truth are on our side. There is never a better time for us to choose sides.

*Completely Secure in Jesus

         Today is the Feast of the Chair of St. Peter, Apostle. In the Gospel reading from Matthew 16, the heavenly Father revealed to Peter that Jesus was the Christ, the Son of the living God. And Jesus said to Peter, "So I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven." Of course, Jesus holds all the keys to the Kingdom of heaven. When we abandon ourselves completely in him, we'll be completely secure in him on earth and in heaven!

****Be Prepared for Temptation and More***

        I'd like to talk about temptation again. God often leads those who love him into temptation to test them so that their faith might grow even stronger. The Lord had already revealed to us that the day of his coming would be like a thief at night (Revelation 16, 1 Thessalonians 5) and we must watch and be prepared. Let me tell you that when the Lord decides to test us, these tests also come suddenly when  we  least expect them. The severe ones can totally crush our spiritual life but for the grace of God. So be prepared is the best defense you can built for yourself. The spiritual battle we face is a fight to death for eternal life in God. If you don't take this seriously, continue to live on as usual, and do not know where you are going, but think that everything is going to be OK, then you are following exactly what Satan wishes you to do! Wake up now to avoid being shocked for all eternity! (I'd like to include this important tip. During any temptation, Satan loves to confuse you by making you think that it might be God's will for you to give in, as you do not know his reason yet. But it's crucial to know that if you do God's will, you'll always have inner peace. As long as you still experience turmoil in your heart, you are not out of Satan's grip yet.)

***The Purpose for Which God Has Creatd Us*****

        Today I see that the Lord God has put us on this earth to discover the purpose for which he has created us. I now know the Lord well enough to know what that purpose is. Most people of the world don't know or don't want to know the Lord. They just let him coexist. This is absolutely tragic. I know the following: (1) God is love. (2) We were created by God in his image. (3) God the Son came to earth to save us from sin. These three facts alone are enough for me to see that the Lord had created us so that he would have someone to love as much as he loved himself! This is an eye-opening, mind-blowing, most uplifting revelation! It's all about love. God is love; God created us out of love; and he died for our sins out of love. We only need to accept his love to make this universe perfect! For the love of God, let's make it into a two-way love!

***The Way to Transform Oneself***

         Sermons or homilies that focus exclusively upon Christ the Lord are usually powerful and most effective, while those that focus upon ourselves are usually weak and instantly forgettable. For example, if I tell someone not to worry about anything without mentioning the Lord, that'd be a complete waste of time. My suspicion is that in the latter case, the speaker himself doesn't really know the Lord well enough yet. You see, if you know the Lord intimately, you'd want to talk about only him to others. He's really the only one who can fundamentally transform us. And people need to know this! To rely upon ourselves to change ourselves just won't work. My advice—no matter who you are, surrender yourself to the Lord to attain union with him first, then you'll receive the power you need directly from the Lord to get yourself transformed. After that you won't need to listen to another sermon or homily again, for you already dwell in the Lord!

Feeding the Soul Before the Body

        Today's Gospel acclamation, Matthew 4:4b, was quoted by Jesus from Moses' second long address of Deuteronomy: "One does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes forth from the mouth of God." We eat bread in order to sustain ourselves physically. To sustain our spiritual life, we need be fed by every word that comes from God. The spiritual life is so much more important than the physical one. What good is it to have a healthy body but a sick soul? It is a clean, healthy soul that will enable you to live forever.

**Why People Reject Christ

         They cannot prove that he never existed. They cannot prove that he is false in any way. They cannot prove that he is not God. So their only reason has to be that they are afraid to face him as they wish to remain being their own god. They are a bunch of cowardly fools.