***A Promise Only You Can Break

        If you ask God sincerely for eternal life, he'll always give that to you. Maybe you knew and just forgot or were uncertain about it. The fact that he even let his only begotten Son die in our place so that we might live forever shows clearly that we can trust in this promise of his. The Father, being the Truth, always speaks the truth and thereby is to be trusted.

**Yearning for God

        We who love the Lord yearn for him. Of course, we want to see him, but that will have to wait. So what I yearn for is hearing him speak to my heart. That mean a lot to me, for hearing his sweet, holy voice means that he is with me and really cares about me. Yes, yearning for God is most proper, most edifying, and most rewarding. 

***Need to Be In God's Hands

         I've had many accidents that could have killed me. I am still here, so I guess my time is not here yet. In any case, we are totally in God's hands. When I was around seven or eight, I accidentally fell into a large not-too-clean pond on a private property. I didn't know how to swim and still remember swallowing a lot of the water. Luckily, someone who saw what happened to me stepped into the water and was in time to pull me in by my toes. Later, while attending the University of Michigan, a friend and I took a break fishing from a rowboat on a lake, and a sudden storm came up and made the boat spin madly. We had no choice but to row with the wind toward the unseen opposite side of the lake. Eventually, we arrived, but it had been a terrifying experience. Another time I lost my foldboat, a foldable canoe, in white water. It seemed that water just didn't like me. I was hiking with a group of friends at Yosemite National Park late in the day. Somehow I walked right off a big rock, fell about six feet, and hit the ground in the dark. My head missed a rock by just a few inches. As I got older, I did less adventurous things, but accidents still happened. In pruning a tree, my ladder fell sideways and I just held onto a branch. Then my hands slipped out of the protective gloves and my butt landed on the ground ten feet below, crushing two of my vertebrae. I did more or less recover, but was never the same person again. Walking one day at a construction site, a worker holding a long 2x4 vertically carelessly let it go and it fell right on my head. He was scared; I was shocked and OK. One big problem old folks face is falling. Sometimes a fall can end your life. I've had my share of bad falls, but have always gotten well in time. The most worrisome fall happened to me on Wall Street in New York. It was evening and I missed seeing the curb in front me and fell forward. The concussion made me not knowing where I was. Again, by the grace of God, there was no internal bleeding and I recovered fully. Oh, I also remember that in my teens, I also had my head hit really hard. I was riding my bike past a tall apartment building. A strong gust of wind bounced off the building and hit me so hard that I and the bike just fell sideways with my skull banging the asphalt. I think because I was young, I didn't suffer any injury. So accidents do happens, no matter how careful you are. All the more we need to put ourselves in God's hands.

***Living Bread That Satisfies

        Communion experience. Today's Gospel from John 4 tells the encounter of the Samaritan woman with Jesus at Jacob's well in Sychar. Jesus told her that whoever drinks the living water he gives would never be thirsty again. The Lord has given me even his own body and blood, so I'll never feel thirst or hunger again. There's absolutely nothing beyond the Lord himself I would need.  

**God's Mercy Extolled*

        We must never ignore our Lord God; most specifically, his infinite mercy. It is by this mercy that we sinners are still living, that there's always hope provided us in this life, and that we can be saved from death forever. If is what we critically need and dependent upon. We must be aware of and thankful for, rejoice in, and embrace it. 

**When to Leave this World*

        Once in while, when something interesting happens in this world, be it spiritual or secular, I think of some loved one who has already passed away and kinda wish that the person were here to see it. Does that really matter? I know that after I am gone, there'll be many perhaps truly wonderful things happening. But for anyone who is ready to meet the Lord himself, the world is no longer interesting. In heaven, you would know what's happening on earth anyway. Knowing the Lord and starting to see things as he sees them, you lose all your attachments to the world and realize how foolish and juvenile it is to be solely interested in living in and for the world. So after you know the Lord and start living for him alone, anytime would be a good time to leave this earth.

