**Wakeup Call!

        The more you do not wish to hear about Christ, the more it shows that he matters to you. 

**Being Good Not Good Enough

        To get your sins forgiven, you need to accept and believe in Christ as your Savior. You might think that you are a pretty good person, and maybe you are, but that is no guarantee that you'll make heaven. Matthew 10.33: Whoever denies me before others, I will deny before my heavenly Father – says the Lord to the Twelve. Yes, accepting Christ does take precedence over getting your sins forgiven. 

***Through Jesus Only!

        John 14.6: Jesus said to Thomas, "I am the way and the the truth and the life.  No one comes to the Father except through me." This makes perfect sense, for he is to be our sole judge and the only one who can take away our sins! It follows that there is no way we can bypass him, right?

**Peace in Christ Only

        Peace on earth begins when you realize that in the God of Christ you can have your future secured for all eternity! No one else in history can promise you that as Christ has with such authority, backed up at the same time by mighty deeds, culminating in his own death and Resurrection. Only in him, the Prince of Peace, will one find ultimate peace.  

**Happy Ending!

        Communion experience. Christ is indeed our end. Once you've let him capture you, your life is full and complete, and you simply rest in him until he takes you to where he is. If you ever prayed for a happy ending to your life, this is it!

*Crux of Making Spiritual Progress

        We know we should love God more, but we cannot accomplish this on our own, for we are finite beings. To go beyond what we can achieve, we must open ourselves to God more to let him power us. Know that the Lord wants to enter totally into our heart to help and we are at the helm of how wide to open the gate of our heart.  

***Getting to the Crux of Our Problems***

        We do not let the God of Christ be our God. If we stop playing God and start obeying him, we'll instantly have heaven on earth!

*Christ Has all We Need to Know

        Anyone who focuses their attention on things of this world only is myopic. Then there are those who search for spiritual truths in the wrong places and end up with nebulous beliefs. Ram Dass is a case in point. You can find out more about him on Wikipedia. I watched the short Netflix documentary "Ram Dass, Going Home" – what he says about life, death, soul, reincarnation, etc., might be attractive to many spiritual seekers, but obviously he doesn't know what he's talking about. Only Christ has provided clear and positive answers to living our spiritual life now and forever. Start or end your search with him.

*Taking Mass Seriously

          At the Last Supper, the Lord Jesus held the First Mass and instituted the sacrament of the Holy Eucharist. Therefore, we should take Mass most seriously. The focus of Mass should be on adoring and glorifying the Lord alone; distraction in any form, no matter how good its intention, should be considered out of place. And worshippers must realize that they are in the house of the Lord and observe silence. Can all this happen in an ordinary parish? I believe that if you do take things seriously, people will come to respect that. It's precisely because you are casual about it that people lose their seriousness too.

**Preparing for Union With God

        In Psalm 31, David writes "Into your hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit." Jesus on the cross cried out "Father, into your hands I commend my spirit" before breathing his last. To me, the spirit is more encompassing than either the heart or the soul. When we commend our spirit into God's hands, we entrust our totality to him. Therefore, making this commitment often should condition us for union with God.  

***Doing Everything With God

        Normally, we don't try to "bother" God with little things we can easily do on our own and only ask for his help when we feel that we need it. Today I ask myself why not ask the Lord to get involved with everything I do, big or little. It would be an excellent way of acknowledging his constant presence and showing my utter need for his companionship. It should strengthen our union of dwelling in each other. So it's doing everything for him and with him. You can never do enough for him who has given all of himself to us.

*Happy, Blessed, and Free Living

        People remain in darkness because it is easier for them to keep their sins hidden than to face light and have them all exposed. They forget that God sees everything in their hearts. Sometimes avoiding facing God can be a sin too, depending upon the circumstances. Again, only God can judge that. Living in darkness is not living at all. Happy, blessed, and free is the one lives completely in the light of Christ, with nothing to hide from the Lord!    

Peace From God Alone

        Today's  Communion antiphon, John 14.27: Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you, says the Lord. The peace God gives us is indeed different because it affects the very soul. Since the world has no power to touch the soul, whatever it gives cannot truly be peace.        

