mercy

God Can Do Anything!

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God can do Anything!

by Angela M Jendro

God can do anything. Although it can be used as a cheap and quick answer to theological difficulties, at the same time there’s tremendous richness to this simple, yet powerful truth. Think about that for a moment…God can do anything! How many times in the Gospels does someone ask Jesus, “if you will it, you can…” In response to cries for mercy, healing, and forgiveness, Jesus consistently responded, “I do will it,” and miraculously restored the person with His human touch or word, and His divine power.

Granted, sometimes God says no to our plea, or at least “not yet” or “not in the way you are asking.”  Pride or pain responds with rage.  “God can do anything, but He won’t do this which I have asked of Him!”  In these moments we are challenged to surrender our reasoning and/or our emotions to the Lord in trust.  Yes, God can do anything, but God is also love.  Not only that, but God’s love is superabundant and prefers to give the very best over the mediocre.  The most loving thing a parent can say to their child sometimes is “no.”  We see this especially today in American culture. We have so much we can give our children that we risk spoiling them and stunting their personal growth if we do not refuse them things we could give, but shouldn’t.  For us, it can be difficult to discern when to say yes, and when to say no.  Sometimes we know the right answer but are too weak to follow through with a no, or don’t have the resources to say yes. Thankfully, our heavenly Father has perfect wisdom and perfect power which He applies with perfect love.  We can trust His will, which is what Jesus did at all times and exhorts us to do as well.  

We should seek to know the Lord, and to pursue deeper understanding of His revelation. God invites dialogue and investigation.  At the same time, we need to remember that it’s not a dialogue with an equal.  There will be times we must simply surrender to His care and trust His word. Jesus taught and did things that went beyond human understanding.  Sometimes we can forget His divinity due to His extraordinary nearness; He had such humility that He “ who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men” (Philippians 2:6-7).  Yet, because of that nearness, many also witnessed his divine power – healing the blind, calming the storm, raising people from the dead, and Himself rising from the dead and glorified.  

Do you believe God can do anything? Do you believe Jesus can do anything? That is the question posed to us during Easter.  Jesus has risen! Do you believe it?  You shall rise too! Can you believe that? If so, then the rest of Christ’s teachings, in Scripture and through His Church, deserve our belief.  Can bread and wine become the Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity of Christ in the Eucharist? Why not?!  If Jesus said so, and He can do anything, then it’s so.  

In our Christian life of discipleship Christ challenges us both to exert our mind and seek understanding as far as possible, as well as accepting when we are in mystery territory and responding with trust, surrender, and praise before the power and glory of God.

Meditate on this truth in prayer: God – Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, cares for me with the full strength of His all-powerful Love. Rejoice in this and take comfort in it.

© 2023 Angela M Jendro

*Pray and Reflect with weekly Sunday Gospel meditations by Angela available in paperback or e-book on Amazon

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sunday Food For Thought…Gratitude

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Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*Pray and Reflect with full meditations in my book Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: Luke 17:11-19

Consider the saying, “I owe you a debt of gratitude”.  The virtue of justice means giving each person his or her due.  When someone offers us a gratuitous kindness, we do in fact “owe” them our gratitude. I don’t mean this in the sense of a gift with strings attached, but rather as an expression of virtue and right relationship.  When someone offers a mercy in love, it is relational – they offer something of themselves to you as a gift.  If you in turn offer your gratitude, then not only has there been an exchange of some good, but additionally an exchange of love and mutual encouragement.

Christ is the ultimate gratuitous giver. He gives His mercy in love, no strings attached.  Offering Him back our gratitude however, is good for us as it reciprocates love for love.  Christ promises our love will always be received and appreciated by Him.  Rather than walk away with a blessing as merely divine pity for your situation, return to the Lord the love and gratitude He truly deserves and rejoice in loving relationship  with Him Who is so abundantly good to us!

Practical Application:

Praise God!  Praise Him in SONG!  Here are a couple of recommendations:

Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

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© 2021 Angela M Jendro

Sunday Food For Thought…Clingy sin

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Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*Pray and Reflect with full guided meditations in my book Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: 

Mud clings.  I remember walking home from school as a sixth grader one spring and cutting through an open lot only to find myself stopped in my tracks, literally.  My feet sunk into the mud so deeply that I couldn’t get my foot out for quite awhile and when I finally did my shoe remained behind!  Later when the ground dried enough for me to recover the shoe I learned just how tedious and difficult restoring it would be.

