Your Gift to God
" HE is WAY, The TRUTH and The LIFE."
Jesus fulfilled the ideal of love St. Paul speaks about. He was never in a hurry, and was always kindness itself. He never envied anybody, and never boasted about himself.
He was never snobbish, or rude, or selfish. He did not take offence easily nor did He become moody or touchy. He did not keep on talking about the wrong things other people did. He preferred to remember the good things and to rejoice in them. He was tough, He could face anything. He had no scruples in using a whip when the need arose. He never lost trust in God, or in people. He never lost hope. He never gave in. He never stopped loving.
HE is The WAY,
The TRUTH
and
The LIFE..
I once heard Archbishop Fulton Sheen tell the following story which poignantly illustrates what Jesus did for mankind when He gave His very life for our redemption:
During World War 2 a Japanese General was investigating the theft of a missing shovel by a group of prisoners in Burma. If it were not returned in five minutes, ten of the prisoners would be shot. Four minutes passed and there was no sign of the shovel. He repeated the statement. One man stepped forward and was shot on the spot. When they returned back, all the shovels were found.
G.k. Chesterton's saying amply describes the condition of the modern world: "When people cease to believe in God, they do not believe in nothing, they believe in anything." Instead of following Jesus they try to force Him to follow them, and as a result, end up in a state of disillusionment.
"There are people who have a steady flame shining from deep inside them / This flame is not extinguished when others criticise or ignore them, for it is not dependent on what others think of them / It is what they think of themselves with a quiet certainty.
Each of us can behave in either of two ways : we can behave like a sinner or a saint. We help people more by giving them a favourable image of themselves than by constantly harping on their faults.
The saints hold up a mirror before us / in this mirror we get a most favourable image of ourselves. We see what we are capable of / All we need is the will to walk in the light of what we have seen."
"What we are is God's gift to us / What we make of ourselves is our gift to God."
"To thine own self be true and it must follow as the night the day thou canst not then be false to any man." (Shakespeare).
Why shouldn't you believe you will exist again after this existence, seeing you exist now after not being? Is it harder for God, who made your body when it was not, to make it anew when it has been. ( St. Irenaeus)
On many an idle day have I grieved over lost time. But it is never lost, my Lord. You have taken every moment of my life in your own hands. Hidden in the heart of things you are nourishing seeds into sprouts, buds into blossoms, and ripening flowers into fruitfulness. I was tired and sleeping on my idle bed and imagining all work had ceased. In the morning I woke up and found my garden full with wonders of flowers.
Rabindranath Tagore.
The word of God is to the human heart what a seed is to the earth. However, just as a seed needs soil, so the word needs a receptive heart. The earth responds to the rain and sun, so that even the desert blooms. But the human heart has the power to resist so that it remains barren. Lord, soften our hearts with your grace, open them with your gentle love, so that the precious seed of your word may take root in our hearts, and bear fruit in our lives.
Anita Kilbride - Jones,
Saint Paul's Bay,Malta.
