GOD’S TEMPLE

If we stay connected to God then there is really nothing we should worry about. Today's 1st reading describes fruit trees of every kind growing with their leaves never fading nor their fruit ever failed. God provides for all our needs and this is a reality that most of us sometimes fail to realize. Whenever things do not turn out the way we expected it to happen we end up searching for other sources or worst decide to do things our way instead of staying within the sanctuary of God. We should not stray from the right path for God will not just provide for our needs but make us a source of blessing for others, too. I remember the time when it was orange and lemon season when we used to harvest bags of these fruits from the backyard of Mr. and Mrs. Lowry. They are so generous to the point of telling us to just get as much as we like. They have very productive fruit bearing trees and it seemed like it never ran out of fruits to harvest. We would fill up big garbage bags and harvest as much as 3-4 bags. Just imagine how many fruits their trees bear. It is so amazing that even after we've harvest too much for us to carry, the tree would still look like it didn't give out any. In fact the topmost portion of the tree where the ladder could not reach had fruits that just waited to rot and fall off. The fruits were too many and heavy that the branches started to bend low and almost reached the ground. It is definitely something and it was like nothing we've ever seen before or something that we often do not normally see. It resembles what today's 1st reading is telling us since we have become so amazed and blessed of these fruit trees but it still is nothing compared to  what the Lord has prepared for us in that heavenly place where we all long to be someday. The 1st reading also reminded me of my 1st boss. She is Mrs. Teofista Tan Tena or Tita Pat as we fondly call her and I consider her one of God's instruments in my having a personal relationship with God. She is an active member of a Catholic Charismatic group (Reach Out For Jesus) and being the boss she would persistently invite us to attend the regular prayer meetings they were having during lunch breaks every Tuesday and Thursday. I can never forget that day when I had a dream or vision of water coming from all directions and I couldn't figure out why. I shared it to her and she said that it was the 1st reading for the day. I was able to confirm it when I went to mass that day and found out myself that it was indeed the reading for the day. From then on I have started leafing through the bible and look for quoted bible passages by people in seminars and retreats I attended. It all started there, my love to read and reflect on the scriptures which is often coupled with a confirming event or situation. Some are overwhelmingly amazing in nature that it has inspired me to keep it going and progressed to writing daily reflections. Looking back after all those years, I should say I have gone a long way already in terms of my frequenting the word of God. I praise and thank God for her that whatever she has planted through me have grown and improved.  I will strive to do my best to keep it that way, continuously maintaining and improving for God's greater glory. She has become God's channel of blessing for me which made me realize now that she has become like the river that flows to me that is mentioned in today's 1st reading. These are only a few of the several experiences I had right after my baptism in the spirit. It kept me inspired and always on fire for the Lord. It was also her who told me that it was the so called honeymoon stage with the Lord.  There are degrees or levels of faith. What I am being reminded today is my 1st degree, level or stage of faith experience. Just like all other stages we have to step up or move up the ladder and reach the peak. We have to mature and look beyond the spiritual highs and still keep up with the faith as we go through an all time low, a plateau or the so called spiritual dryness. It is when we can really prove our loyalty to God. As scriptures say, just like gold we are tested through fire. In this journey of life we need to go through a process where we all hope and aspire to bring out the best in us and be the person God has all meant us to be. This inspiring message that is often quoted by preachers should resonate in us. Sow a thought and it will become an act. Plant an act and it will become your habit. Create a habit and it will become a virtue or vice. Cultivate that character and it will become your destiny. Morality is defined as living an authentic and responsible Christian life. In order to understand morality there is a need for us to look at our physical world in parallel to a spiritual world. We are made up of body and soul. If we refer to our bodies as the 1st person then our soul becomes the 2nd person. We need to feed our soul the way we do to our bodies. It is very sad to know that according to some actuarial scientists only 13% of Americans believe that the 10 commandments will lead us to happiness.  There is a specific percentage of people who would be willing to do evil in exchange of $10M. There is a need to educate ourselves morally and enrich our spirituality. God looks into the heart and soul. We need to be a human person that God wants us to be. We should do good, avoid evil and be a beatitude person. In saying this we need to understand that beatitude means blessed or happy. The Old Testament speaks of the 10 commandments while the New Testament speaks of the Beatitudes. It is noteworthy that in some versions of the beatitudes the word "blessed" is also translated as "Happy are those..." There 5 important things we need to know to achieve happiness.