In St. Paul’s letter to the Hebrews today (12:1-4), he exhorts us to “rid ourselves of every burden and sin that clings to us”.  Imagine Jeremiah being pulled out of the cistern.  Scripture describes it as having no water, “only mud, and Jeremiah sank into the mud” (Jeremiah 38:6).  How long it must have taken him to get cleaned up! Sin clings to us – whether we fell in by accident, were drawn into it by others, or simply formed the bad habit over time.  We might knock off big chunks at first but the tedium of removing the clingy bits in the crevices, grooves, and fibers can discourage us to the point of despair. However, St. Paul encourages us to persevere because muddy shoes slow you down and tire you out in a race and we are running the race to heaven. 

Thankfully you don’t have to do it alone, but you do need to ask for help.  The waters of grace have the power to cleanse even the most difficult stain. If we turn to Christ and ask the Holy Spirit to remove the clinging sin then it can be done.  Psalm 40:1-2 praises the Lord for just such a miracle:

“I have waited, waited for the LORD,

     and he stooped toward me.

The LORD heard my cry.

He drew me out of the pit of destruction,

     out of the mud of the swamp;

he set my feet upon a crag;

     he made firm my steps.”

We resist clingy people, pets, and even clothing because they restrict our freedom and flourishing.  Let us resist clingy sin for the same reason. It will require patience, perseverance, and prayer, but as St. Paul reminds us “we are surrounded by so great a cloud of witnesses” (Hebrews 12:1) and they give us hope that it can be done!

Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

Order the new set of guided meditations for this year’s Sunday Gospels!

 

© 2021 Angela M Jendro

Sunday Food For Thought: Taking a Leap of Faith

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This Sunday’s Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*Pray and Reflect with a complete guided meditation in my book Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: Hebrews 11:1-2, 8-19

St. Paul honors Abraham as a man of faith because Abraham acted on God’s word.  Abraham left his very comfortable home where he was already prosperous for a land that God would show him,  not one God had already shown to him.  Abraham received his son Isaac through two impossible circumstances in which he acted based on trust in God over trust in his own natural limitations: first, Isaac’s birth despite Abraham and Sarah’s old age and Sarah’s prior sterility, and secondly at the sacrifice of Isaac wherein Isaac’s life would be taken but would have to be restored by God.  Abraham acted on faith, he took huge risks. This wasn’t blind faith however, in some obscure and unknowable mythological or philosophical God.  Rather, Abraham responded in faith to a loving God Who revealed Himself to Abraham and Who reveals Himself to you and I even today. 

God acted in faith too and took a huge risk for us. God sent His only Son to become man, die for us, and rise again for our salvation.  Jesus Christ lived among us, taught profound Truth, and performed great miracles. This is the most historically verified fact of anyone in history. 

How will you and I respond to the revelation given to us?  Will we avoid the challenge and drown ourselves in distractions (like the unfaithful servant in Luke 12:32-48) or will we rise up like Abraham, our father in faith, and act.  

May we act, not on the reward we have in hand, but in faith in the God Who promises it and has given His own outstretched hand to us.

For a full guided Gospel Meditation on this Sunday’s readings, check out Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

Order the new set of guided meditations for this year’s Sunday Gospels!

 

© 2021 Angela M Jendro

Sunday Food For Thought: Excuses, Excuses…Be Brave! Be Determined!

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13th Sunday in Ordinary Time:   Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: Luke 9:51-62

Being a Christian means following Christ, wherever and whenever He goes.  Full discipleship requires 100% commitment, not the made-to-order or pick and choose buffet we are accustomed to in our culture.  Consider Jesus’ own example.  He had to journey to Jerusalem and to sacrificial suffering.  Notice the attitude He chose – resolution and determination. 

Followers of Christ need the same resolution and determination.  St. Teresa of Avila, the great Spanish mystic, emphasized repeatedly the necessity of determination to advance in the spiritual life.  In her instructional work The Way of Perfection, she warned against our tendency to draw back and complain when things become difficult:

“Be determined, Sisters, that you came to die for Christ, not to live comfortably for Christ.”[i]

Saint Paul also exhorted the Corinthians to live their faith with bold resolution.  He warned against conditional discipleship and encouraged the Christian community to be generous and steadfast:

“The point is this: he who sows sparingly will also reap sparingly, and he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully. Each one must do as he has made up his mind, not reluctantly or under compulsion, for God loves a cheerful giver.” 2 Corinthians 9:6-7

As Jesus journeyed doing the Father’s will, those He encountered each had an opportunity to join Him, but their conditional stipulations determined whether they would accept it or turn it down.  The Samaritans received messengers from Christ but rejected the Lord before He even arrived when they learned accepting Christ meant surrendering their bitterness toward Jerusalem.  The next person took the initiative to seek Jesus out and requested to be in His company. However Jesus, who knows the hearts of each one of us, also knew the man’s interior conditions for discipleship. Thus, Jesus cautioned him that He would provide spiritual security and comfort but not necessarily the feeling of physical security and comfort. 

