**Today's Stray Sheep

        In today's Gospel reading from Mark 6, a vast crowd waited for Jesus to show up. When he arrived and saw them, his heart was moved with pity for them, for they were like sheep without a shepherd. Today we have Christ as our shepherd, but many do not even choose to follow him—we have truly gone astray.  

***Mind Follows Heart*

        If your mind is easily cluttered with all kinds of thoughts that make you feel unsettled, trace it back to your heart. If the heart remains clean and calm, the mind will follow suit. Of course, attain union with God through the Holy Eucharist and you'll have a pure heart filled with peace. 

***Most Righteous Goal*****

        One goal of my blog is to spread the name of Jesus for the whole world to know. For he is our most beloved Lord, creator, and Savior. He alone deserves to be worshipped, adored, and praised. Without him, we'd be nothing. With him, we can have eternal life. He is the truth, the light, and the way. I want all to know and acknowledge all this so that they may be set free! May this goal be the goal of every one of us. 

***Ready to Face God?

         We'll never be perfect when we face God, but if you don't have any hesitation and is eager to go to him, you are OK—good enough to go. 

**Happiest Tears*

         These are the ones to which you are moved when you genuinely sense or feel God's love for all of us. It follows that you are a happiest person when you know that God truly loves you.

**The Lord's Doing

         Communion experience. The Lord made my soul presentable to him; I was ready for his judgment.

***We Are Precious to God***

         Know that God has shed his own blood to free us from spiritual death, so we are absolutely precious to him. Therefore, let's keep our soul as spotless as possible. With his help, this becomes practically effortless.

***Going All Out for God*

         The Lord God always goes all out for us and we need to go all out for him to live a purposeful and exciting life. So go all out to worship him, to adore him, to praise him, and to obey and serve him. Then we'll be blessed and rewarded to the max by him with eternal life securely in the bag. 

***Reconciliation with God, a Must***

          God has already paved the way for us to go to heaven. All we need to do is to reconcile with him. It's that plain and simple! So what's your problem?

***God's Beautiful Love*

         It' the most beautiful thing in the whole universe. It is pure, meek, humble, most forgiving, but also most powerful, transforming, and capable of solving all our problems—it's the Lord God himself.  

**God's Permanent Joy

         I use eyedrops to keep the my eye pressures down. As I lay down in bed this morning to do the drops, I first turned on the clock radio by the bedside to see what's playing on the classical music station. It was a guitar concerto that sounded quite beautiful. Then I realized that this listening pleasure was only a passing one, while the joy of Christ I experience is already mine, dwelling in me forever! This realization is in itself a joy!

**Letting Go in the Lord

         Communion experience. Receiving the Lord in the Holy Eucharist strengthens our union with him, readying us for living and dying for him. 

**Triumphant Proclamation**

         Today's psalm response from Isaiah 38.17: You saved my life, O Lord; I shall not die. All faithful Christians already know this, but it sure was good to hear it proclaimed aloud five times at the reading of the psalm.

***Bravery or Cowardice

         If you don't believe in Christ, that doesn't mean that he is not our Savior, for you may be dead wrong. As a believer, I know that no one will ever be able to prove that Christ is not our Savior! So all unbelievers are simply avoiding facing reality. Risking losing your soul for all eternity is not an act of bravery, but one of sheer cowardice and stupidity.

*** Only One Final Judgment!***

         We do not know how and when we'll die. Will there be time for making a final confession of sins? What if we die unexpectedly all of a sudden? Know that after we die, there'll be just one judgment, with no higher court to which we can appeal our cases, for the Lord God is our final and only judge. If you don't have your eternal life secured by Jesus Christ yet, you absolutely need to think about it right now!

***Praying with Faith

         Pray earnestly with persistence, but always believe that the Lord will answer you, and remain in peace.  It's earnest sans anxiety. Jesus said to his disciples, "I tell you, all that you ask for in prayer, believe that you will receive it and it shall be yours." (Mark 11:24) 

**Living for Eternity*

         If you love the Lord, you'll always receive what's best for you. So be happy with what you have and the state you are in, and do not complain under any circumstances, for there's so much for us to be thankful for. This may be difficult to achieve, but as disciples of Christ, we live for him and what's to come. All hardships now are nothing compared to what we'll be receiving later. Live joyfully now and your joy will continue forever!

***All Are Relative*

         Relative to God, we are truly despicable sinners. The more you know the Lord, the more awesome he is to you. Once you know Christ well, all worldly pleasures become tiresome and I can even go so far as to say that everything we do for ourselves without involving the Lord in any way is basically frivolous.