Making Doing Good Meaningful

        Doing good per se is good, but to make it meaningful, you must have a higher purpose. When we treat our own family members kindly, it's only natural. When we do good to strangers, it only makes us feel good. The higher purpose I am talking about is to do good for the sole purpose of pleasing God, not ourselves. This is the way to be set free and to build up lasting treasures in heaven. What Jesus has done to us is most meaningful because he died for us willingly in complete obedience to the Father. No act can be meaningful should God be kept out of the picture.

**Sad Division

        At the end of Mass this morning, Fr. P held up a baby high to show us the one he just baptized yesterday, and the little one grinned. The whole congregation rejoiced and applauded. At that moment, I thought of those babies who did not get baptized because the parents either did not know Christ or had fallen away from their faith before their child was born. It saddened me to see this division among the children through no fault of theirs. 

**Most Tragic and Foolish Act

        Disregard of Your Own Soul.        

***Beautiful Union

        Communion experience. God is completely open and ready. We match him and voilà, the most beautiful encounter happens!

**Letting God Unfold His Plan

        Again, in the Gospel reading from Luke, Jesus says to his disciples, "Everything written about me in the law of Moses and in the prophets and psalms must be fulfilled. Thus it is written that the Christ would suffer and rise from the dead on the third day and that repentance, for the forgiveness of sins, would be preached in his name to all the nations, beginning from Jerusalem." Somehow, at that point, the Lord made me see that there was no reason for us to be terrified of anything anymore, as everything would unfold according to his plan.

*Complete Self-Giving

       In today's Gospel reading from Luke 24, the disciples recognized the Lord Jesus in the breaking of the bread. Each time at Mass, when I see the priest breaking the host, I know the Lord is letting himself be broken and distributed to each one of us, inviting us to join him in union with him.   

*God Is Eternal!

        In today's 1st reading from Acts 3, we heard Peter say to the people, "The author of life you put to death, but God raised him from the dead; of this we are witnesses." It dawned on me that since Christ was our creator, the author of life, then, of course, he cannot possibly ever remain dead! The Resurrection was unavoidable!  

*Church Before Bible

        The Church has always held fast to and taught the Sacred Traditions rooted in Scripture, handed down by the Apostles from the very beginning. The New Testament was not comprised by the Church until almost 400 years later. Therefore, it is false to believe that the Bible is the only teaching authority you need. Just witness the the disunity and disorder among the countless Protestant denominations without the teaching magisterium of the Church. In Thessalonians 2.15, Paul writes "Therefore, brothers, stand firm and hold fast to the traditions that you were taught, either by an oral statement or by letter of ours." The Bible came out of the Church, not the other way around.

*Challenging Questions

        If you don't believe in Jesus, then are you prepared to say that the fact that he performed many miracles, died on the cross and rose from the dead, ascended into heaven, and the Apostles and many early disciples willingly followed him only to meet death is all a big hoax? Are you also prepared to say that the over two billion Christians in the world and the great saints throughout history have all been deceived into believing in a falsehood that has been perpetuated for two millenniums?

**Delightful Holy Spirit

        When the Holy Spirit fills your heart with joy to overflowing, it becomes impossible to keep it to yourself. I love the Holy Spirit, sweet and gentle, yet powerful and insuppressible. The experience of being slain in the Holy Spirit is most peaceful, yet intoxicating. The Holy Spirit is a delight! 

**Back to the Basics

        The Son of God had come to us, revealing God's love for us to the point of dying himself on the cross for our sins so that we might be saved. And he made it clear that whoever believes in him will have eternal life. Yet so many of the world ignore him – how foolish can you be? They do not come forward to say that the good news is untrue either – how cowardly can you be? If I sounded harsh, that's because I am concerned about their souls. Jesus prayed even for those who crucified him from the cross, "Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do." I pray that every single one of us on earth will enjoy heaven after death. What is so great about our God is that no matter how sinful you are, if you repent and ask for his forgiveness, you are right back in his bosom. Now, you are no longer a foolish coward or cowardly fool. 

**Breakthrough for Our Salvation*

        According to Jesus, the greatest commandment for us is to love God the Lord with all our heart, with all our soul, and with all our mind. How do we measure up? To say that we fall short miserably is not far off the mark. It shows how weak we are and how we deeply we have become entangled in the snares of the evil one. Against this, our hope rests in the infinite mercy of God. Even though we can never love God as perfectly as we should, we must try our very best. Again, I recommend seeking union with God to make everything easy. Yes, yielding ourselves to the Lord is the breakthrough we need to ensure our salvation.

