We have a tendency to overlook the ordinary and simple
things around us. We must not be impressed with just the extraordinary. Our
approach to Christian life should not neglect the day to day and the ordinary
things we do. The very thing that is right in front of us is our next good step.
This is how we will walk to holiness. We may be in a gloomy and dark situation
at the moment but we must not lose hope and put our best foot forward. Is there something that we have been waiting,
longing and hoping for a long time already and is yet to come? Are we on the
verge of giving up and losing hope because of the seemingly endless waiting
period that we are going through? Does it look like things are not getting any
better and would just end up in nothing? Do we sometimes confuse God as someone
who is stern and rough rather than a loving father who would pull us through
any difficult situation? We have to do our best and be immensely patient even
in times of great difficulty and trial. We imitate Christ in his humanity as he
went through his passion and death with the certainty of resurrection. We
should remember that if we pray to God, He would definitely and absolutely
answer in the best way possible for us in His perfect time. Amen. Hallelujah!
Hosea 6:1-6
1 “Come, let us return to the LORD, For it is he who has
rent, but he will heal us; he has struck us, but he will bind our wounds. 2 He
will revive us after two days; on the third day he will raise us up, to live in
his presence. 3 Let us know, let us strive to know the LORD; as certain as the
dawn is his coming, and his judgment shines forth like the light of day! He
will come to us like the rain, like spring rain that waters the earth.” ...For
it is love that I desire, not sacrifice, and knowledge of God rather than
holocausts.
Organizing
all my daily reflections since 2007 made it easier for me to locate and
retrieve them. I have found it very rewarding and beneficial. It has given me
the opportunity to access with ease, the insights and reflections I wrote in
the past. Thus paving the way to recall, reflect, and share it again. In light
of the readings today I am reminded of Fr. Alex Amayin, the associate priest in
St. Elizabeth Ann Seton. His talk was about reconciliation which is very much
in line with the 1st & psalm readings for today. It was centered on 4
things which is 1. SIN 2. GRACE 3. FORGIVENESS 4. RECONCILIATION. He said that
the 1st 3 are all a reality but #4 is only a possibility. There is no doubt
that SIN happens but the GRACE of God is always present and available for us even
before we ask for FORGIVENESS. When we ask FORGIVENESS, God is always ready to
give it. RECONCILIATION calls us to true conversion. We should always
find our way back to God and never doubt His mercy. He cited the example of a
snake and caterpillar since both of them undergoes conversion. The snake sheds
off its old skin but comes out the same while the caterpillar emerges into a
butterfly. We can either choose to be the snake or the caterpillar. Take your
pick. The sacred heart of Jesus should be our model and guide as we strive to
live out the call to be a genuine follower of God. “When we open our heart to
the love of God and to others, it makes us capable of shaping history according
to God’s plan.” - said Pope John Paul II. In His fourth apparition to St.
Margaret Mary, our Lord revealed His Sacred Heart, declaring: "Behold this
Heart which has so loved men that it spared nothing, even going so far as to
exhaust and consume Itself, to prove to them Its love.” The center of devotion
to the Sacred Heart of Jesus is the Enthronement of the image of the Sacred
Heart in the home. By the Enthronement of the Sacred Heart, we link the
tabernacle of our parish church to our home, inviting our Lord to be our
constant and most intimate companion. The Enthronement is a way of life.
It means that Christ is King of our hearts, and we desire Him to be present
with us always. In other words, by the Enthronement we signify our desire to
make our hearts and our homes holy, to sanctify our lives in every aspect. God
will not refuse nor turn His back on us if we are truly sorry for our sins and
are willing to mend our ways. Let us not be so naive into thinking that we can
get away with anything and cheat God. Let us be fair and truly square in
dealing with things that concern not just our future but our eternal destiny.
Whether it's heaven or hell, we would have to decide for that not God. If we
choose to do evil then we are surely headed where it's bound but if we remain
faithful to God and all that He represents then we are headed to a place
prepared for us by God in heaven. We are sure to go where our hearts lead us.
The problem is that there is a great propaganda out there. It makes sin appear
with all its fun, excitement and glamour. It makes virtue appear boring, lame,
bland and unexciting. But the truth of the matter is, it’s not. The pleasures
that God created in this world are enjoyed the most by those who don’t abuse
them and use it simply. Who do we think enjoys food most? The person who
doesn’t know how to fast and engorges all the time or a person after a fast
experiences a feast? The virtuous person enjoys life the most. The person who
uses creation and all things according to God’s plan enjoys it the most. It is
because pleasure is God’s idea. All the good things in the world that people
want are God’s idea. Satan can’t invent even one bit of pleasure. But God
commands them to be used so that it leads to life and a part of life is joy.