The next two men Jesus invited to follow Him procrastinated and avoided discipleship by requesting to finish up their other work first.  Their requests seem valid and even noble.  In fact, burying the dead is a corporal work of mercy and honoring your father and mother is the 4th commandment. Is Jesus asking us to neglect our duties?  Does Christian discipleship excuse neglecting our families?  Does God contradict Himself?  No.  Do we sometimes rationalize our cowardice or weakness by twisting God’s commands against Him?  Yes.  It reminds me of kids who try to avoid chores by claiming they need to work on their homework all of a sudden.

Many of us (including myself!), often excuse our lack of time for prayer by pitting it against the active life of charity.  It sounds something like this: “I don’t have time to sit and pray because I need to do [fill in the blank] which God would want me to do.”  A practical example would be, “I could sit and pray/ ‘doing nothing’, or work an extra hour to provide for my family, or do a load of laundry and dishes, or run an errand.  God wants me to care for my family, that is my prayer.”  Sometimes that might be the case.  But, in truth, there’s usually time for both.  This mentality has sometimes been referred to as the heresy of activism. 

Spending quality time with Christ in prayer first is the foundation of discipleship. How can we follow Him if we rarely take time to listen? In addition, without prayer, even our loving activities can tend to be more self-loving rather than other-loving. Jesus knew the hearts of the two men who wanted to return to their families before following Him.  Rather than contradicting His command that we love one another, especially our families, He may have been calling them out on their rationalizations. 

Let’s face it, we have an inner desire for God, and we may even have authentic zeal for discipleship, but we also struggle with attachments that hold us back.  The good news is that if we open ourselves up to Christ in prayer, He will reveal those attachments to us and provide the grace to overcome them.  It requires resolution and determination, but with God all things are possible!  

[i] Kavanaugh, Kieran, and Otilio Rodriguez, translators. The Way of Perfection: A Study Edition. ICS, 2000.

Consider:

+ Like the Samaritans, how many of us hold on to bitterness, anger, or un-forgiveness? Prayerfully ask Christ to reveal if any of these are holding you back from following Him.  Pray for the grace to surrender it to the Lord.

+ Like the man who proclaimed he would follow Christ wherever He goes, consider why you are a Christian. Is your love for the Lord intermixed with some self-love as well?  Do you complain when you encounter trials?  Are you impatient or upset when you experience discomfort?

+ What rationalizations do you use to delay responding to Christ or to responding more generously?

Practical Application:

+ Each day this week thank God for one deterrent He has helped you overcome or from which He has freed you. Invite Him to reveal and free you from a current hindrance you may or may not realize you have.

+ Pray for an increase in resolution and determination. Choose one concrete thing you can do this week to apply it.  (e.g. pray 15 minutes each morning or evening, say something kind to your spouse when you want to say something critical, hug your child when you want to throw your hands up in exasperation, choose a daily Mass to attend and do what it takes to get there, go to Confession…)

This reflection is an excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

Order the new set of guided meditations for this year’s Sunday Gospels!

 

© 2021 Angela M Jendro

Sunday Food For Thought: Attainable Unconditional Love

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6th Sunday of Easter:   Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: John 14:23-29

“As the world gives” tends to leave a person bitter and disillusioned.  It begins with promises of security and pleasure but lacks real permanency or loyalty.  After a while we even struggle to relax during periods of calm, worrying that it won’t endure long.    Nothing seems to last, and this causes anxiety in good times and in bad.

[…] 

Christ however offers the peace every human soul longs for – permanent, deep, and healing.  Moreover, we do not have to chase after it like a greyhound that will never catch the rabbit.  Rather, Christ bestows His peace freely as a fruit of His unconditional love.  To receive this peace, we merely need to enter into a relationship of love with Him. Relationship with Christ is merciful and enduring.  Jesus doesn’t throw us away when we become difficult or even when we betray Him. He persists in pursuing us, binding our wounds, and transforming our hearts. His greatest pain, he revealed to St. Faustina, is our lack of trust in Him.  To Mother Teresa, He said, “I thirst”; meaning He thirsts for our souls and relationship with us. 

