***Faith in God Is Beautiful . . .

because you know that what God knows is all true.         

**Work and Diligence Essential

         In today's Gospel reading from Mathew 5, Jesus taught his disciples many things. For example, he said to them, "Whoever is angry with his brothers will be liable to judgment." It seems that to be saved, it's rather like to graduate from a school: there is a certain amount of work you are required to do to succeed. At school, if you play too much and don't work hard enough, you won't make it. Similarly, if you get angry a lot and don't try to become holier, you won'e make it either. Play it safe by surrendering yourself completely to the Lord and you are being absolutely wise!

***Why Be Holy*

        The primary reason is that we should love and obey the Lord God. And here's the most wonderful side benefit: When we are holy, we not only enjoy living a free, peaceful, joyous life, we are also ready to receive the Holy Eucharist to attain union with God, getting to enjoy him to the fullest extent.

**God's Mercy for All*

         When the Lord grants mercy on me, he's going to consider what my heart really desires. Now, I truly wish that he'd save all of us by converting the whole world. So when I pray "Have mercy on me, Lord." he knows that I am also praying for the whole world, including my own family.

***Counting on Christ***

         This is what I received from the Lord today. Whatever he tells us, we can trust completely. In Matthew 10, Jesus sent out the twelve to the lost sheep of the house of Israel to proclaim that "the kingdom of heaven is at hand." He asked them to cure the sick, raise the dead, cleanse lepers, drive out demons, and they received that power! We may not receive such specific instructions from the Lord, but we can surely count on his promise that whoever believes in him will have eternal life!

***What We Must Not Delay

         When we are in sin, we cause the Lord great sorrow, for he truly loves us. It's our duty for the sake of both God and ourselves to remain holy at all times. The moment you commit a sin, repent of it to let Christ remove it pronto. Delay this process can put you soul at risk, especially if the sin is serious. When we please God, the whole heaven rejoices and we receive great joy ourselves in return. 

*****Perfect, Sweetest, Heavenly Moment***

         Communion experience. Our church has finally resumed offering the wine of the Eucharist again. Receiving Communion under both species was truly a perfect, sweetest, heavenly moment of life with the Spirit permeating my entire soul!

***REJOICING in the SPIRIT of the LORD***

         Today is Pentecost Sunday. I love the last two verses read from Psalm 104: Lord, if you take away their breath, they perish and return to their dust. When you send forth your spirit, they are created, and you renew the face of the earth. This shows our utter dependence upon the Lord, and I rejoice that I have such a loving, wonderful, trustworthy Lord to depend upon! 

**It's Our Choice

         A glass can be seen to be half full or half empty. Science can make us believe that God exists or God doesn't exist. Similarly, sin can make us turn to God to ask for his forgiveness or turn away from God to hide from him.

**The One Who Gives Peace

        No matter how much turmoil you experience within, you can have your peace restored when you turn to Christ and surrender yourself to him. 

**Practical Conclusion*

        Whether you follow the Lord or not, he knows all about you. Hiding or escaping from him is impossible. So you might as well get to know him to receive his love, protection, and all the other benefits from him. Otherwise, you just end up alone, not being loved by anyone for all eternity!

**Narrow Horizons

         If you do not believe that nothing is impossible with God, you limit not God, only yourself!

*****Our No. 1 Calling (Often Forgotten)***

         In today's Gospel reading from John 17, Jesus asked the Father to keep all those he had given him from the Evil One. This reminds me that the No. 1 calling for all of us in life is to remain holy in this evil world. Once we accept this calling, any specific calling as to what each of us should do will become clear. All in all, to wish to remain holy shows that we truly love God and are obedient to him. Furthermore, it reveals that we are now free.

***God Completes Our Existence*

        We don't see God, but he sees us. We may not know him, yet he knows all about us. Under such circumstances, don't you think that we'd better get to know him? I now know the Lord intimately and can say that my life is complete, for knowing him has absolutely secured our eternity.

***Go to Christ First Always*

        See your spiritual journey as a process of letting Christ become more and more your only Lord and master. I have been advocating "go to the Lord directly," "focus upon the Lord alone," "be completely open to him" . . . so I am reiterating things here. Think about how you can serve and love God is good, but great progress can only come from shifting your attention to the Lord to let him inspire you directly! Basically, know God and you'll know what to do.

**Practical Advice

        Jesus said to Thomas in John 14:6, "I am the way and the truth and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me." So we might as well let Christ transform us to get us ready now for our return to the Father.

***Our Great Ignorance***

        If you think that your God is way up somewhere in heaven and you are way down here on earth in a totally separate world, then you've got the wrong God. The true God we have is most personal whom we can know most intimately through Jesus the Son, for the Father and the Son are alike. In fact, we can achieve spiritual union with him through receiving Christ in the Holy Eucharist. If we open ourselves up to God completely, he is all ours! It's ironic that so many of us choose to run away from him and end up lost forever. Basically, we treat ourselves who are dearest and most precious to God the Father as worthless junk. All the more we need to turn to the Lord and ask him to take away our pride and ego!

**Union Through Belonging**

        In today's Gospel reading from John17, Jesus prayed to the Father, saying "I revealed your name to those whom you gave me out of the world. They belonged to you, and you gave them to me, . . . I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for the ones you have given me, because they are yours, and everything of mine is yours and everything of yours is mine." How good it is that God the Father completely owns us whom he has chosen and who now completely belong to him! This is union all right.