Wonderful Feeling

        Communion experience. Knowing that you belong to Christ, that you are his, is a most wonderful feeling.

**Playing Smart With God

        In today's Gospel reading from John 6, the Jewish feast of Passover was near when Jesus saw that a large crowd was coming to him. He said to Philip, "Where can we buy enough food for them to eat?" He said this to test him because he himself knew what he was going to do. Philip answered him, "Two hundred days' wages worth of food would not be enough for each of them to have a little." Andrew, another disciple, said to him, "There is a boy here who has five barley loaves and two fish; but what good are these for so many?" Jesus had all the people recline, about five thousand in number. Then he took the loaves, gave thanks, and distributed them to those who were reclining, and also as much of the fish as they wanted. 

       The lesson here is clear. God does test us, knowing well what he is going to do. As a matter of fact, I see every problem we face as a test of our faith. Knowing well that God always knew what he is going to do, we might as well place our trust in him always.

*Heavenly Banquet

        Communion experience. The Lord fed me the bread from heaven! This is the very bread about which Jesus said, "I am the living bread that came down from heaven; whoever eats this bread will live forever; and the bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world." – John 6.

Reasons for Surrendering to God

(1) To know him, (2) to experience him, (3) to glorify him, (4) to please him.

*Greater Than We Think

        Being finite creatures, we cannot possibly comprehend how great God our infinite creator is. But we can realize that he is always faithful and more powerful, more loving, more merciful, and much wiser than we can possibly imagine.

**"Where Is God?"

        When things go bad, you question where God is. But did you believe in him or even seek him when things were going well? God is always there with us. To his disciples, Jesus said, "Behold, I am with you always, even to the end of the age." You ask where God is because you were never with him! 

*Becoming Free to Go to God

        Communion experience. Receiving Christ makes you forget everything else in the world momentarily. This is a blessing, for you learn to become detached to the world and ready to return to the Lord your God. 

***Truth and Reality

        Today's Gospel reading John 3.16-21, the first part: God so loved the world that he gave his only-begotten Son, so that everyone who believes in him might not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only-begotten Son of God. Comment: The truth John, the Apostle, has spoken to us here should shake us to the core!

          The second part: And this is the verdict, that the light came into the world, but people preferred darkness to light, because their works were evil. For everyone who does wicked things hates the light and does not come toward the light, so that his works might not be exposed. But whoever lives the truth comes to the light, so that his works may be clearly seen as done in God. Comment: Again, John has spoken the truth, the reality then and now. When John wrote the Gospel at an old age, he had fully understood who Jesus was and why he came into the world. We must give these sayings of his most seriously.

**Fighting Temptation

        I've posted that the best way to fight temptation is to run away from it, but it is easier said than done for these two reasons. First, temptation is enjoyable – normally, we just do not walk away when we are having fun. Secondly, temptation is not a sin. When we sin, we sense the guilt and try to stop it, while temptation comes to us and does not make us feel that it is our fault, so the urge to walk away from it is not strongly present. In any case, it takes discipline to overcome temptation. Turning our attention to the Savior should be effective in getting us out of this trap.  

*Awesome Experience

        Communion experience. The Lord entered me in the form of bread to be absorbed totally by me, and physically and spiritually he and I became one. Awesome, awesome, awesome! 

**What God Desires From Us

        During Mass, we hear the names of many great saints invoked. Do you realize that God desires to and can easily make you a saint too? Give him the go-ahead and experience his power, and he will be greatly pleased and honored.

***World in Darkness!

        Godlessness in our world has reached a pinnacle as far as I can see in my lifetime. Do not rule out an imminent World War III. When that happens, you would wish that you knew Christ all along. Do not remain idle. It is time to pray hard with all your heart that the Lord will save all souls and crush all evil. There is never a time we need to cry out for God's mercy more. 

*Ideal Position to Be In

        Most people who are religious were either raised in their religion or looked for and found one they liked. But the only valid reason for one to believe in a religion should be that it has been found to hold the whole truth, and this is how I feel about Catholicism. I watched a short travel vlog showing an American vlogger in front of a Buddhist temple in Beijing, China. Like the native worshippers, she also took some incense sticks, held them up and bowed to the big statue of Buddha in the temple. She's probably having fun or just did it for sake of the vlog. At that moment I realized how blessed I was. I knew God in person, where I was going, what actions would draw me close to God and what actions wouldn't. Life became completely clear and purposeful. This is the ideal comfortable position to be in – the very opposite of being lost.   

