**Living a Productive Life

        If you do not know Christ the Savior yet, you are most likely living a life for yourself and not helping him save any souls, including your own. This is not being productive. In fact, it can be most destructive. Living for Christ helps him save souls, which is God's primary mission and our obligation if we ever wish to get into heaven. 

If You Really love God . . .

        If you really know the God of Christ, you would love him and want to serve him willingly and unconditionally, not expecting to receive any reward from him. He becomes the only one you care about and live for, with you living the most selfless life. It sounds austere, but on the contrary, it's utterly joyous and liberating!

**More Christian Joys

        Here are two more. (1) The joy of hearing the Lord speaking to you in your heart. (2) The joy and satisfaction you feel, proclaiming God's glory to the world.

****How to Enjoy God the Most****

         Just surrender yourself completely to him and you'll experience the greatest joy of you life. (Don't get too carried away yet; for in heaven, you'll experience the greatest joy of your whole existence!)

**Not the Same Person Again

        Communion experience. The Lord offering himself to each of us present—it was a most personal offering. After you receive the Blessed Sacrament, you are not the same person again! As I realized that, it was 8 AM and the church bells tolled, as if celebrating that joyous moment.

**Making God Treat Us Well

       Jesus told us that the measure with which we measure would be measured out to us (Matthew 7:2). This applies to whatever we measure out to God too. If we trust in him 100%, he'll trust in us 100%. The truth is that he's always ready to respond to us. When we treat him well, he treats us well right away. In a way, we are in control, reaping what we sow.

***Our Only Way to Freedom

        In today's Gospel reading from John 8, Jesus said to some Jews, "Amen, amen, I say to you, everyone who commits sin is a slave of sin. If the Son frees you, then you will truly be free." We are not free, precisely because we sin. And Jesus, being God the son and our Savior, is precisely the one who can take away our sins, thus setting us free. There is not another way for us to become free!

*Learning to Know What We Do

         After Jesus had been crucified, he prayed, "Father, forgive them, they know not what they do" (Luke 23:34). I can say that all of us who do not know Christ also do not know what we do most of the time. Even if you already know him, it could take you the rest of your life to learn to know what you do. The time to get started is now!

**End of Quest

        Communion experience. It's like I've reached the end of my life's biggest quest. I can now rest and relax, waiting for whatever God sends my way. 

***Enemy of Peace

        As long as you still have an ego, you will not have complete peace. Vestiges of the ego are most difficult to eradicate. Only most intimate union with the Lord can help you get rid of your entire ego. It's letting the selfless Lord displace the self-centered ego.

**Trusting in What God Says

        When God created the heavens and the earth, he said: Let there be light, and there was light. At the Last Supper, when Jesus took bread, said the blessing, broke it, and giving it to his disciples said, "Take and eat; this is my body," the bread became his body. Likewise, when he took a cup, gave thanks, and gave it to them, saying, "Drink from it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant, which will be shed on behalf of many for the forgiveness of sins," the wine turned into his blood. Whatever the Lord says, it materializes.

***What Life Is All About***

         It's all about how we get along with God. Do we obey him or rebel against him? Reject God and life becomes meaningless. 

***Extreme Bonding, Extreme Separation***

        The bond we can form with God when we surrender ourselves to him is the strongest bond we can possibly create. Nothing in heaven or earth can break that. On the flip side, when we reject God, we cause the greatest separation from God we can possibly create. Our lives on earth are mild compared to our afterlives. 

***Best Advice for Us*

        In today's Gospel reading from John 8, Jesus saved a woman caught in adultery from being stoned by the scribes and the Pharisees. He finally asked her, "Woman, has no one condemned you?" She replied, "No one, sir." Then Jesus said, "Neither do I condemn you. Go, and from now on do not sin any more." Gentle, but powerful advice. God's mercy is great. To avoid being condemned, just do not sin anymore. Such a simple formula! With the Lord's help, following it becomes super easy. Nothing is impossible with God if we submit ourselves to him to let him lead us.

****Understanding God's Calling

        When God calls you to follow him, he doesn't call you to be just a mediocre, lukewarm disciple. In fact, he wants you to excel and be perfect as the heavenly Father is perfect (Matthew 5:49). Otherwise, you are still a burden to him. Now, this may sound strange, but true. The more you trust and rely upon the Lord, the less you are a burden to him. This is because he doesn't have to "worry" about you anymore. So let him make you holy, pure, and blameless.

**Reflecting on Ourselves and Christ

        We are finite creatures who live a short time on earth. We don't really understand ourselves. We do know that we have a conscience helping us to know good from evil. Then we have the good news coming thru Christ that we can be freed from sin and saved for all eternity. So are we to accept this God or not? It looks like there is no better other way. The God of Christ seems to be the sensible truth. When you yield yourself to him and believe in him, you finally realize that he is the truth. 

**Communion Response

        All I could do for the Lord loving me was to say I love you and ask him to have mercy on me.

**Why I Like God*

        What I like about the Lord God is you can totally trust in him. His yes means yes and his no, no. When he grants you eternal life, you get it with absolute certainty. God is the very opposite of Satan, who is all deception through and through.