THE GREATEST SIGN

The story of Jonah who got swallowed by a whale before he finally committed to doing what God asked him to do could very well be our own story. Jonah 1:17, Yahweh prepared a great fish to swallow up Jonah, and Jonah was in the belly of the fish three days and three nights. Oftentimes we are confronted with difficult decisions in our lives and are full of fear and doubt. Sometimes we all end up like Jonah when we refuse to follow and obey what God is telling us to do. We tend to underestimate and doubt the power of God in our life. When we waver and falter in our faith in God and refuse to act according to the Lord's bidding then we end up trusting more, our own personal strength and understanding rather than God's. No matter how difficult the things may seem to be it is always for the best that we seek God's will and approval in everything that we do. Just like Jonah, all we have to do first is obey even without first seeing results and everything else will follow. In today's first reading we are reminded not to hesitate but to obey the Lord's bidding. For it will always be the right thing to do for no matter how impossible a task may be, He can always work things to our advantage. But things can get mixed up and can be misinterpreted, misunderstood, overlooked and taken for granted. It's a good thing we all deserve a second chance just like Jonah. If at first we thought we were doing the right thing but ended up mistaken then we should not despair rather be thankful to God for the experience of being able to find out what we should have done or not. God allows us to live our lives the way we wanted it in order to become fully capable of making decisions based on our everyday experiences. It is a consolation to know that whenever we are off track He never fails to bring us back to our senses. This 1st reading taken from the Book of Jonah has very significant signs and symbols that we can attribute to our Lenten observance. The theme for Lent is penance from sin and conversion. The Ninevites believed in God, converted and repented of their sins. The Church reminds us of these very important things that we should always keep in mind so as to gain the favor rather than the wrath of God. Here is a question that each one of us would like to know the answer. Could God ever threaten to do evil on His people? Isn't it true that God is All Goodness and Holy? Then how could He possibly carry out evil? There is a misunderstanding if we would ever think that this bible passage in today's 1st reading is meant that way. I somehow believe that it may have caused some miscommunications when it comes to the way we see God. In truth, God can never threaten nor carry out something that is evil. It is the evil ways that we resort to and refuse to turn away from that threatens the peace and tranquility in our lives and not God. Come to think of it, but we are in reality sometimes led to believe that we have a punishing God who will annihilate us whenever we do something wrong. I guess, it is time to revise our old edition beliefs and upgrade it to the loving and merciful God revealed in the image of Jesus who died on the cross for our sake. This is also the same message that Fr. Corsie Legaspi conveyed to the people in a healing mass. He said that we are in a way blaspheming if we ask God, “Why me?” or “What have I done to merit such kind of illness or suffering?” God only sanctifies and heals and could never cause anything evil. What we can be very sure about is that evil begets evil. We reap what we sow. We should see it coming our way, sooner or later whenever we do something evil. But God can combat and reverse evil if we make a decision to turn away from it. This is how we should look at it. The people during the Old Testament are savage and their understanding of God is limited to their experience in which we are definitely at an advantage. Why? In the New Testament, we have Jesus, God's only begotten son who came to us to suffer and die for our sake. The ultimate sacrifice of love the world has ever known. This we really ought to see, feel and experience. Amen. Hallelujah!

Jonah 3:1-10

...it took three days to go through it. 4 Jonah began his journey through the city, and had gone but a single day’s walk announcing, “Forty days more and Nineveh shall be destroyed,” 5 when the people of Nineveh believed God; they proclaimed a fast and all of them, great and small, put on sackcloth...When God saw by their actions how they turned from their evil way, he relented of the evil that he had threatened to do to them; he did not carry it out.

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. 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. 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!  

Psalms 51:3-4, 12-13, 18-19

R: A heart contrite and humbled, O God, you will not spurn.

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) 10 [12] A clean heart create for me, O God, and a steadfast spirit renew within me. 11 [13] Cast me not out from your presence, and your Holy Spirit take not from me. (R)  …For you do not desire sacrifice; a burnt offering you would not accept. My sacrifice, God, is a broken spirit; God, do not spurn a broken, humbled heart.

Stubborn, stiff necked, hard headed and what else can we say to ourselves when we still doubt and falter in our faith in God. For so many times already, God has moved and shown His mighty power working in our lives in many instances and yet we still fail to act and respond in accordance to what God has done for us. We still insist on doing things in our own way instead of acknowledging the truth that there is nothing really more we ought to see and witness.  For the love of God manifested in Jesus is the greatest love and sacrifice ever known. If we can think of something greater than this then maybe we can continue to be stubborn and be justified in our evil ways but we can search long, far and wide and find none. Sometimes we rely on our feelings, intuition, prevailing situation, by trend and popular choice. Sometimes too there is nothing wrong with it because these are all part of our human nature. Our God relates to us in a very personal way. He knows the exact message that we need at the right moment. God in His Infinite goodness and intelligence wanted to communicate His love and mercy to us but we are limited in our capacities to understand everything that there are times when these creative means as in signs help us when we make decisions. God never stopped showing us in a variety of means His great love and mercy for us throughout generations. It is very sad that in spite of it all we sometimes just don't get it. How many more signs are we waiting for to come to us before we do what we have to do? In the fullness of time God has already sent the most perfect sign of all. Let us no longer be like this evil generation who continue to be blind of it. Let us not look any further. Let us not be fooled or tempted by the false propaganda of the world and its lies. If we are to look very closely and think deeply we are not going to end up making the wrong decisions and choices. God never runs out of things, situations and circumstances that constantly remind us of what we are supposed to do. We should be grateful for all these experiences that keep on coming one day after another to us. We must admit that somehow it gives us a boost in the midst of all the turmoil in this world we live in. Sometimes we take these things for granted and become insensitive. We fail to see the real meaning of the things we encounter and continue in our careless and stubborn ways. When this happens we end up missing the real point, the so called "greater than Jonah here". If we continue this attitude day in and out then we might find ourselves being condemned. Today's gospel warns us of this fate if we keep on passing up on all the countless signs that God has given us from the very beginning most especially the biggest and greatest sign. We ought to keep our hearts, minds and souls open to these inspirations that God gave, is giving and continues to give and not miss the greatest sign ever known. There is indeed something greater than Jonah that we ought to have seen by now. There is no other sign that could best lead us to the right path than the sign of God's love. What our human minds can not fathom God communicated to us in the flesh in no less than His only Beloved Son who came down from heaven in order to suffer and die on the cross and save us from our sins. Amen. Hallelujah! 

Luke 11:29-32

While still more people gathered in the crowd, Jesus said to them, “This generation is an evil generation; it seeks a sign, but no sign will be given it, except the sign of Jonah. Just as Jonah became a sign to the Ninevites, so will the Son of Man be to this generation. At the judgment the queen of the south will rise with the men of this generation and she will condemn them, because she came from the ends of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon, and there is something greater than Solomon here. At the judgment the men of Nineveh will arise with this generation and condemn it, because at the preaching of Jonah they repented, and there is something greater than Jonah here.”