Relationships are risky – they require two people to both freely choose to love one another.  No matter how faithful, how loving, how sacrificial one partner is willing to be, if the other walks away the relationship ends.  Christ is the ultimate risk taker.  He loves us no matter what, even if that love is unrequited.  Moreover, the partner who walks away suffers the greatest loss because he or she closes himself off from the riches of the other partner’s love.  When we walk away from Christ, we close ourselves off from the love He longs to bestow upon us.

Jesus offers peace, love, and joy.  All we must do is live in a loving relationship with Christ.  To do this He says, we must follow His commands.  We live in a wounded world confused about authentic love.  Jesus teaches us through His commands and offers the perfect example for us to imitate. We can chase after the illusion of love or embrace the God who is love.  If we choose the latter, God will dwell within us and our joy will be complete.  It feels more risky because it’s harder to see at first. Ultimately however, it’s the soundest reality and truest love.

Consider:

+ Jesus says, “Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.” What do you allow to cause you anxiety and fear?  Surrender each thing to the Lord and entrust your concerns to Him.

Practical Application:

+ Examine your day each night or morning.  Thank God for His blessings.  Recognize when He came to your aid.  Identify when you failed to love Christ or your neighbor and ask for Jesus’ help to do better the next day.

This reflection is an excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

Order the new set of guided meditations for this year’s Sunday Gospels!

 

© 2021 Angela M Jendro

Sunday Food For Thought: Secure Relationship

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4th Sunday of Easter:   Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: John 10:27-30

We often hear in psychology, parenting advice, or therapy about the importance of attachment and bonding. The intimacy and security derived from these relationships provide critical ingredients for overall mental and emotional health. How might we develop this essential bond with Jesus, the source of our spiritual wellbeing?

First: what not to do.  Jesus described His relationship with His flock in response to stubborn hearted Jews who had pressed Him once again to declare clearly that He was the Christ. Jesus expressed anger at the question because He had demonstrated it so many times at this point, that their blindness was sharply willful and to repeat Himself would be pointless. They did not ask for an answer, they asked simply to argue with no real intent of listening.  You may have experienced this type of frustrating exchange with someone yourself. It’s one of those points at which you must just walk away.    

Jesus encounters the same blind argument today: “How can I be sure Jesus is God if He lived so long ago? What evidence is there that He even rose again from the dead or that the Bible is reliable? Maybe there were miracles back then, but not anymore.  How can I believe if Jesus doesn’t work a miracle in my time?”  Despite the myriad of evidence to the contrary all around us or at our fingertips, we need to choose to open our eyes.  In addition to the tomes of scholarly work in every discipline which has proven the reliability of the bible against every modern standard, or the witness of the apostles and early church that Jesus truly rose from the dead (why die a martyr for this if there is no resurrection?), Jesus is still present today and He works in our lives constantly if we would simply be open minded and open hearted enough to see.  He literally speaks to us through His Word in the Scriptures and His Church. He cares for our needs through His followers and even “the heavens are telling the glory of God” (Psalm 19:1). Finally, in the quiet of our hearts His Holy Spirit speaks, gently guiding us. If we really want to see, if we really want to follow, we need only ask the Spirit to heal our sight that we may see all this abundance around us.

When a person truly encounters Christ, their hearts burn with love; their bond and attachment to Him welded solid. They enter the intimate security of being in His flock, from which no one can snatch them from Him (v.28). A person becomes Christ’s sheep through Baptism and permanently marked as Christ’s forever. In consequence, secure in His love, Jesus’ sheep listen to His voice and let Him lead that they may remain near Him and under His protection and compassionate care.

Easter celebrates Jesus’ conquering of evil, sin, and death.  He opened the gates of heaven, the gates of His fold, where He and the Father invite us to share in their love and receive it in our own hearts – the Holy Spirit.