*Our Most Urgent Need

        We are sinners. Therefore, our most urgent need is get our sins forgiven by God! After that we can freely enjoy all the benefits, privileges, and advantages that flow from him, our Father. 

*Being Extremely Foolish

        It is plain impossible for us to avoid God and we are definitely not doing fine on our own. Therefore, ignoring the Lord who wishes to save us is being foolish to the expreme.

Getting the Most Out of God

         There is the saying, "You only get out of something what you put into it." In the case with God, the more you surrender to him, the more you are free. Moreover, since the Lord is infinitely rich, what you reap from him can be infinitely rewarding, such as being transformed by him into a new creature, holy and beautiful in his eye. Go all the way to get the most out of God.

*Most Dangerous Living

        It is never wise to live dangerously. You may get the thrill, but you can lose your life and/or everything you have. But to ignore Christ is downright living most dangerously – not only you do not get any thrill, you can lose your soul forever! 

*To Be Beautiful Forever

        The world looks for the most attractive contestant in a beauty pageant or the most impressive physique in a bodybuilding contest. But the Lord God looks at our heart. What is beautiful to him is a heart that's pure, clean, and obedient to his every will. Aim for inner beauty that will shine forever, not for superficial beauty that fades away rapidly.

Jesus As Lord

        The Lord Jesus is not dictatorial nor bossy. On the contrary, he is compelling only because he is meek and humble out of love for us.  

Most Exhilarating Freedom

        There are all kinds of freedoms out there. The best, most precious, and most exhilarating freedom has to be the freedom given by God only: freedom from sin. 

My All

      Communion experience. God is my all because he is all my soul needs.

***Do Not Stifle God's Spirit!***

        You cannot be an good swimming teacher if you are not a proficient swimmer. And you cannot be an good driving instructor if you are not an experienced driver. Similarly, you won't be an effective evangelizer if you do not know the Lord well yourself. To know the Lord thoroughly is to surrender yourself to himself completely so that you may feel the zeal and inner fire and speak with passion and conviction. Otherwise, your message will only sound academic, dry, not-coming-from-the-heart, and lack power. To uplift others, let the Lord uplift you first. To inspire others, let him inspire you first. We should not spend so much time feeling sorry about how we fall short of loving God and trying to figure out how you should love him more. Instead, we should spend a lot more time focusing upon God's love and mercy, such great hope he has given us, and that he can actually help us overcome our sins and transform us into saints! The Holy Spirit does not like us to remain lukewarm; he wants to set our hearts on fire! Not letting ourselves go in God is stifling his Spirit.

***My Ardent Wish

       In today's Gospel reading from John 21, the Risen Christ revealed himself to seven of his disciples yet one more time at the Sea of Tiberias. Simon Peter, Thomas, Nathanael, James and John the Zebedee's sons, and two others went fishing and caught nothing throughout the night. When it was already dawn, Jesus was standing on the shore; but the disciples did not realize that it was Jesus. He said to them, "Children, have you caught anything to eat?" They answered him, "No." So he said to them, "Cast the net over the right side of the boat and you will find something." So they cast it, and were not able to pull it in because of the number of fish. Then John said to Peter, "It is the Lord." When Simon Peter heard that it was the Lord, he tucked in his garment, for he was lightly clad, and jumped into the sea. 

        First, John had that great it-is-the-Lord moment, followed by Peter so eager to get to his Lord. Would that everyone of us will recognize the Lord and run toward him with all his heart, casting everything else aside!

The Negative Can Be Positive

        You may not pay much attention to the good news of salvation brought to you by Christ, but realize the dire consequences of rejecting it and you might just want to take it most seriously. It's like realizing the horror of hell makes one want to seek heaven. The negative can surely make the positive look attractive.

*See Jesus in 3D

      When you look at a scene with your eyes, you see depth and everything else in 3D. But when you look at a photo of the scene, you see it in 2D only, even though you can perceive the 3rd dimension hidden in the image. If we look at Jesus merely as a historical figure, it would be like looking at him in 2D. But he is the same yesterday, today, and forever! Now see him in 3D to watch him come alive with depth.