What I like about the Lord God is you can totally trust in him. His yes means yes and his no, no. When he grants you eternal life, you get it with absolute certainty. God is the very opposite of Satan, who is all deception through and through.
Saturday, April 2, 2022
***A Test of the Ego
On this First April Saturday morning, the Church was quite packed and the line for confession afterwards was extra long—all good signs. Here's one thought on confession. If after I confessed, I still think about how I did and wonder if I impressed the priest, then I still have an ego and that's a sin in itself. To forget yourself is to forget all your ego too.
*Fascinating Sign*
A fascinating sign at Fatima on the day of Papal Consecration of Russia to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Friday, April 1, 2022
**Do You Know that . . .
if you already believe in Christ, God has chosen (handpicked) you to inherit his kingdom? Therefore, rejoice!
**Formula for Living in Peace
In today's Gospel reading from John 7, some of the Jews tried to arrest Jesus, but no one laid a hand upon him, because his hour had not yet come. For us too, God has an hour for everything. We are to trust in God and wait for whatever he sends our way. This is how we can live in peace.
Thursday, March 31, 2022
****Life's Two Parts**
Life consists of just two parts. The first part on earth is quite brief, but most important, for it determines what the next part will be like, the part that's eternal. You can say that what we sow in this brief life will determine what we reap in our next life eternal. In case you don't know yet, how we should sow to reap the best possible outcome has already been laid out clearly and completely by our heavenly Father thru his Son Jesus.
**First Saturday Devotion Recommended
As the first Saturday of April is coming up in two days, if you love the Blessed Mother, I'd recommend that you look into the 5 First Saturdays Devotion if you haven't done it yet. Here's just one of the sites online for you to learn about it. Trust in Mary and she will remove all barriers between you and her Divine Son. She is our most loving mother.
Wednesday, March 30, 2022
**Joyful Coincidence
In union with God, your will and his will become one. So when you do your will, you do his as well. What a joyful coincidence!
***Importance of Our Heart
We must love God with all our heart. We must pray to God from the heart. To hear him, we need to listen for his voice in the inmost recesses of our heart. God communicates with us through the heart. And when he sees us, he always looks at our heart first. Harden your heart and you cut yourself off from knowing God. Give your heart to him and you become his and are set free.
**Being Treated like an Apostle
Communion experience. I received exactly what the Apostles did at the Last Supper.
*****Once-in-All-Eternity Offer
Today's entrance antiphon, Psalms 69.14: I pray, O Lord, for a time of your favor. In your great mercy, answer me, O God, with your salvation that never fails. I am thinking about that salvation of God that never fails. I can quote many sayings from Scriptures, but the gist is that if you believe in Christ as your Savior and follow him faithfully, you are saved for sure! You have to be an utter fool to pass such a golden, once-in-all-eternity free offer.
Tuesday, March 29, 2022
**Follow God's Ways and Thoughts
The Ukrainian soldiers have been celebrating their victories over their Russian counterparts in defending their country against the invasion. For us humans, that's the natural thing to do. But as Christians, we should thank God first for not letting the enemy prevail. Russia has suffered great losses so far. As I understand, many Russian soldiers were not for fighting this war, but had no choice and got killed. God loves all of us and wants us to love even our enemies. So praying for them, those who are still alive and those who have died, is what we should do. We are to follow God's ways and thoughts in all things and not do what we feel like doing.
***Becoming a Saint Made Easy*
God knows every little thing we do. All we need to do is "do every little thing with great love for his glory" and we become saints! (Then we shall always have joy and not complain anymore.)
***Soul-Changing Experience
Communion experience. The food nurtures and heals the soul. It's like attending a banquet in heaven. You are never the same person again.
**Our Obligation Not to Sin Anymore*
In today's Gospel reading from John 5, Jesus cured a man who had been ill for 38 years. Later when Jesus found him, he said to him, "Look, you are well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse may happen to you." Once Jesus has cured us or done us a favor, we are obliged not to offend him anymore. Otherwise, something worse may happen to us. Actually, the Lord has already died to save us from sin. For this alone, we should not sin anymore. If we don't listen to him here, surely things are going to get worse.
**Multitude of Joys from the Lord
The disciples of Christ receive many joys from the Lord. Off the top of my head, I can mention the joy of union with him; the joy of salvation; the joy of being forgiven by him; the joy of meditating upon his suffering for our sake; the joy of knowing that we are loved by and precious to him; the joy of knowing that we are headed for heaven to be with him forever; the joy of having our soul being healed by him; the joy of feeling pure and clean; the joy of serving, glorifying, and adoring him; the joy of hearing him speaking to our heart; the joy of receiving answers to our prayers; the joy of being set free from sin by him . . . .
Monday, March 28, 2022
**Another Privilege of Knowing God
After receiving Holy Communion, I enjoyed communing with the Lord, sharing my deepest innermost thoughts and feelings with him. Again, you can do this only with God, not possible with anyone else. Another great privilege of knowing the Lord personally thru the Holy Eucharist.