***Father Most Forgiving***

         Today we heard the parable of the lost (prodigal) son from Luke 15 at Mass. This is very likely the best known and most moving parable of all the parables Jesus had told. The story reveals how much our heavenly Father loves us. You really have to have a heart of stone not to be moved by it. The Father is so forgiving that as long as we realize that we need to return to him, we can do no wrong. His mercy is great indeed. You really have to be the greatest idiot not to be forgiven by him. 

**Infinite God Our Perfect Fit*

        The Lord God is infinite and has inexhaustible riches to offer us. They are ours for the asking. How can we finite creatures not be happy with such a God who loves us so much and can satisfy our deepest desires? He is a Father who can give us good things way beyond our expectations. Personally, I am wide open and eager to receive whatever he wishes to bestow upon me in abundance. 

**My Greatest Act*

        Communion experience. I have found my eternal rest in Christ. Peace now reigns. I accomplished the greatest act of my life by reconciling and submitting myself to the Lord. 

***Two Breakthrough Moves.

     1. We realize we are sinners and need Christ to save us from sin. We then believe in him and accept him as our Lord and Savior.
        2. We fall in love with Christ and wish to attain union with him, so we surrender to him completely every time we receive him in the Holy Eucharist.

***How to Stop Sinning***

         Open up to Christ to experience his tremendous love for you, then you can't help but fall in love with him. Now you stop sinning because you don't ever wish to hurt your most beloved.

**Saints vs. Evildoers (Going Separate Ways)**

         The only difference between the two is the awareness that God exists and he loves us and can save us from sin. The saints have it while the evildoers don't. They now all live on the same planet, but soon they'll go their separate ways. There'll be rejoicing and lamenting. It is difficult to even think about this. The Lord is always right, yet there are those who do not believe in him. I can only pray, pray, and pray, wishing that many will wake up in their last moments before death. That's why we ask Holy Mother Mary to pray for us now and the hour of our death. I believe that this is a grace God can and does grant.

**Be like a Student

        Obeying God is most meritorious while offending him earns you demerits. The Lord does keep account of what we do. Consider yourself a student going to school now. You want to be sure that you'll earn enough good grades to graduate. Be obedient to God now to receive top honors from him later.

**Balance Between Trust and Fear

        We need to keep a balance between trust in God and fear of him. By fear of God, I mean the fear of offending him. Psalms 130.3: If you, LORD, keep account of sins, Lord, who can stand? Offending the Lord can be horrible. While trusting in God draws us toward him, offending him repels us from him. This balance can change though. The more you trust in the God, the less you need to be concerned about offending him. Once you attain union with God, you automatically don't wish to sin anymore.

***Our Perfect Prayer***

        It is the Our Father Jesus has taught us. If we pray it truly from the heart, meaning every word we say, we become completely reconciled to God and feel his peace. The process of perfecting ourselves now begins. 

***For the Rich to Enter Heaven

        In Matthew 19, Jesus said to his disciples, "Amen, I say to you, it will be hard for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of heaven. Again I say to you, it is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for one who is rich to enter the kingdom of God." According to one tradition, the "eye of a needle" referred to a narrow gateway into Jerusalem. A camel heavily loaded would not be able to pass through it unless it gets unloaded first. In any case, it will be harder for a rich person to enter heaven. In today's Gospel reading from Luke 16, we heard the parable of the rich man and the poor Lazarus. After they both died, Lazarus was comforted and the rich man in agony. It seems that for a rich person to be able to enter heaven easily, he needs to detach himself from all his possessions, to unload them, so to speak. Next, choosing to be rewarded in your next life rather than in this life can help. Last, in Luke 12 Jesus told Peter, "Much will be required of the person entrusted with much." So the richer we get, the more generous we should become to the poor. Now, love the Lord with all your heart and you should get into heaven easy.

***Christ Is True God

        The more you believe in Christ, the more you know that he is the truth. To the unbeliever, this may sound dubiously logical, but to me who experience the Lord, I know it is true only because he is true. For if you believe in something that is not true, you won't ever feel this way and at the same time experience freedom, peace, and joy. When you believe in the true God, he actually responds, revealing himself to you in the most intimate, loving way, eradicating all doubts. 

**Ultimate Rest

        Communion experience. I know I've found my ultimate rest.