1. The main reason that God created us, is for us to be happy. At the end of it all God wants us to experience eternal happiness with Him.
2. God planted a desire in man to search and long for happiness since it is the nature or GPS of man.
3. God is the author of happiness and the author of desire.
4. Essence of happiness is God since God is love, "gaude" and "agape". He is the author of happiness and desire and only Him can make us happy.
5. God through the Holy Spirit can guide us in this treacherous journey in our desire to be happy.
We’ve got to make a decision whether we want to become a holy soul filled by God’s love or remain a holey soul. According to Fr. Ronald Rolheiser, a Jesuit priest and author of the book, "Holy Longing", man's desire is so intense that he called it a raging inferno. It's unstoppable and powerful that it creates holes in our souls. We can attempt in our human nature to fill in these holes but we still end up with a hollow feeling. These holes come in different shapes. We may be trying to fit in the wrong shape into these holes. These holes can only be filled in by God. Only God our Creator knows best and He is the only one who can determine which will fit into our soul. We all have our desires and longing in life but if we insist on doing it our way and not follow the pattern and shape that God has given us then we will never be truly happy. M. Scott Peck of the book, "The Road Less Traveled" said that desire is a feeling but to love is a decision. God loved us first in the same way that the father in the Parable of the Prodigal Son showed his wasteful and reckless love for his son. He welcomed back his prodigal son who squandered his possessions in gambling and women. He did not even demand for an explanation but instead gave his love lavishly on his son. From the Annotations of St. Ignatius of Loyola he said something that consist this song,
Take and receive O Lord my liberty
Take all my will my mind my memory.
Do Thou direct, and govern all and sway,
Do what Thou wilt, command and I obey.
Only Thy grace and love on me bestow
Possessing these all riches I forgo.
All things I hold, and all I won are Thine,
Thine was the gift, to Thee I all resign.
Amen. Hallelujah!

Ezekiel 47:1-9, 12

1 Then he brought me, Ezekiel, back to the entrance of the temple, and I saw water flowing out from beneath the threshold of the temple toward the east, for the facade of the temple was toward the east; the water flowed down from the southern side of the temple, south of the altar. 2 He led me outside by the north gate, and around to the outer gate facing the east, where I saw water trickling from the southern side. 3 Then when he had walked off to the east with a measuring cord in his hand, he measured off a thousand cubits and had me wade through the water, which was ankle-deep. 4 He measured off another thousand and once more had me wade through the water, which was now knee-deep. Again he measured off a thousand and had me wade; the water was up to my waist. 5 Once more he measured off a thousand, but there was now a river through which I could not wade; for the water had risen so high it had become a river that could not be crossed except by swimming. 6 He asked me, “Have you seen this, son of man?” Then he brought me to the bank of the river, where he had me sit. 7 Along the bank of the river I saw very many trees on both sides. 8 He said to me, “This water flows into the eastern district down upon the Arabah, and empties into the sea, the salt waters, which it makes fresh. 9 Wherever the river flows, every sort of living creature that can multiply shall live, and there shall be abundant fish, for wherever this water comes the sea shall be made fresh. 12 Along both banks of the river, fruit trees of every kind shall grow; their leaves shall not fade, nor their fruit fail. Every month they shall bear fresh fruit, for they shall be watered by the flow from the sanctuary. Their fruit shall serve for food, and their leaves for medicine.”