****Let God Do This Tremendous Thing
I was greatly moved at Mass when I realized that Christ can take away my sins. This is significant, in fact momentous! It's something only the Lord can do. When he does that to you, the effect is tremendous: You are now made clean and fit for heaven! Think about it. If you don't get your sins removed, they will sink you in the end.
**God Our Spearhead
God is our refuge, our strength, our fortress, etc. I also see him as our spearhead, for it's thru his prompting and inspiration that we accomplish great tasks for his glory.
**Trust and Live
In today's Gospel reading from John 4, a royal official whose son was ill in Capernaum went to Jesus in Galilee and ask him to come down to heal his son, who was near death. Jesus said to him, "You may go; your son will live." The man believed what Jesus said to him and left. He found out later that the fever left his boy just at the time Jesus had said to him, "Your son will live." It show that if we truly trust in what God tells us, we really don't have to worry about anything. This is what the Lord wants us to realize and how we should live.
Sunday, March 27, 2022
**Beautiful Union*
Communion experience. Uniting yourself with the love of God is about the most beautiful thing in the whole universe, and this is what you experience when you receive the Holy Eucharist. You let the love of God totally fill your mind, your heart, and your soul. It is thru this Most Blessed Sacrament that you achieve this most intimate union with the Lord.
**Living to Find Life
We want to live in Jesus, but we want to die in him too. Anyway, we no longer live for ourselves. As the Lord said, "For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it, but whoever loses his life for my sake will find it" (Matthew 16:25).
***How Not to Judge
Don't judge others means you mind your own sins only. Let God take care of the sins of others.
****Repentance Not to Be Delayed
Always repent as soon as possible. For venial sins, you can repent right way. For serious sins, go to confession. If you don't, you put yourself in a situation as precarious as hanging from a cliff.
***Distinct Benefits of Union with God***
(1) You are aware of God's presence at all times.
(2) Your conscience becomes super sharp.
(3) You lose the fear of death.
*****Incredibly Loving & Generous Father!
In today's Gospel reading from Luke 15, we heard the parable of the lost son read. For me, this is Jesus' most beautiful parable. It shows how incredibly our Father loves us. If we tell him we are sorry for what we've done, he is overjoyed and all our faults are forgotten and forgiven! It's almost as if he is at our mercy, which shouldn't be! Then when we become his good children, all he has is ours. How most generous he is! This is holy "spoiling"! So to those of you who have not returned to the Father yet, you don't know how much you are missing that could be all yours! I truly feel sorry for you.
**Complaining Not from God*
Blessed and wise are those who never complain about anything that come to them. They have submitted themselves completely to God, knowing that complaining comes from the Devil to rob them of peace. Praise God always and complain not about anything.
**Entrusting Our Death to God
The war in Ukraine has already caused thousands of deaths. The news media report daily how the Russian soldiers got neutralized; look, they all got blown up by drones, anti-tank rockets, or mines. Such news is tragic, but how one dies does not reflect where the soul goes after death. The souls of many Christian martyrs went straight to heaven, whereas anyone who lives comfortably and dies naturally could still end up in hell. All we know is that God is all-knowing and just. We can help by praying for all those who have died and gone to purgatory; better yet, pray that all who are living will turn to God before they die.
Saturday, March 26, 2022
**Definitive Divergent Paths
Reject Christ and what will ultimately happen to you will be a lot worse than you can imagine. I want everyone to realize this to avoid being shocked later. On the other hand, follow Christ faithfully and what will ultimately happen to you will be way beyond what you can possibly expect. I wouldn't think about it now so that my joy may be greater when I experience it.
*God Has to Be Real
You may not believe in God, but you see evil all around you. You feel it in your heart and soul too when you do something bad. If evil is real and you can feel it, logically and intuitively God has to be real too (even if we do not consider Christ, our overwhelming evidence).
**Getting God to Accept Us
In the world, we learn how to get along with others in order to achieve success. Dale Carnegie's book How to Make Friends and Influence People is a classic. I read it when I was young and found the advice given to be wise, sensible, and most helpful. In today's reading from Psalm 51, verse 19 reads "My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit; a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn." This is it—to get along with God, approach him with a contrite and humbled heart. Here we have the secret of getting God to accept us.
Thursday, March 24, 2022
***How God's Justice works
In the current Ukraine war, many thousands of lives have already been lost in one month. Perhaps Russia has suffered the largest loss of its armed forces so far. I feel sad that all the deaths occurred because one man, Putin, decided to invade Ukraine. I started thinking about God's justice. Say you have two individuals, A & B. Let say that A killed B, but finally repented of his sin, so God forgave and saved him. B was not a bad person, but when he died, he was in a state of mortal sin, so he wasn't saved. To us, it seems unfair because it appears that the killer got away, but his victim didn't. We can learn two important things here. (1) Repentance is absolutely essential to salvation. (2) Each of us is responsible for his own soul. How someone else's soul ends up is all up to God, none of our business.
