I Take off the MASK!

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“We should not judge people by their peak of excellence; but by the distance they have traveled from the point where they started.”  – Henry Ward Beecher

You are not expected to do things you are not capable of, or to travel to places you cannot reach for now. You are not expected to be who you are not.

What is being expected from you is to start from where you are and to do the things within your reach. What is being expected from you is to be the person that you are.

Let today be that day when you start to see what you can do, what step you can take. Don’t be disheartened by the long journey ahead, enjoy the view where you are! If the vision at the end is so pleasing to you, let it inspire you each day as you get closer to your heart’s deepest desires.

The LORD will fulfil that which concerns me;
your loving kindness, LORD, endures forever.
-Psalm 138:8, WEB-BE

‘Put on Christ!’ …and you will see the wings of hope spreading and letting you journey with joy towards the future…” – Pope Francis

I’ve been to a lot of places.  I’ve had very memorable journeys that taught me much and allowed me to meet good people along the way.  I still have a long way to go and a lot more places I long to see.  But I know deep within me that our greatest journey is not our physical  journey, but our spiritual journey towards becoming more and more like Jesus Christ.

What Does It Mean to Walk With God?

• Walking with God is walking with spiritual eyes.  It is trusting the Guide more than trusting the road we see ahead, because many paths that appear good are really broken and will not lead us anywhere safe.

• To walk with God is to grow in the awareness of His love for me.  It is to grow from wanting to believe to being able to believe, from having the knowledge of His love to having the sweet experience of His presence.  There is no end to knowing Him, there is no end to the joy of walking with God.

• Walking with God doesn’t mean walking ahead of Him.  How many times have we exhausted ourselves because instead of being led by God, we tried to walk ahead of Him and go our own way?

• Walking with God is walking in the silence of our hearts. It doesn’t mean one becomes mute or speechless.  It doesn’t mean the absence of sound or music.  But walking in silence means walking without the distraction of noise and of the many other voices that distract us from hearing the sweetness of God’s own voice.  While the world presents chatter and useless talks, God’s voice soothes our hearts and gives us peace.  While the world shouts in anger and in fear, God’s voice reassures us and gives us joy.

• Walking with God doesn’t mean we don’t rest.  God knows how much we need it!  Even the great prophet Elijah was made to sleep and eat for the journey is too much for him.  Let us avail of these moments when we can rest in God and regain the strength we need to continue walking in His ways.

• Walking with God is walking in faith with the One who leads.  Along the way are unexpected turns and twists in the road, but we trust the Hand that leads us.  We trust in the God who has never let us down and who will do everything in His great power and love to lead us to eternal life.

• Walking with God often means letting go of our extra baggage so we can keep up with Him.  Carrying a heavy burden (heavier than the cross we were meant to carry), slows us down, and we find it harder and harder to follow where God is leading us.

• Walking with God also means walking with His friends.  You have the entire communion of saints in heaven praying for you.  You have your guardian angel.  You have Mary as a Mother.  God Himself is a Trinity (Father, Son and Holy Spirit), and the Church is a family where we help each other out in love and in joy.  We never walk alone.

It was God who pursued us.  If we are walking with Him now, it is because He has led us away from the wrong path.  He sought us from the darkness where we were and led us into the light of His presence.

Many people think that by serving God, we give up much happiness and we should expect to live a rather boring life. But I believe the opposite is true. When we start our journey with God, we begin our most joyful journey. With God, we can’t even guess what wonders will come our way. We are no longer limited by the thrills and knowledge of the world, and our path would always be exciting, awesome and new!