What an awesome God we have, he always declare His great love for us in psalms and songs. The joy that comes from God is like a well that never runs dry, it will neither be affected by dry season nor drought. We can compare it to the trials/problems that come our way and we will not be moved for the joy of the Lord is our strength. We can only imagine but we can never see the real picture of how it is to be in the holy dwelling of the Most High. It is always nice to have something to look forward to most especially because as Christians we believe that we are just passing by and everything around us will all be gone. When this happens we know that we are headed to an eternal place prepared for us by God. Isn’t it wonderful that at this present time we can go on living every day of our life to the full and still be assured that the best is yet to come. It is important for us to stay within the boundaries of the so called city of God, the holy dwelling of the Most High. There is no doubt that God is our refuge, strength and help at all times but we need to cultivate in ourselves a holy place for God where He can always dwell within us and not drive Him away from us. Peace and holiness can be achieved if we are one and in communion with God.  We belong to a community. If we commit murder we go to jail, become cut off from the community and separated from the rest. Somehow this explains the need to be communal or the "WE" vs "I". Our life is best defined by the choices we make as well as the choices that the people around us make. Love is the essence of morality and we need to live a moral life. In order to do this we need to be aware that there are certain laws that we need to observe and follow like the 10 commandments. The 1st 3 commandments is all about loving the Creator. The 4th is about loving others by exercising honor, respect and obedience. There should be mutual respect between parents and children alike. The 5th is respect for life from the moment of conception up to the last breath of life or from the womb to the tomb. We also have a responsibility to protect and conserve our environment. The 6th & 9th commandment speaks of respect of sexuality which is about chastity, purity and modesty. The 7th & 10th commandments: Life of Justice. Speaks of Respect of possessions, charity and social justice. The 8th commandment that tells us to speak & live the truth. Our world is governed by Natural and Man made laws. Natural laws has 3 attributes. 1. universal 2. permanent 3. unchanging. If we attempt to tamper with nature, disasters happen. Earthquake is a natural occurrence in places where there are fault lines. In the same way that if there are faults present in our lives then we are headed for disaster, too. We need to guard our morality. Our moral conscience is God given to evaluate the rightness and wrongness of an action but we need more than conscience alone to be moral. There 3 elements of morality. 1. object chosen 2.intention 3. circumstances There are many factors we need to consider such as what is the object chosen, who is it intended for or the agenda and the circumstances that surround it. These are the questions that need to be addressed, who, how, when and where. There are mitigating and aggravating situations that are attributed to our actions. Are we nice to someone for the sake of goodness or do we have a personal agenda attached to it or a vested interest. Think of virtue and sin. It is best to always make the 3 theological virtues on loving God our priority. 1. faith 2. hope 3. love. Faith is the opposite of apostasy which is the total denial of Jesus and schism, a refusal to submit to the authority of the Church and the Pope. Hope is refusal to succumb to despair knowing that God will always love and forgive us. Love can be defined as our constant and eager desire to know more about God and not be spiritually lazy. The observance of the law is a demonstration of our love for God and neighbor. It is important for us to know that even man made laws are drawn and based from a moral standpoint. We need to differentiate virtues and sins very well. We have to remember HALT. Whenever we need to make certain decisions we must not be H-hungry, A-angry, L-lonely, T-tired. Sin is anything against reason and truth. To sin means missing the mark. When we sin we almost always blame the devil for it without realizing that some of our sins are self induced due to our concupiscence. We desire what is evil, give in to our weaknesses and stated in Phil. 4:8, we fail to fill our minds with everything that is true, noble, good and pure, everything that we love and honor, and everything that can be thought virtuous or worthy of praise. There is no doubt that God can do a lot of tremendous things for us that is why the Lord invites us to fully soak ourselves in the living waters of God. Not just wade in it or be immersed ankle deep, waist deep nor up to your neck but take a plunge. In whatever situation and stage in life we are in, we ought to keep in mind that there are variables. Just like any variable they continue to come and go in our lives. What we need to hold on to is the constant and not the variable. At this point we need to be sure who the constant is. By this time we should have made it clear that the Lord our God is our constant. Amen. Hallelujah! 

P S A L M

 Psalms 46:2-3, 5-6, 8-9

R: The Lord of hosts is with us; our stronghold is the God of Jacob.

...There is a stream whose runlets gladden the city of God, the holy dwelling of the Most High. 5 [6] God is in its midst; it shall not be disturbed; God will help it at the break of dawn...