 It takes humility to be a sheep or to be a child. Both require a poverty of spirit that accepts its own dependence.  Just as pride restricts and blinds us however, humility expands and frees us:

“Truly, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child he is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.” Matthew 18:4

 What peace and joy to belong to Christ!  Fr. Jean-Pierre de Caussade (1675-1751) expressed it well in his spiritual classic Abandonment to Divine Providence:

“The truly faithful soul, well versed in all the secrets of God, lives in peace, and, instead of being frightened by what happens to it, is comforted, for it is quite, quite certain that God is guiding it.”[i]

[i] Jean-Pierre de Caussade. Abandonment to Divine Providence. Translated by  

          John Beevers. (Image Books: New York, 1975).

Consider:

+ To what extent to do you trust Christ, and to what extent to do you resist Him?

+ Do you have the humility to accept your dependence on His grace, to surrender your wisdom to His, to belong to Him instead of yourself?

+ Consider Christ’s strong love and attachment to you. Pause to reflect on His faithfulness and the security that flows from it.

+ Pray to Jesus with these words and reflect on this beautiful gift: “I belong to You”.

Practical Application:

+ Prayerfully pray and recall several times throughout the day: “I belong to You, Jesus”. Be at peace, secure in His love.

This reflection is an excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

Order the new set of guided meditations for this year’s Sunday Gospels!

 

© 2021 Angela M Jendro

Sunday Food For Thought: Love and Mercy in Superabundance

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3rd Sunday of Easter:   Scripture Readings

Food For Thought

*excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain In His Love

Meditation Reflection: John 21:1-19

I was recently presented with the question, “How can we know that the Christian religion is the true one as opposed to others?”  I responded, “ours is the only one whose founder has risen from the dead”! 

The miracle of Christ’s resurrection affirms the truth of His teachings and the divinity of His Person.  The apostles evangelized by bearing witness to this event, one that they experienced with their own eyes. Many struggle to trust in Jesus because we cannot see Him.  However, the Gospels, Acts of the Apostles, and numerous Epistles all testify that our faith does not rely on mere ideology but rather the physical resurrection of our Lord witnessed by reputable persons who all suffered for their testimony.  Not a single apostle recanted his position to avoid martyrdom.  All of them endured severe trials and difficulties with no monetary or physical reward.  They had no ulterior motive.  They did not say they “believed” Jesus had risen from the dead, but rather that they had all “seen” the risen Lord.

God knows we struggle to believe without seeing.  Despite our weak faith, He mercifully became incarnate that we might see Him when He redeemed us.  Moreover, He exceeded all expectations of the imagination by liberating us Himself rather than sending someone in his place.

We have all heard stories of backpackers or journalists who cross an enemy line and become imprisoned in a dangerous or violent country.  Imagine if you were that person, afraid in your cell as to what will become of you, praying that your president will learn of your state and send someone to save you.  You might hope for a diplomatic solution or even military special ops to heroically liberate you.  Consider your surprise however if the president himself were to show up in military gear and break you out of prison at his own personal risk.

Christ reveals the love of God that exceeds any possible expectation or imagination.  He condescends to our limitations even though He deserves better.  He liberates us at His own painful expense.  Moreover, He gives us a share in His resurrection and a chance at new life. 

The Christian life is a response to the love and mercy we have first received from our Lord.  Peter fed the Lord’s sheep because of his love and gratitude for His mercy.  Jesus did not throw away their friendship after Peter’s betrayal.  Instead, He gave Peter a second chance, an opportunity for contrition, forgiveness, and conversion.

Jesus gives each of us this same opportunity.  He comes to wherever we are, offering us something to eat and an outstretched hand of friendship.  He asks each of us the same question: “Do you love Me?”  If the answer is yes, then He insists we respond in kind by extending a hand up to others and accompanying them in their conversion.

Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation The Joy of Love addresses in a comprehensive way the joy of love in families – both the ideal as the gift God has given to us, and the painful “irregularities” that need careful healing.  The love of Christ and the call to feed His sheep begins in our families.   Jesus asks that if we love Him, we ought to give generously and tenderly to those placed by Him in our daily lives, beginning with our families and reaching out from there.

Consider:

+ It’s easy to be discouraged by our failures.  Consider the encounter of Peter with Christ.  What failure would weigh heavy on your heart if you faced the Lord?  How would you respond to His hand up and His offer of mercy?

+ Who in your life needs your mercy? How might you offer him or her a hand up?

+ Consider how Christ can be recognized by His superabundance. When the apostles pulled in such a large catch, John knew immediately it was the Lord. 

  • When has Christ surprised you by exceeding your expectations?
  • Ask for the gift of surrender and openness. Rather than giving Christ a list of tasks you would like Him to help accomplish, surrender the logistics to Him and do the tasks He sets before

Practical Application:

+  Offer mercy toward someone each day this week.

