Thursday, December 10, 2015

Season of Waiting


The Season of Advent is a season of anticipation of the coming of our Lord. It magnifies somehow the beauty of living in the moment while waiting for what is to come. And for us Christians, it is a joyful waiting because Jesus whom we are waiting brings joy and life. It also helps us to reflect on our daily life.

Life is waiting; expectant parents waiting for there child to be born, children eagerly waiting for parents coming home, teenagers waiting to become young adults and everyone waiting to pass on from this life and meet the Lord. In between these are different forms of waiting, from the mundane to the most important ones. Waiting for a ride on the way to work, waiting for the time to get off work, waiting for a yes after months of courtship and so on and so forth.

Waiting does not just purify intentions; it actually shows what our posture towards the goal we are waiting. Waiting will show our true colour and will reveal inconsistencies in what we believe in.

It takes humility in order to survive waiting because it’s not easy to wait much more not knowing if it comes at all.

Waiting teaches us to live according to Gods Will and actually enjoy the journey while what we want is not yet there.

by aats


Wednesday, December 2, 2015

Love Beyond


The Lord has been very good to us this year with the gift of life, health, family and community. In our Christian life, through our community in CFC, we have serve and attended a lot of teachings, formation and conferences, not to mention series of one on one session.  

What have all these activities done to us? Did it made us more loving?

If I may ask, how many Sunday masses you have already attended since you have memory? This is not even counting the weekday masses you have attended. What did these masses did to you? Did it transform you? Have you become a better person?

I am asking these questions, because it is important for us to know that service should be transformative or else it is useless and meaningless. When we do service, it should change us for good. It cannot be that we are not change when we are in the service of God, or else it is but a show or for personal fulfillment. Then it is no service at all.

Service changes us, and not just the person we are serving. Service is selfless, it therefore connotes an exchange of selflessness and therefore transformative.

Discernment

It is in growing in holiness while serving the Lord through our community that we become more attune with God. This is what we call the growth in personal relationship with Him. We can listen to Him and we can know if He is the one talking because we have grown deeper in our friendship with Him. Every time we have decision to make, big or small, it is easy to discern Gods will for us.

So, one thing I hope every one of us is growing is in the area of discernment. Overly used word but very important and crucial in our stage of life. SFC is a discernment age. In this stage of our life, we are more concern about our vocation, career and even faith. We ask, what job will I take, am I for married life, religious vocation or single blessedness, and or we ask, why am I feeling lonely and incomplete, where am I going, what am I going to do?

I remember one time I felt so inspired while was praying that after I finished I walked back home feeling so high admiring at the tress and grass on the side. I asked the Lord, “Lord, is this you inspiring me or satan deceiving me?” Remember satan is the father of deception and lies. (If you want to know more about this, I highly recommend to read the Spiritual Exercises/Discernment of Saint Ignatius)

There is a need for a closer and deeper relationship with Jesus so that in our discernment we will truly hear the Lord and not someone else.

It is only in a relationship that has taken root can we know if Jesus is the one talking to us.

Only in a genuine relationship can we truly know each other.

Only if we are anchored in this relationship with Jesus can we truly “Love More’ than what we can imagine.

We have so many teachings on “Love More” this year. So, have we loved more? In loving more, have we grown deeper in our relationship with the Lord? So that in our discernment we can truly hear the right voice and therefore make the right decision?

Love Beyond

After loving more, our challenge is to love beyond. Loving beyond is to be discerning and discernment becomes fruitful only if we have a deeper relationship with Jesus.

Decision with God is discernment while decision without God is forecasting. If we decide without God we are like forecasting weather, errors abound.

Service

All of us are here because at some point someone ask us to lead and we discerned and decided to be leaders. I hope so.

Why are we serving? Why are we planning? Why did I say yes to this?

3 Reasons:

1.  Some say, it is a distraction “good distraction” from work routine.

2. Others say it’s finding fulfillment, a deeper meaning of life and existence.

3. Others still say, they genuinely want to have a deeper relationship with Jesus and put His teaching into practice in their lives.

These are all of course in our point of view. But in Gods point of view, He had always been seeking us out, extending His love to us, saying “Only in me can you truly find joy and meaning in life.”

So no matter what our reasons of serving, or planning or just being here; be it a distraction from work, a fulfillment or a genuine desire for relationship with Jesus is but our response to a God who loves us deeply and cares for us passionately. Then our service becomes more of an excuse for us to grow in this relationship that finds its fulfillment and fullness in Christ.

Rejoice Pray Give Thanks

This deeply rooted relationship with Jesus is very evident the Letter of Saint Pauls’ to the Philippians 4:4-7.

Saint Paul was imprisoned when he wrote this. Yet in this same letter, the joy of Saint Paul was so evident even while he was in prison. He exhorted them to rejoice! Have no anxiety but instead ask God with thanksgiving! Then you will have peace in your heart, he said.

Only a man with deep relationship with Jesus can have a joyful attitude while in prison. I would say this is because He knows Jesus! He knows that everything He said He will do and that suffering will not have the last say. Jesus will!

He knows he will never be where God is not, because if he looks at his past, he was never been where God was not.

That is why, wherever we are or will be: whether in prison, in work or out of work, in agony, in breakups or breakthroughs, and or in dilemma over some decision to make, we are never be where God is not. Because if we look back at our own lives, we where never been where God was not.

Therefore we are joyful in whatever circumstances we are in.


Reflection Question:

What does the Letter to the Philippians 4:4-7 means to you personally and as a community?


by aats


Monday, November 2, 2015

Inspired Missionary

If you consider mission just a work, it will expire you, but if it is a call, it will inspire you! It has to be a call or you will make yourself miserable.

A miserable looking missionary is a worst evangelizer.  No amount of eloquent speeches can an expired missionary evangelize, but even without eloquence, an inspired missionary can.

by aats 

Sunday, November 1, 2015

A Wonderful Feast

All Saints Day is such a wonderful feast in the sense that it reminds us of our capacity to become saints! It is a recognition that there are faithful servants of God who may not be included in the Canon and thus not known, but have done just the same if not more than the known Saints.

Sainthood is available to anyone who strive to do even the ordinary things but with extraordinary love, known or unknown. The message of All Saints Day is that holiness is within reach!

by aats

Reset

This morning I walked up gaining an hour. It’s the time of the year when the clock reset an hour again as Daylight Saving Time ends. The feeling of having an extra hour of sleep is actually interesting.

It’s a good reminder that if time resets how much more our lives?

God allows reset. His mercy and compassion allows us to restart again. When God resets, we are not just going to feel good, we will be changed for good.

by aats