Saturday, August 2, 2025
**Only Two Ways to Live**
We either live unselfishly for God or live selfishly for ourselves. If you live for God, you become free of yourself and experience peace. On the other hand, if you live for yourself, you become your own slave and will not experience true joy ever. These two outcomes are a matter of course.
Friday, August 1, 2025
***So Easy to Know***
When God lets you know something, you know that it is true, When he forgives you, you know that you are clean. When he gives you joy, you know that it's his joy. When he promises you eternal life, you know you are heaven bound. I can go on and on.
***Direct Path to God***
All saints know God intimately because they finally go directly to Christ to let him perfect them. So the best way for us is also to go directly to the Lord, even bypassing the saints, to seek union with him, through the Holy Eucharist.
*****Secret to Knowing the Lord*****
When I was majoring in mathematics in college, the home work usually involved proving theorems. Once I was given a really difficult one to prove, I racked my brain so hard until finally I got a glimpse of the solution at the limit of my perception and quickly jotted it down before it faded away. That was exciting but exhausting. By contrast, this morning at Mass I simply remained open and the Lord unexpectedly gave me an insight which remained with me. That was exciting and uplifting.
Here's what I saw. We don't know God because basically we don't want to know him. If we really want to know him without questioning, we'll know that he is indeed our God. It works out this way because you are open to truth.
**To Be Chosen by the Lord**
John 15:16 is today's Communion antiphon: It was not you who chose me, says the Lord, but I who chose you and appointed you to go and bear fruit.... The fact is that we all can choose the Lord to become his chosen ones. When we are open to him, he will show us how to bear fruit.
Thursday, July 31, 2025
***Our Super Vision***
It could even be called our supernatural vision. This is the vision God gives to our hearts and minds when we attain union with him. We see the whole truth of the Trinitarian God. We now know what pleases the Lord and what offends him, what life is all about, how we can be freed from sin and live forever with him ... all not completely known to us earlier. Returning to our creator now puts everything in perfect order!
***Joy of a Super Sharp Consciene***
To be holy, a crystal clear conscience is essential. The muddier your conscience, the easier it is for you to sin. My advice is that you aim for union with God thru the Holy Eucharist. Once you attain union, you'll possess a super sharp conscience. Now you see right and wrong as the Lord sees them. Great peace and joy ensue.
**Common Sense Advice*
God being our only judge, only he knows if we're good enough to enter heaven or not. Should we not care about the whole thing, then we're doomed. If we try to be good, we may have a chance. Anyway, common sense alone tells us that if we are serious, you should try to be as holy as possible with God's help.
****Controlling Our Destiny Now****
Today is the Memorial of St, Ignatius of Loyola. Here's the first part of the Gospel reading from Matthew 13: Jesus said to the disciples: "The Kingdom of heaven is like a net thrown into the sea, which collects fish of every kind. When it is full they haul it ashore and sit down to put what is good into buckets. What is bad they throw away. Thus it will be at the end of the age. The angels will go out and separate the wicked from the righteous and throw them into the fiery furnace, where there will be wailing and grinding of teeth." So we'll either be kept or thrown away by God at the end. Knowing this, we can now confidently choose to remain righteous and reap our reward from the Lord later.
***JESUS IS LORD***
Today's entrance antiphon, Philippine 2:11-12: At the name of Jesus, every knee should bend, of those in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. We can never submit ourselves to and praise Christ enough!
***Lesson Learned**
Yesterday I accidentally cut the fourth finger of my left hand a little bit when I was trying to cut the insulation on an electrical wire with a razor blade. I wrapped a bandage around it to stop bleeding. It should heal in a week or so. Meanwhile, this happening has made it hard for me to do a bunch of regular things such as washing my hands, playing the piano, lifting or moving certain objects, etc. Besides, I must be careful not to bump the wound against anything hard so as not cause bleeding again. You could say that this one small cut has wrecked my life. The Lord made me see that any small sin we commit can likewise wreck my whole spiritual life, if we don't take care of it.
Wednesday, July 30, 2025
***Live Without Christ And . . .***
life become tiresome, boring, and meaningless; for he is the truth, the way, the life, and our only Savior! I can bank my life on that.
***You Just Know the Truth***
Today's Gospel reading from Matthew 13: Jesus said to his disciples: "The Kingdom of heaven is like a treasure buried in a field, which a person finds and hides again, and out of joy goes and sells all that he has and buys that field. Again, the Kingdom of heaven is like a merchant searching for fine pearls. When he finds a pearl of great price, he goes and sells all that he has and buys it." Do you feel that way about Jesus? If you treasure Jesus so much that you'd be willing to sell all that you have in order to keep him, then he's truly the one you need, as only God can make you feel this way! Do you get it?
*****Our Only God*****
Many people believe that God exists, but they don't know what that "God" is like nor know him (or whatever), so what's the point? Christ as God is different—you can actually get to know him personally to the point he becomes your savior, healer, guard, guide, friend, and soulmate! He is the the real McCoy, not to sound irreverent in any way. We should rejoice that we have such a loving, caring perfect God!