There is a truth in the saying that that the best healer is a wounded healer. As in Isaiah 50:6, I gave my back to those who beat me, my cheeks to those who plucked my beard; My face I did not shield from buffets and spitting. This is the reason for the Incarnation of God. Jesus experienced everything. He had been wounded and hurt thus He is the best Healer there is. This season of Lent should be taken advantage to make the grace of God a mighty river of grace. We should see the source of the grace, Jesus Himself. The grace is not just a vague force. In today’s gospel we see the man waiting for the pool to be stirred. This is a very big pool in fact to this day, 2 churches were built inside the pool to commemorate the very miracle that took place in it and even pagans go there for healing. We find that Jesus does not take the man to the water. It’s the word of Jesus and His authority that heals the man. He is the source of grace that brings about the healing. The man does not come across to be particularly bright because he said that there’s no one to put him in the water. He did not even bother to ask who healed him and has no idea as he doesn’t go looking for Christ. It was Christ who looked for him. It was a sort of ungrateful way to deal with the healing. Jesus not only heals him physically but addresses the state of his soul as He told him to sin no more. He knows the depths of what’s inside of us. We are told also in a way to sin no more, so nothing worse is going to happen. We want that river of grace to flow from Jesus Christ to us so we pray, abstain and fast to intercede for the grace to come to our culture. We need to use our time to seek the word of God and know the gospel better and better so we have the word that heals to bring to our culture. We bring a word of Christ and its power. Not by our own but we bring that grace by the power of Christ. We bring healing to the dryness and deadly state of our culture. In this way the Lord uses us to help transform a culture of life. In a way this connects to this vision of Ezekiel in the 1^st reading. This is part of the Holy year of the Jews, a year of God’s jubilee celebration for Jerusalem after 25 years of exile. This is a vision of hope at that time because Jerusalem is still in ruin and the temple is a mess. People can’t offer sacrifice for even the priest was in exile. The huge amount of water gushing forth in a land that’s very much desperate like a desert but later on have trees grow there is a sign of hope. This jubilee vision shows how God heals the land of its desert status. It is not only to bring water but to become a permanent spring. The dead sea is 9x as salty as the ocean, meaning it is 27% salt and anyone can die drinking it. To heal those waters is a great sign of Jubilee. We need an outflow of grace into our culture where so much spiritual life does not grow due to materialism and attitude of people who don’t expect to find God anymore. The grace of God would flow through it and bring about new growth of Christianity. The saltiness of the dead sea is a great symbol that we can see in our culture in which no one idea is any better than another. Christianity is just one idea among many and we see strong forces in our culture. People are trying hard to evangelize and make a revival of paganism and worship of witchcraft. These forces are active and aggressive. In fact it becomes institutionalized as we see a campus minister that practices witchcraft or Satanism. We have to be alert of its salt which is deadly. The good news is that the grace of God is more powerful than they are. The grace that flows from God is more powerful if we are willing to cooperate to fight these forces they can be defeated. Every single day is designed by God for us to praise and worship Him through our daily lives, wherever, whoever, whenever we may be and whatever we do. In all circumstances we must choose to praise and thank God through our actions and turn our back on sin. God in today's gospel gives us a warning and a word of caution that Jesus already made us well and it's all up to us to keep it that way and even become the best. Amen. Hallelujah!

John 5:1-16

1 There was a feast of the Jews, and Jesus went up to Jerusalem. 2 Now there is in Jerusalem at the Sheep Gate a pool called in Hebrew Bethesda, with five porticoes. 3 In these lay a large number of ill, blind, lame, and crippled. [4] 4 5 One man was there who had been ill for thirty-eight years. 6 When Jesus saw him lying there and knew that he had been ill for a long time, he said to him, “Do you want to be well?” 7 The sick man answered him, “Sir, I have no one to put me into the pool when the water is stirred up; while I am on my way, someone else gets down there before me.” 8 Jesus said to him, “Rise, take up your mat, and walk.” 9 Immediately the man became well, took up his mat, and walked. Now that day was a sabbath. 10 So the Jews said to the man who was cured, “It is the sabbath, and it is not lawful for you to carry your mat.” 11 He answered them, “The man who made me well told me, ‘Take up your mat and walk.’ ” 12 They asked him, “Who is the man who told you, ‘Take it up and walk’?” 13 The man who was healed did not know who it was, for Jesus had slipped away, since there was a crowd there. 14 After this Jesus found him in the temple area and said to him, “Look, you are well; do not sin anymore, so that nothing worse may happen to you.” 15 The man went and told the Jews that Jesus was the one who had made him well. 16 Therefore, the Jews began to persecute Jesus because he did this on a sabbath.