The way to enjoy life is to follow God’s commands. Life is not all about rules
and regulations. God did not just give us a bunch of rules and regulations that
we are supposed to obey like machines. What we do does not just proceed from
who we are but also makes us who we are. The actions we engage, the words
that we say and the things that we do have an impact on us. We are making
ourselves all the time. God created us when we came out of the womb, our
mothers and father have a great role in that but our creation continues every
single day of our lives. We’re even becoming someone more beautiful, mature and
stronger or someone weaker and more despicable. There’s no middle ground. We’re
going one way or another. Life leads either to heaven or to hell. That’s what
the acts that we commit do. Let us always ask God's mercy for our sins and
repent of it. The Lord said that He is not sent for the well but for the sick.
We have a disease in our souls that if left uncared for can cause death. We all
have a terminal disease called sin, we need a doctor to give us advice. We have
been saved by God but we can lose it just as we can lose our human life for not
caring for it. We go to God who is our Divine Physician to be healed. He alone
can make us whole. God's presence in our lives is inevitable just like the coming
of dawn before the break of day and if we have mastered the art of loving back
God then we become a pleasing sacrifice before Him. And in his good pleasure
makes us prosper, then we find ourselves rebuilding the walls of our boundaries
as we expand our borders. It is of prime importance that we take extra care in
attending not only to our temporal needs but our spiritual as well. We have
this mindset that it pleases God whenever He sees us going through hardships
and difficulties in life. We tend to equate God to an oppressing tyrant that
would pin us down for every wrong move. Or worst to a slave driver that would
not be satisfied unless his subjects exhaust all their strength to his service.
The people during the time in the Old Testament could borrow a good excuse for
having this kind of mindset because Jesus has not come yet. We who live in this
time of the New Testament do not have a good alibi because God already
demonstrated the greatest expression of His love for mankind when He sacrificed
His only begotten son, Jesus, to suffer and die for our sake. With this truth
always engraved in our hearts and minds we could no longer harbor wrong
impressions and mindsets of our God. Whenever a particular human right is being
violated certain activist groups passionately rally to defend such right that
is in question. What about the right of God? We are so concerned about our own
personal agenda and we fail to realize that we need to address it more than
anything else. According to Pope Benedict XVI, Jus Divinum is the right of God
which constitutes the proper and correct response of God’s creatures such as
man to his Creator. This we ought to realize and take action. We should do all
the good that we are supposed to do to a God who created us. There is something more to what we
see, hear and feel about people. We really couldn't judge a book by its cover.
It's in knowing what is hidden in the heart that we can truly say for sure what
is real. But who can see through our hearts? Nobody but God alone. What is unknown
and hidden from us, God knows. We may be able to hide from men but never from
God. We can only pray to God to create in us a clean heart. For where our
treasure is, there also will be our hearts. This should all be our prayer,
“Change me Oh God, mold me in accordance to your pattern and plan and not mine”
Dirt stain in clothes sometimes doesn't want to come off even after several
times it has been machine washed. There are really some dirt and stain that do
not go away that easily with regular washing. There is a need to scrub it
manually with soap and water so that it will come out clean. Our souls are just
like clothes which are stainable by our sins. It is a consolation to know that
our sins are washable in the blood of our Lord Jesus Christ. We can always come
to Him and acknowledge our sins with a sincere and repentant heart so He can
cleanse us, wipe out our offenses and blot out all our guilt. There is nothing
that could separate us from the love of God. Let us not be deceived nor
dissuaded to believe otherwise. Just like clothes that need to be washed after
being worn and got dirty so our souls need to be cleansed too by the blood of
the Lamb. God’s love ever present in the body and blood of Christ is always
present and available for us. All we need to do is reach out for it because God
is a gentleman and would never force Himself on us. There has always been a
raging battle between God and satan. Though it has already been won, satan just
won’t give up. He continues to wreak havoc and evil among us in his desperation
to bring misery into our lives and share in his condemnation. He doesn’t have
the tiniest power over us and he can only have it if and only if we give in to
his lies, deceptions and false promises. We need to make this conscious decision
each and every single day for the Lord. We need to purge ourselves of the
impurities of our souls we have to go through a certain process that will
render us with a clean heart. As we strive to nurture a heart that beats for
God alone we also go through a process of cleansing as stated in the psalm
today. God's mercy is greater than any of our sins. If we are to repent and
turn away from our sins then we've got to do it right now and really do it
fast. God sees through our hearts, our motives and intentions. What God wants
of us is to truly acknowledge His great mercy and goodness to us that in doing
so will abound a natural inclination to repent and repair all our iniquities
and lead to a brand new, wholesome and clean Christian in the truest sense of the
word. We need to stand in all humility before God and confess our sins. The
body and soul are good but it demands a need for physical asceticism. We have
to submit our bodies to an act of sacrifice without neglecting that conversion
is first of all interior. Total conversion demands not only expression in works
of penance but also of the heart. God is able to do anything. All the more
should we be full of confidence that He can create a clean heart and steadfast
spirit for us if we truly ask for it. God our Father will never turn His back
on us. Let us get this straight, it is the sin that God hates and not the
sinner. If we are in sin then that's the time we drive away God's Holy Spirit
dwelling in us for it is impossible for God's presence to exist with sin. It's
our call then to respond to the psalm's invitation to rise and go to God or
remain slumped in the mud of sin. Our God will always be the best Father a
child could ever have, the best Brother/Friend and the best Comforter and Guide
all in one. Bottom line, to Him alone shall we go because we don't know that
much and if we don’t then we end up doing one of these things, take for
granted, ignore, forget or neglect the things God is telling us to do. What's
worse it could be all of the above! We get blinded and become preoccupied with
a lot of things that lure us away from doing what God wants us to do. We are
deceived into believing all the lies of this world disguised and packaged by
the enemy in an inviting and convincing truth. We should realize that it is
always for our own good that He commands us to do the right thing. It is not
merely to impose but for us to freely decide for a life lived to the full.