***Calling All Hardened Hearts***
We so often harden our hearts, not even willing to listen to our Lord and Savior. Guess who has the softest heart of all? It's the Lord who has the most merciful Sacred Heart! It seems so unfair to have billions of hardened hearts turning against one most loving soft heart. Pray to the Sacred Heart of Jesus to soften and melt your hearts to experience a transformation. All you prodigal children need to return to your heavenly Father or remain lost forever!
***Don't Evict the Lord!***
Once you receive Christ in the Holy Eucharist, he begins dwelling within you. To make sure that he is most happy, you must remain as holy as possible. Otherwise, you would be evicting him!
***True Humility Is . . .***
perfect obedience to God. (Our true God is most meek and humble. When we obey him, we become like him.)
**Repaying the Lord
Communion experience. The Holy Eucharist is our greatest gift on earth. It nurtures us, elevates us, and fulfills us spiritually. How can we repay the Lord? It seems most appropriate that we put ourselves completely at his disposal.
*Having Undivided Faith in Christ*
In today's Gospel reading from Luke 11, Jesus drove out a demon from a mute man, and some people said that it's by the power of Beelzebul, the prince of demons, that he drove out demons. Jesus said to them, "Every kingdom divided against itself will be laid waste and house will fall against house. And if Satan is divided against himself, how will his kingdom stand?" I believe we've all heard the saying "United we stand, divided we fall"—it's practically common sense. I started thinking that if we want to remain strong in Christ the Lord, our faith must not be divided in any way. That is, we must single-mindedly trust in him. A strong faith gets results.
**Best Action to Take Now
From today's Reading I from Jeremiah 7, we heard that the people no longer obeyed nor paid heed to the Lord. They walked in the hardness of their evil hearts and turned their backs to him. It's a nation that would not listen to the voice of its God. Today, the peoples on earth are doing no better. With the ongoing war in Ukraine, abortion continuing worldwide, most governments and the Church corrupt to the core, mass media spreading fake news, and shocking evil deeds being performed by so many people every minute, I no longer pay much attention to all these things. The world will reap what it sows. My only resort is to go deep into the Lord and pray even harder, for only he can do great things for us. If everyone would trust and follow Christ, we'll have peace within us and throughout the world. This shows that I am doing the right thing.
Wednesday, March 23, 2022
*****All Thru Christ
It is thru Christ that we were created, remain alive on earth, are given all the things we need, are saved from our sins, obtain all kinds of favors from God, do great things, and finally get to return to the heavenly Father. For he is the way, and the truth, and the life. We owe everything to him. Without him, we wouldn't even be around!
***Christ Our Savior and Perfector
Jesus came to us to save us and also to perfect us. Let him perfect us and we are automatically saved.
**God to Be Our Only Guide
When you love God, he knows exactly how you can serve him best. Since we are all different, we are called to serve him in different ways. If others seem to do greater works, let yourselves be inspired by them, but do not imitate them. Let the Lord alone be your guide.
**Two Stages of Becoming Holy
Start with a pure heart, then your thoughts will be pure and your soul clean. Now you are ready to live a life completely in the Lord God, obedient to him in everything for his great glory.
Tuesday, March 22, 2022
***Holy Mother Calling Us
Our Blessed Mother has always been calling us to turn to her Son, now more urgently than ever. I'd listen to her now to avoid forcing God to giving us some kind of a big shock later as a last resort to wake us up.
***Who Can Console God?****
We find joy and consolation in the Lord. But in whom can he fine joy and consolation? The answer is us! A father always finds great joy and consolation in his beloved children when they trust and obey him, and we can do precisely that to our heavenly Father! This would make the whole heaven rejoice too! And knowing that the Father is pleased with us, our joy and consolation further increase. The Father in heaven and his beloved children on earth rejoicing in each other—what a glorious event!
**Ideal State for the Soul
The Lord can increase in us only if we decrease ourselves. If we don't decrease at all, then there won't be any room for him. If we decrease to nothing, he then fill us to the fullest and we are set free. This is the ideal state for our soul to enjoy peace and freedom in him.
**Be As Forgiving as God
In today's Gospel reading from Matthew 18, Jesus wants us to always forgive anyone who sins against us. We must do this because this is how the Lord forgives us. If we are unforgiving, we prevent him from forgiving us.
Monday, March 21, 2022
**Teaching on Purgatory*
I recently read the book The Amazing Secret of Purgatory, an interview with Maria Simma by Sr. Emmanuel. Maria Simma probably knew more about purgatory than anyone else. I learned so much that I am getting the book Get Us Out of Here by Nicky Eltz, a more complete and better-known interview with Maria. This Fr. Goring video of a week ago on purgatory is worth watching. You'll learn something definitely beneficial to know.
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