+  Offer Christ your work week. Give him one week of being in charge and trust Him to accomplish His will.  Just do the tasks He sets before you and let Him bring things together.

This reflection is an excerpt from Take Time For Him: Remain in His Love available in ebook or paperback. Order a copy and don’t miss a single week!

 

Order the new set of guided meditations for this year’s Sunday Gospels!

 

© 2021 Angela M Jendro

The Trap of Self-Reliance

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Excerpt from Take Time For Him: Some More

by Angela M Jendro

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Order the kindle e-book (or paperback) to read the Christmas meditation, the meditation for Mary Mother of God, and to reflect on the meditations all year at your convenience.

2nd Sunday of Easter/Sunday of Divine Mercy

Read the Gospel of John 20:19-31

Meditation Reflection:

The Christian faith is neither a well-crafted myth nor a brilliant philosophy.  Rather, the Christian religion is based on eye-witness testimony of the resurrected Lord.

It began with the testimony of Mary Magdalene, who encountered the risen Christ in the morning when she went to His tomb and was subsequently sent by Him to tell the apostles.  They felt excited and a bit confused “for they did not yet understand the scripture that he had to rise from the dead” (John 20:9 NAB).   In the evening, Jesus appeared to them as well except for Thomas who wasn’t there.  Upon seeing Him with their own eyes they believed and rejoiced. 

When they shared their Good News with Thomas he refused belief until he could see it for himself.  Thomas had been willing to die with Christ (John 11:7-8, 16) but he couldn’t envision rising with Him. In consequence, his faith – though fiercely loyal – remained limited to his own personal experience. One week later however, Jesus showed mercy toward Thomas’ obstinate self-reliance, appearing to him in the flesh and so enabling Thomas to believe. 

We too can fall into the trap of self-reliance in matters of faith – limiting our belief to personal experience and rejecting the witness of Jesus’ apostles and His Church.  Our present culture tends toward “cafeteria Christianity”, meaning we pick and choose what we like and leave what we don’t.  We view doctrine as a buffet of ideas that we can take or leave according to our personal preferences and reasoning. 

Imagine Thomas saying to the other ten, “you have your truth and I have my truth, one is not better than the other.”  Yet, one is that Jesus is risen and the other is that Jesus is dead!  How could Jesus’ Church endure with such conflicting beliefs?  The same remains true today.  Capitulating to the attitude of an individualistic faith undermines Christ’s work.

Jesus chose to share His Truth and grace through the apostles’ witness (and their successors – the pope and bishops).  Their interpretation of Scripture and the power of their miracles came from the Holy Spirit bestowed on them by the Lord. At the final moment of Jesus’ death, He breathed His last and surrendered His Spirit to the Father.  On the evening of His resurrection, He breathed upon the Apostles, and gave them His Spirit and His authority:

“‘As the Father has sent me, even so I send you.’ And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, ‘Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive the sins of any, they are forgiven; if you retain the sins of any, they are retained.’” John 20:21-23

Christianity is an encounter with the incarnate God who dwells within the very souls of His baptized disciples and makes them one Body.  Jesus is not a restauranteur who offers the world’s greatest buffet.  He is the Son of God who desires all persons to be united as a family in the Lord.  He therefore established a visible Church endowed with His invisible presence to guide and govern its members to His eternal kingdom.

Today, one week after Easter, we celebrate the inexhaustible, generous, mercy of Christ which He lavishes on all who will accept it. As He did for Thomas on this same day, Christ reaches down into the darkest parts of our souls, to our most acute failures and sins, to apply the healing balm of His Merciful Love poured out on the Cross for our salvation. Our Lord is a crucified Lord.  When He appeared to the apostles “He showed them His hands and His side” (John 20:20).  He did not choose, as Satan tempted Him to be in the desert, a king without the Cross.  Similarly, true disciples are crucified disciples.  They have died to self, and self-reliance, and live by the Holy Spirit in communion with the Church.

There’s no sin too great for Jesus to forgive. He only requires a repentant heart which chooses to trust in His love.  There’s also no weakness of faith He can’t strengthen, no doubt He can’t heal, and no question of doctrine He can’t explain to you – if you let Him.  And remember, He has given us the fellowship of the Apostles through both the Scriptures and the living voice of authority in His Church.

