It was in the news that on the 29th of this past month, a young Catholic priest, Fr. Joseph Tran Ngoc Thanh, was killed while hearing confession in his parish church in a city in Vietnam. The death was tragic, but triumphant, for he died serving the Lord. It's better to die like this than dying in sin. Here are two worst ways of dying. (1) You die at the hands of a sin. For example, you lose your temper, fly into a rage, and suffer a fatal heart attack. (2) You die while you are committing some serious sin. Since we don't know the hour of our death, it's best that we be holy at all times. You wouldn't want to be caught dead doing anything that could make you lose your soul forever, would you?
Saturday, February 5, 2022
Friday, February 4, 2022
**A Good Start to Becoming Holy
From what I've read so far, it seems that when we go before the Lord to be judged by him, he's going to show us the harm we've done to others, how we badly we've made them feel. (I believe this is what we'll experience when the illumination of conscience takes place.) So it would do us great good to start working on not hurting anyone in any way.
***Repentance and Obedience
The Lord always looks at our intention in whatever we do. Whether we succeed or fail is not as important as our original intention. Sometimes we fail to accomplish God's will because it's not easy, then God understands. Peter's denial of Jesus comes to my mind. If we have sinned, we need to repent the sin. If we have failed to do God's will, we need to pray for more submission to him so that we might not fail the next time. God loves his children who repent and obey him.
**Union with God Strengthened
To want to attain union with God is to want to be like him. We learn his ways and his thoughts. Since we love the Lord, we want to know how he feels about all things. Sharing his joys and sorrows greatly strengthens the union.
Thursday, February 3, 2022
***To Be Spirit-Filled
God is spirit, so to know him we must let the Holy Spirit touch our spirit. Such an encounter is essential for us to be filled with the Spirit and to set our heart on fire. Pray for baptism in the Holy Spirit.
**Hearing God Calling
Some people pray to God hard, do not hear anything from him, and conclude that he does not exist. The better approach would be to remain passive and listen for his voice, for God is always calling us thru various means. Revelation 3.20: "Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will enter his house and dine with him, and he with me." In life, anytime you feel discouraged, rejected, hopeless, bored, or burdened down, it's the Lord calling you to look his way. If you'd just listen with your heart, you should hear him calling you to follow him. This would be such a blessing! Of course, if you've already hardened your heart and/or in a wrong environment, you probably wouldn't hear anything or a voice so faint that you can easily dismiss.
**Faith Is Fundamemtal
It is faith that makes it possible for God to forgive our sins and save us, and for us to experience peace and be made whole. All good things spring from faith in God our Savior. Start believing in him with all your heart today.
***GOD'S LOVE***
If we truly love others, we would harbor absolutely no hatred for anyone and forgive always everyone, and we'll have peace in our hearts. Fr. Mark Goring's video today, inviting us to become fire to ignite lives, is most timely. The Spirit-filled message comes straight from his heart.
***God Most Miraculous!
We do not expect to see miracles very often, yet there are ongoing miracles we don't even notice. One prime example is the fact that we can remain alive on earth for many years. This morning before I got out of bed, I noticed the sunlight on a part of the bedroom wall outlining the window opening thru which it came. Then I realized that this light has been visiting me every year at the same time on the same day at the same spot for all these past years; perhaps it's been consistent like that for billions of years since the earth came into existence. This has to be a miracle made by God. I further realized that he must have made the size of the earth, its distance from the sun, the speed of its rotation about its own axis, the speed for it to go around the sun, etc., just right so that we who reside on the earth do not even feel that we are being whirled thru space—all this is truly miraculous too. The infinite God has truly created infinite miracles around us. Actually, everything he does is miraculous, and the most amazing miracle of all is that he loves us and is ready to transport us into heaven to be happy with him for all eternity. Let us appreciate our miraculous God.
Wednesday, February 2, 2022
**Freedom from Fear of Death
Today is the Feast of the Presentation of the Lord. In the second reading from Hebrews 2, Paul wrote that the Devil has the power of death, but Jesus can free those who through fear of death had been subject to slavery all their life. It makes me see that if you fear death, you are not free, and the resurrected Lord is precisely the one who can remove the fear of death from us to set us free by granting us eternal life.
**God Exceeding Our Expectations
This we can be certain of. When we start to consider God's beauty, mercy, faithfulness, sanctity . . . all the good qualities, the reality has to exceed our highest expectations, as it is impossible for us finite beings to comprehend fully the infinite God.
***When God Honors Us . . .
he never inflates our ego. Instead he humbles us and fills us with great joy! And our soul is refreshed! (I love my Lord.)
*****The One We Must Face*
Christ or the God of Christ is the only one everyone must face now or later. There is not another one like him, for he is our creator, our final judge, and our God. In John 1, the Apostle speaks about Christ: "He was in the beginning with God. All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be." Again in John 14:6, Jesus said to Thomas, "I am the way and the the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." His Crucifixion proves that he loves us and his Resurrection and Ascension prove that he is indeed the Lord God. Since facing him is unavoidable, it'd be wise to face him now, not later. If you don't believe all I've said here, then you are living in an imaginary world.
Tuesday, February 1, 2022
*Big Realization*
In this life, unpredictable things happen to us our whole life. Blessed is the one who finally realizes that he cannot possibly be happy without the God of Christ, turns and gives himself to him, and finds meaning in life and peace in his heart. Now he can finally say what David proclaimed to God in Psalm 86: "You are my God." The has to be the big realization that cheers up the whole heaven.
**Expediting Attaining Union with God
Every time we pray or do anything, we can act to surrender ourselves to God from the heart. This is most appropriate and should speed up our process of attaining union with God.
**Where to Experience God
Just saw this video featuring the Prahran House in Melbourne, Australia. It's a luxurious home beautifully designed with expensive art works filling the whole house. It seems that everything about the house was specially designed and the overall picture you see is quite impressive. Then I do feel that one would not feel free living in such a home, for everything has to be in place and safeguarded. The bottom line is that we cannot be spiritually free if we must serve our own material treasures. In fact, it is in suffering that we find it easy to unite ourselves with the Lord God. (To see and read about this house, you can go here.)
**God Screens Us
When we hire someone to do a certain job, we screen the candidate carefully to make sure that he or she is the best person for that job. Now, to determine whether we are to go to heaven or hell is so much more important that whether we are qualified for filling some job vacancy. The Lord has to be sure that we are holy enough. That's why we need to do everything according to God's will. For every thought, word, and deed of ours he knows and matters.
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