There is no other way to maintain the Holy Spirit dwelling in us but to let it
reside in a clean heart. We drive away God's Spirit in us if we don't
strive to let our hearts remain clean. Today's psalm is a song that I have come
to know and sing by heart without the aid of a song book. I always love to sing
it and hear it being sung most especially by the choir during mass. It is well
for us to not just love to sing it with our voices but with the sincerity of
our hearts. The words "take not your Holy Spirit from me" made me
realize that God has the power to give and take. The thought of the Holy Spirit
being taken away from us is the worst thing that could ever happen. If we don't
feel God's presence in our life anymore and we've become numb and insensitive
to the promptings and guidance of the Holy Spirit then now is the time to
reconnect and realign ourselves to God's Spirit most especially during this
Lenten season. It is important that we always maintain a clean heart and a
steadfast spirit so that we are constantly in God's presence. It's not that God
loves us any less, no matter what we do He will always love us. It's just that
a Holy and Loving God can not dwell in an impure heart and spirit. It is
of prime importance that we take extra care in attending not only to our
temporal needs but our spiritual as well. Amen. Hallelujah!
R: It is mercy I desire, and not sacrifice.
1 [3] Have mercy on me, O God, in your goodness; in the greatness of your compassion wipe out my offense. 2 [4] Thoroughly wash me from my guilt and of my sin cleanse me. (R) 16 [18] For you are not pleased with sacrifices; should I offer a burnt offerings, you would not accept it. 17 [19] My sacrifice, O God, is a contrite spirit; a heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn...
Let us always be reminded of the truth that as we soar high
and become blessed, there is a tendency to claim it for our own personal glory.
We must always strive to keep our feet on the ground and bring back all the
glory to God. We should always go back to the truth in this gospel by becoming
like Jesus who stooped down to our level, became man, served and died for
humanity. Sometimes we are so preoccupied with how we are faring in the eyes of
men without realizing that God's point of view and criteria should come first.
We've got to discover the secret hidden in today's gospel and genuinely live
it. Without truly understanding the real meaning of being humbled before the
Lord then we can never apply what today’s gospel is telling us. It is important
to know how we picture God in our life. It will automatically create a series
of reactions in us. Let us not be caught off guard or unprepared. We may be
getting the wrong impressions. Just like the Pharisee in today's gospel who
thought that he was right before God and the tax collector was the one who was
unacceptable to God. Jesus, who is God the Son, King of Kings and Lord of Lords
humbled Himself to the point of a most humiliating and painful death on a cross
during that time when only the worst criminals were punished in that manner.
God the Father, suffered to see His Beloved and only Begotten Son shed His
blood and became the Sacrificial Lamb of God who took away all our sins. If
this could not move us to true humility then nothing else could. Let us always
conduct ourselves with all humility, though, there are times when we tend to
forget. We must keep in mind that we must avoid following the example of the
Pharisee and be like the tax collector although sinful was honest before God
and humbly admitted his iniquities. God doesn't care if we are as dirty as a
rag, all we have to do is be humble in admitting it before Him and He will make
as brand new. Even when we go through a spiritual rut we must not hesitate to
come before God and cling to him even more, knowing that only He can deliver us
from all evil. Let us examine ourselves very closely, we may not be thinking
and acting the way God expects us to. They say a lot of people die because of
wrong impressions or Maraming namamatay sa maling akala. Let us strive to align
everything in our lives in accordance to God's standards and not ours most
especially if we truly want to be in union with a Perfect God. When we go to
God in prayer we must keep in mind that God is the source of all good things
and without Him we are nothing. When we get the real picture of our
relationship with God we become better and better. We need not say or do
anything to exalt ourselves because our efforts are merely nothing as compared
to God’s. All we have to do is trust that God who sees and knows all will put
everything in our life in its perfect order. Amen. Hallelujah!
Luke 18:9-14
...everyone who exalts himself will be humbled, and the one
who humbles himself will be exalted.”
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