Jesus said, “Blessed are those who have not seen and yet believe” (John 20:29). Today’s Gospel passage concludes with John offering the same witness to us that was offered to Thomas. Today is the day to surrender to Christ in prayer every doubt you harbor and every limitation you place on faith.  Then, receive His mercy in daily prayer, immersion in the Scriptures, the Eucharist at Mass, and trying to learn the Church’s reasons for her doctrines.  In consequence, you too will become an eye-witness of the resurrected Christ to others.

Consider:

  • When buying a product online or hiring someone for a house project, how much credence to you give to people’s reviews?  How much credence to you give to the testimony about Jesus from the Apostles, the saints and martyrs, the Christians you know who testify to the Lord’s work in their lives?
  • It’s hard to trust someone you can’t see.  Do you make Christ visible to others in your life?  How might you witness the reality of His truth and mercy even more?
  • Reflect on the choice presented today: whether to sand stubbornly in self-reliance or enter the communion of the Body of Christ – His Church – and lean on one another.
  • Jesus told St. Faustina that His greatest pain is distrust on the part of souls in His mercy.  In his book, The Name of God is Mercy, Pope Francis observed that we fail to believe in Christ’s mercy because we have no experience of mercy in our lives and therefore believe no one – not even Christ – will help us.
    • To what extent has this been your experience? 
    • What makes it difficult to trust Christ? 
    • How might you extend mercy to the people in your daily life so they might believe in Christ’s mercy?

Practical Application:

  • Every time you feel helpless, turn to Christ in prayer and throw yourself at His mercy. Repeat the words He asked St. Faustina to have written under His image: “Jesus, I Trust In You.”
  • Do one work of mercy each day.

All Rights Reserved © 2020 Angela M Jendro

I highly recommend both the Diary of St. Faustina and The Name of God is Mercy .

A beautiful exemplar of Christ’s merciful love is Mother Teresa. I also recommend her book A Call to Mercy: Hearts to Love, Hands to Serve

Finding True Love

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Excerpt frTake Time For Him Book coverom Take Time for Him: Simple, Soulful Gospel Meditations to Ignite the Busy Person’s Spiritual Life  Get your own papercopy from Amazon!

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6th Sunday of Easter

Gospel of John 14:15-21 and the Sunday readings

Meditation Reflection:

Every human person yearns for love, intimacy, and understanding. We may not need to be loved or understood by everyone, but we desire that connection with at least one person and preferably a whole community. Without it, we suffer an oppressive loneliness leading to depression, anxiety, and confusion.

Given the rapid advances in communication, it would seem we should feel more connected than ever and therefore happier than ever. Yet, consider the high rate of depression and suicide in our culture, despite the unprecedented wealth and physical well-being compared to any other time in history. So, if we are relatively wealthy, healthy, and connected, why aren’t we happy?

Jesus reveals the answer in today’s Gospel passage.  The world offers superficial connection, defining love as self- gratification rather than self-gift. Self-centered love uses others to make oneself feel good or to advance one toward a personal goal. It might demonstrate a modicum of virtue, but only insofar as it provides personal reward. Intimate married love has been replaced with casual sex and pornography. Intimate family love through the gift of children has been replaced with pets (not that pets are bad, just that they are not kids). Intimacy of friendship or shared work carry some comradery, but disillusionment ensues when they are quickly exchanged for a personal advancement. All these experiences leave people feeling used and alone, rather than loved.

Pope Francis shed light on our pain by identifying the source of our wounds. He connected our pain with our disconnect from Truth and the experience of mercy. In his book, The Name of God is Mercy, he wrote,

“…humanity is wounded, deeply wounded. Either it does not know how to cure its wounds or it believes that it’s not possible to cure them. And it’s not just a question of social ills or people wounded by poverty, social exclusion, or one of the many slaveries of the third millennium.  Relativism wounds people too:  all things seem equal, all things appear the same…

Pope Francis identified relativism as a wound because it disables our ability to determine right from wrong and truth from error. Christ forbids us from judging other people because only He knows what is in their hearts. However, we must be able to make moral judgements about actions and choices.  It’s just as important to know the dangers of sin to the spiritual life, as it is to know the dangers of gravity when leaping from high places.  I tell my boys all the time, especially in the summer when they are careening down the hill on their bikes or scooters, “Force = Mass times Acceleration – think about how fast you are going, because you could get hurt badly!”  The same truth becomes even more important as they get older. Now that my oldest has his driving permit and is nearing his license, I try to curb the teenage boy’s “need for speed” with the same physics lesson. I’m not being judgmental; I’m being loving by teaching him the truth. The same applies to the spiritual life. Sin wounds, hurts, and can even kill.  The Truth of Christ is a saving gift.

