***Understanding God's Blessings

        There are those who preach or believe that the stronger your faith is in the Lord, the more he'll bless you by making you successful and prosperous in this life. If that doesn't happen, they conclude that their faith must not be strong enough. The gospel never taught such a message. In fact, Christs wants us to deny ourselves, take up our cross, and follow his example. His blessing is not to reduce or take away sufferings from us; he only prayed that his disciples would be strong enough to withstand all imminent tribulations coming their way (Luke 21:36).  

***Year End Thoughts and Wishes

         2022 is drawing to a close. What will come next year? There'll be both good and bad things for sure, and I pray that there'll be a lot more good things happening than bad ones. Good things will happen because the Lord is always with those who love him. He wants to be with everyone, but not everyone is receptive to him yet. Bad things will happen because the evil one is still allowed to wage his war against the Lord. I can only pray that the days of the evil one will be shortened, and this will happen if enough of us pray hard enough for it. For those who are faithful and love the Lord, there is nothing to worry about—it'll just be a matter of waiting a little longer. But for those who have gone astray and are lost, we can only pray for God's mercy on them. They will surely awaken if they see the truth. I don't need to celebrate another new year, for my heart celebrates the love and mercy of Christ every single moment. May the world see that we are nothing but dust without God's love.

***Love Is Tolerant

        You hear people say that they can't stand this person or that person. But if you let God fill your heart with his love, you will want to love everyone and pray for their conversion or salvation (never destruction). In Matthew 5:44, Jesus counsels, "Love your enemies and pray for those who persecute you." If you can't stand someone, the truth is that you really can't stand God and shouldn't stand yourself either.

**New Year's Wish for All**

        The Lord God alone teaches the truth. The light of Christ helps us see this truth. May this light shine on and illuminate you so that you may see and embrace the truth. Then evil won't be able to touch you and your soul will be kept safe for all eternity. 

***Sign of Spiritual Progress***

         You may be making spiritual progress nicely. Now, if it turns out that everyone else loves God a thousand times more than you do and is a thousand times holier than you, and you not only do not mind but even rejoice in that, then you have indeed progressed spiritually. 

*****Great Tragedies of Today

        Today is the Feast of the Holy Family of Jesus, Mary, and Joseph. The families worldwide are under attack by Satan. So many families in this country have disintegrated, becoming disorderly or dysfunctional. Evil has deeply infiltrated all levels of our society and the Church. The way of today has been accepted as the normal, making an awakening to God's love and mercy ever much more difficult. People see nothing wrong with what they do. When the real warning from heaven comes, it may be too late for many of them. This is the great tragedy I see. 
       In parallel, most of the world's population is unaware that Christ can save us, turn everything around, give us the hope we need, set us free, and fill us with peace and joy. In a way, this is an even greater tragedy than the one I mentioned above. Is the world too far gone? I believe that nothing is impossible with God. As things worsen, acts of great mercy will come from him. But the time to pray and be prepared is definitely now for all who hear his voice.

***Complaining Is Out of Order

        I realize that all things that come to me, burdens included, are for my edification, for God loves me. It's the Evil One who wants you to complain. We should follow the example of the Lord Christ who is alway patient.

**Contentment and Joy

        Communion experience. The contentment I felt was heavenly and my joy was complete. I am sure that both contentment and joy would increase manyfold in heaven. 

**Consider What Comes from the Heart

         We sang some of the prayers and responses at Mass. One attendee sang everything out of tune. You noticed that right away and it sounded almost funny. Then I realized that he's doing his best from his heart, and right away he sounded even more beautiful than all the others to me. I think the Lord looks at us this way too.

***Freedom in Serving and Loving God***

        Be least to give yourself the greatest freedom in serving God. Be most humble to give yourself the greatest freedom in loving God.

**Appreciating Jesus

        Jesus is not only an amazing person, he is also our God. So we have an amazing God. And this is a tremendous blessing to us.

**Be Ready like Simeon

        Today's Gospel reading from Luke 2 is about the Presentation of the child Jesus in the temple. The Lord had revealed to Simeon that he should not see death before he had seen the Christ of the Lord. He came in the Holy Spirit into the temple and saw the child. He took him into his arms and blessed God, saying: "Lord, now let your servant go in peace: your word has been fulfilled: my own eyes have seen the salvation which you prepared...." We who have not seen the Lord, but have believed in him and known him intimately should surely be able to go to him in peace at any time.

***Amazing Lord***

        We do not see the Lord God, yet many of us rejoice and believe in him without the slightest doubt. How is this possible? Answer: It's possible because the Lord who created us knows how to speak to our hearts. The Holy Eucharist can be the big catalyst here. So we need to keep our hearts open to God always. 

****Most Uplifting Tidings

       Today's entrance antiphon, John 3.16: "God so loved the world that he gave his only Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but might have eternal life." Response to readings from Psalm 96: Let the heavens be glad and the earth rejoice! This is huge news! If you truly believe in it, you can't help but be glad and rejoice. If you don't feel that way, then most likely you don't know the Lord personally well enough yet. 

**God at Our Disposal

        I slept on my right side last night and must have put too much pressure on my right arm. It went numb momentarily and I woke up. Well, like all other things that happen to me, it's all the Lord's doing. Then I am directly connected to him, so I can communicate with him about anything at any time. The subject can range from a numb arm to eternal life. The Lord is most personal to us!

***What God Asks of Us***

        All God asks of us is to not sin anymore so that we might have eternal life—nothing more, nothing less. Is this really a request that's unreasonable or too hard to accept? The Lord has done all be could for our sake and we have no power to change anything except by him.

****How to Succeed in Loving God**

        Yesterday I posted that to love someone, you need to make an effort to know that person well by sharing inner thoughts and feelings with each other. This works with the Lord God too. If you truly love God, you'd want to share with him all that's in your heart and be completely open to him to let him reveal all of himself to you, for love implies intimacy.

**How God Blesses Us

        As the priest invokes the Lord God to bless us all at the end of Mass, I feel that the Lord actually adorns all of us to make us more beautiful to him.