The LORD is my shepherd:
I shall lack nothing.
He makes me lie down in green pastures.
He leads me beside still waters.
He restores my soul.
He guides me in the paths of righteousness for his name’s sake.
-Psalm 23:1-3, WEB-BE

“The settled happiness and security which we all desire, God withholds from us by the very nature of the world: but joy, pleasure, and merriment, He has scattered broadcast. We are never safe, but we have plenty of fun, and some ecstasy. It is not hard to see why. The security we crave would teach us to rest our hearts in this world and oppose an obstacles to our return to God: a few moments of happy love, a landscape, a symphony, a merry meeting with out friends, a bathe or a football match, have no such tendency. Our Father refreshes us on the journey with some pleasant inns, but will not encourage us to mistake them for home.”
–C.S. Lewis

“God is more anxious to bestow His blessings on us than we are to receive them.” – St. Augustine

God’s answer isn’t always what we expect it to be. It may not even arrive at the time we thought it would. One thing is certain however, that God’s answer will always be in response to His love.

He who loves much always wants what’s best for his beloved. He cannot turn a deaf ear to her pleas. He cannot delay without reason. He cannot remain silent unless silence is the answer itself. To someone who loves much, it is better to suffer than to see his beloved suffering. It is better to die so he can give life to the one he loves.

God’s answers will often astound us. We may not see it now, but we will realize later on how they truly worked for our good. God’s answers are far generous than we could ever deserve and exceedingly beyond what we could have ever hoped for!

For everyone who asks receives. He who seeks finds. To him who knocks it will be opened. Or who is there amongst you, who, if his son asks him for bread, will give him a stone? Or if he asks for a fish, who will give him a serpent? If you then, being evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him! – Matthew 7:8-11, WEB-BE

“In a world in which we risk relying solely on the efficiency and power of human means, we are called to rediscover and to witness to the power of God which is communicated in prayer…” – Pope Benedict XVI

“Love is patient and is kind; love doesn’t envy. Love doesn’t brag, is not proud, doesn’t behave itself inappropriately, doesn’t seek its own way, is not provoked, takes no account of evil; doesn’t rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things. Love never fails.” – 1 Corinthians 13:4-8, WEB-BE

There are many kinds of love:

A love that is brought about by sentimentality.
A love that is invoked by feelings of pleasure or excitement.
A love that is based on what is popular or well accepted.

But there is another kind of love:

A love that is able to see what’s true.
A love that is patient and strong.
A love that endures and thinks about the good of the other instead of oneself.

The world needs more of that kind of love today. Not a partial love, or a selfish love, or a foolish love. But a love that is heroic. A love that is willing to suffer with one’s beloved and to make a sacrifice. A love that isn’t afraid even of death because it knows that what it has is far stronger. It knows that it cannot fail because we can never really fail when we find that kind of love that is TRUE.

“It is not by sidestepping or fleeing from suffering that we are healed, but rather by our capacity for accepting it, maturing through it and finding meaning through union with Christ, who suffered with infinite love.”– Pope Benedict XVI, Saved in Hope: Spe Salvi

“Joy is prayer – Joy is strength – Joy is love – Joy is a net of love by which you can catch souls.” – Mother Teresa

The circumstances in life do not always bring about happiness. But this doesn’t mean that we cannot find joy where we are. Ours is the greatest joy in knowing God Himself came down from heaven, suffered, died and lived again for our sake, to give us eternal happiness. And so in whatever situation we may be, we have joy, if not in actual possession of it, in our certain hope that it will be ours.

Joy is with us always,
in our hearts and in our hands,
in our triumphs and in our failures,
in our fullness and in our emptiness.

For how can we be far away from it
How can we ever be so far?
Joy can be found where God is,
And God is always where we are.

I will tell you what my joys are –

in suffering, it is Christ
in sickness, it is healing
in dying, it is the thought of new life

in defeat, it is in future triumphs
in silence, it is prayer
in confusion, it is wisdom

in calamity, it is being able to repent
in poverty, it is the charity I may give and receive
in sacrifice, it is the presence of love

in blessings, it is my gratitude
in uncertainty, it is hope
in happiness itself, it is the thought of
far greater joys and of eternal bliss

Joy is here
Joy is in my tomorrows
Joy always
And always, JOY!

“Go your way. Eat the fat, drink the sweet, and send portions to him for whom nothing is prepared, for today is holy to our Lord. Don’t be grieved, for the joy of the LORD is your strength.” – Nehemiah 8:10, WEB-BE