In today’s Gospel Jesus teaches that Truth, Goodness, and Love are inseparable. Without truth and without virtue, we will miss out on love. Jesus said that He is the Truth (John 14:6), and those who love Him follow His commands. God is a relationship of three distinct Persons in one divine nature.

The three Persons of the Trinity share a unity that exceeds our understanding, but Jesus unveiled a glimpse of its experience. He speaks on numerous occasions of the unity of He and the Father. That unity comes from a relationship of love and obedience through an eternal self-gift. The Holy Spirit is described as the Love between the Father and the Son. For us to share in the intimate relationship of the Trinity, we must share in God’s love through the gift of the Holy Spirit.

In-the-World-Not-of-the-World-DESKTOPWhen we place our faith in Christ, He sends the Holy Spirit that we may live by His Truth, following His commands, and thereby grow in intimate love.  Jesus told the apostles,

I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.” (John 13:34-35)

In other words, we must not only love in general but love like Christ – sacrificial, unconditional, and merciful. Merciful love means forgiveness, and it also means speaking the Truth instead of enabling someone in their self-deception or rationalization. It means never helping someone sin, but always helping them when they try to leave their sin.

To love in this way, we need supernatural grace which flows from the indwelling of the Holy Spirit. St. Cyril of Alexandria (c. AD 375 – 444), a bishop and Doctor of the Church, describes the Spirit’s transformative power in a beautiful way in a commentary he wrote on the Gospel of John:

“After Christ had completed his mission on earth, it still remained necessary for us to become sharers in the divine nature of the Word. We had to give up our own life and be so transformed that we would begin to live an entirely new kind of life that would be pleasing to God. This was something we could do only by sharing in the Holy Spirit…

Only by his own presence within us in this way could he give us confidence to cry out, Abba, Father, make it easy for us to grow in holiness and, through our possession of the all-powerful Spirit, fortify us invincibly against the wiles of the devil and the assaults of men.

It can easily be shown from examples both in the Old Testament and the New that the Spirit changes those in whom he comes to dwell; he so transforms them that they begin to live a completely new kind of life…

Does this not show that the Spirit changes those in whom he comes to dwell and alters the whole pattern of their lives? With the Spirit within them it is quite natural for people who had been absorbed by the things of this world to become entirely other-worldly in outlook, and for cowards to become men of great courage.”

The Holy Spirit infuses us with Divine Love which bears fruit in our lives. This love is so exceptional, that Jesus tells His disciples it will be evident to the world that they are His followers. The fruit of worldly love is loneliness, anxiety, and depression. The fruit of Christian love is intimacy with God and His followers, peace, and joy. Worldly wisdom wounds, but Christian wisdom heals. The great paradox of happiness, which Pope St. John Paul II re-iterated time and again, is that self-fulfillment can only be found in self-gift. Christians experience the intimacy of friendship in their shared vision of the Truth, the intimacy of true love in living their vocational call to sacramental married love, Holy Orders, vows of religious life, or the single vocation, and above all – the deepest, most intimate, abiding love of our Trinitarian God dwelling in our soul as His very own Temple. Happiness is loving and being loved, Truly.

Consider:

  • Consider the relationship between Truth and Love. Why is honesty necessary for relationship? How does honesty deepen intimacy?
  • Have you ever had to make a decision that required you to choose between worldly wisdom and Christian wisdom? Which did you follow and why? What were the results?
  • Consider the power of the Holy Spirit to transform us. Have you experienced spiritual healing, transformation, or love through the Holy Spirit? Have you witnessed it at work in another person?

Make a Resolution (Practical Application):

  • Grow in your relationship with Christ who is the Truth, by studying Scripture or studying the faith. Read a spiritual book, join a bible study, listen to Christian talk radio or podcasts, or visit with someone advanced in the faith who can teach you.
  • Invite the Holy Spirit to bear more fruits of love within you by connecting with Him in prayer and/or the sacraments. Add just 5-10 minutes of prayer to your day (or if possible, I highly recommend adding a daily Mass), and note the change in your reactions to others and to situations, or to the level of peace you feel amidst whatever is happening around

~ Written by Angela Jendro © 2019

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