**Beautiful Prayer**

          In Luke 18, Jesus told the Parable of the Pharisee and the Tax Collector. A Pharisee and a tax collector went up to the temple area to pray. The Pharisee took up his position and prayed, "O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity—greedy, dishonest, adulterous—or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, and I pay tithes on my whole income." But the tax collector stood off at a distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, "O God, be merciful to me a sinner." Jesus commented, "The latter went home justified, not the former; for everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one who humbles himself will be exalted." Here we're given this most beautiful prayer we can pray unceasingly. Saying it puts us in our right place. When we are humble enough to ask God for mercy, he is overjoyed. As a result, he grants our request without hesitation and we experience peace.

*****Crucial Realization***

        Since we all sin against God, we definitely need to beg for his mercy on our souls!

**Serving God Like the Angles*

        Today is the Feast of Saints Michael, Gabriel, and Raphael, Archangels. The entrance antiphon after Psalm 103:20 reads: "Bless the Lord, all you his angels, mighty in power, fulfilling his word and heeding his voice." I feel it's so right for us, who are supposed to serve the Lord, to also do what the angels are doing, namely, acting at the Lord's behest and being obedient to his command.

***Love Prevails**

         Communion experience. I dared to touch the Lord only because of his great love.

***Complete Abandonment to God Is . . .***

not caring about your own will anymore, letting the Lord do whatever he wills with you! This is achieving ultimate freedom and fulfillment.

**Generations of Hardened Hearts**

         Today's Gospel reading from Luke 16 presents the Parable of the Rich Man and Lazarus the poor man. When Lazarus died, he was carried away by angels to the bosom of Abraham. The rich man also died and was buried, and from the netherworld, where he was in torment, he raised his eyes and saw Abraham far off and Lazarus at his side. And he cried out, "Father Abraham, send Lazarus to my father's house, for I have five brothers, so that he may warn them, lest they too come to this place of torment." But Abraham replied, "They have Moses and the prophets. Let them listen to them." He said, "Oh no, father Abraham, but if someone from the dead goes to them, they will repent." Then Abraham said, "If they will not listen to Moses and the prophets, neither will they be persuaded if someone should rise from the dead." Many of us today do not even listen to the Son of God! What will then happen to them? I shudder at the thought.

***Getting Along with Jesus a Delight*

         All of us human beings have our likes and dislikes, so it's safe to say we won't ever find someone we can get along with perfectly. I have been married to my wife decades and we still misunderstand each other often. Then there's Lord Jesus. He not only listens to us with infinite patience whenever we share our innermost feelings and thoughts with him, he also understands us perfectly, for he knows our hearts inside out. And he always speaks to us with love and kindness. As long as we remain obedient to him, we can get along with him perfectly!  And we find that we now get along with everyone else better too! 

**Being Raised to an Exalted State*

         Communion time thought. The Lord exalts the humble. So when we surrender our will to his, our spirit soars.

*****More Important than Ourselves*****

         Since Christ is our creator as well as our Savior, he is more important to us than ourselves! So when we become his totally, we are totally fulfilled by him! I see this clearly.

**Extreme Outcomes**

         Remain in Christ and you are saved and on your way to heaven. Rejecting Christ and you are lost and cut off from him forever. These diametric outcomes are extreme because God's love for us is extreme and to reject this great love is surely to be extreme too.

***Saints' Preference**

         I believe that all the great saints, living and deceased, would prefer or have preferred to remain unknown so that Christ alone may be the center of our attention and glorified.

**Unbeatable Feeling

         Communion experience. The Lord touched me way beyond the physical level; he healed and perfected my soul!

***The Christ Difference***

         If you are living without Christ, chances are you are not too happy with your life. But if you are quite happy, then know that this is as happy as you'll get, for you cannot possibly have a happier afterlife without knowing Christ first. On the other hand, with Christ you're lifted to a higher state of existence—you are now set free from the world and your sins, and destined to live your next life infinitely happier than your present one. 

***The Crucial Question***

         In today's Gospel reading from Luke 9, Jesus asked his disciples, “Who do the crowds say that I am?” They said in reply, “John the Baptist; others, Elijah; still others, ‘One of the ancient prophets has arisen.’” Then he said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Peter said in reply, “The Christ of God.” Today, we face the same question and must respond to the Lord, for how we answer will determine our eternal destiny.  

**Difficulty in Following Christ**

         Some of the teachings of the Lord Jesus seem almost humanly impossible for us to follow. Of course, we should never give up and decide to ignore them. So what shall we do? First of all, we must believe that God will never put anyone who loves him through a test he can't pass. And if we do face a difficult test situation, the Holy Spirit will surely show us how to respond. So stop worrying and trust in the Lord fully, then everything will work out well. It sounds cliché, but it's the truth.

**Clear Fact Today**

        In today's Gospel reading from Luke 9, Herod the tetrarch was greatly perplexed about Jesus because he heard some saying, "John the Baptist has been raised from the dead"; others, "Elijah has appeared"; still others, "One of the ancient prophets has arisen." That's understandable. Today, with billions of Christians worldwide, it should be crystal clear that Jesus is the Son of God, our Savior!

***Why Total Abandonment?***

        St. Augustine wrote in his autobiography Confessions this famous saying: "You have made us for yourself, O Lord, and our heart is restless until it rests in you." So if your heart is restless, you have not rested in God yet! The Lord God can totally take care of us and we need to abandon ourselves totally in him.

**Unfinished Business*

         We'll always have unfinished business to deal with till our last day on earth. So try to complete what's important or necessary first and the rest when you have the time. Of course, if you die right now, you'll just have to let everything go. So it wouldn't make any sense to let unfinished business cause you to lose your peace. Once you're with the Lord in heaven, he may still assign tasks for you to perform. Then you'll simply see it as following his will and not as something to complete. And you'll always experience peace and joy. So why not see it that way starting right now on earth? If you know your are heaven bound, you might as well live as if you were already there?