Category Archives: Christ

This Day For God

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John the Baptist baptizing Christ

Image via Wikipedia

Father, I thank you for this day, this holy day.
As I rise from sleep, may my soul arise,
Leaving sin to seek Your face.
As I wash in preparation for new day,
I recall my Baptism.
And the cleansing River of Life
That flowed from the side of my Redeemer.

 

As I clothe my body,
I remember the dignity of Christ
And the Name by which He calls me.
I am clothed in the robes of a priest
To sacrifice with Jesus in my day.
The words of a prophet
Live on my lips,
Ready to give an account
Of my hope and joy.

The Kings of Kings
Proclaims me a king,
By the power of His throne in heaven,
He rules in my life,
And the lives my life touches,
Through all generations.

Through my prayer of faith,
Covered in humility,
Born of the Blood of Christ,
Angels minister to the People of God.
Grace bringing peace, protection, strength and provision.

I proclaim my “Amen”
To His Will
And His prayer,
“Father, forgive them.”

Go before me, Lord.
Walk with me, Lord.
Be my rearguard,
Precious Savior, Warrior King!

You, Who live in me,
Suffer in my flesh
That which is to be
In this hour on Your Cross.

You are “more than a conqueror”
As You bring about Your kingdom,
In this day.
O, Love sublime,
My life is Thine.

By Joann Nelander

 

 

 

 

 

 

From a work by Saint Bonaventure, bishop With you is the source of life

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From a work by Saint Bonaventure, bishop With you is the source of life

Take thought now, redeemed man, and consider how great and worthy is he who hangs on the cross for you. His death brings the dead to life, but at his passing heaven and earth are plunged into mourning and hard rocks are split asunder.

It was a divine decree that permitted one of the soldiers to open his sacred side with a lance. This was done so that the Church might be formed from the side of Christ as he slept the sleep of death on the cross, and so that the Scripture might be fulfilled: They shall look on him whom they pierced. The blood and water which poured out at that moment were the price of our salvation. Flowing from the secret abyss of our Lord’s heart as from a fountain, this stream gave the sacraments of the Church the power to confer the life of grace, while for those already living in Christ it became a spring of living water welling up to life everlasting.

Arise, then, beloved of Christ! Imitate the dove that nests in a hole in the cliff, keeping watch at the entrance like the sparrow that finds a home. There like the turtledove hide your little ones, the fruit of your chaste love. Press your lips to the fountain, draw water from the wells of your Savior; for this is the spring flowing out of the middle of paradise, dividing into four rivers, inundating devout hearts, watering the whole earth and making it fertile.

Run with eager desire to this source of life and light, all you who are vowed to God’s service. Come, whoever you may be, and cry out to him with all the strength of your heart. “O indescribable beauty of the most high God and purest radiance of eternal light! Life that gives all life, light that is the source of every other light, preserving in everlasting splendor the myriad flames that have shone before the throne of your divinity from the dawn of time! Eternal and inaccessible fountain, clear and sweet stream flowing from a hidden spring, unseen by mortal eye! None can fathom your depths nor survey your boundaries, none can measure your breadth, nothing can sully your purity. From you flows the river which gladdens the city of God and makes us cry out with joy and thanksgiving in hymns of praise to you, for we know by our own experience that with you is the source of life, and in your light we see light.

From a treatise on the Lord’s Prayer by Saint Cyprian, bishop and martyr May your name be hallowed

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Second reading
From a treatise on the Lord’s Prayer by Saint Cyprian, bishop and martyr
May your name be hallowed

How merciful the Lord is to us, how kind and richly compassionate! He wished us to repeat this prayer in God’s sight, to call the Lord our Father and, as Christ is God’s Son, be called in turn sons of God! None of us would ever have dared to utter this name unless he himself had allowed us to pray in this way. And therefore, dear friends, we should bear in mind and realize that when we call God our Father we ought also to act like sons. If we are pleased to call him Father, let him in turn be pleased to call us sons.

We should live like the temples of God we are, so that it can be seen that God lives in us. No act of ours should be unworthy of the spirit. Now that we have begun to live in heaven and in spirit, all our thoughts and actions should be heavenly and spiritual; for, as the Lord God himself has said: Those who honor me I will honor, and those who despise me shall be despised. And the blessed Apostle wrote in his letter: You are not your own; you were bought with a great price. So glorify and bear God in your body.

We go on to say, May your name be hallowed. It is not that we think to make God holy by our prayers; rather we are asking God that his name may be made holy in us. Indeed, how could God be made holy, he who is the source of holiness? Still, because he himself said: Be holy, for I am holy, we pray and beseech him that we who have been hallowed in baptism may persevere in what we have begun. And we pray for this every day, for we have need of daily sanctification; sinning every day, we cleanse our faults again and again by constant sanctification.

The apostle Paul instructs us in these words concerning the sanctification which God’s loving kindness confers on us: Neither the immoral, nor idolaters, nor adulterers, nor homosexuals, nor thieves, nor the greedy, nor drunkards, nor revilers, nor robbers will inherit the kingdom of God. And such indeed you were. But you have been washed, you have been sanctified, you have been justified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. We were sanctified, he says, in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ and in the Spirit of our God. Hence we make our prayer that this sanctification may remain in us. But further, our Lord who is also our judge warns those who have been cured and brought back to life by him to sin no more lest something worse happen to them. Thus we offer constant prayers and beg night and day that this sanctification and new life which is ours by God’s favor may be preserved by his protection.

Via Divine Office .org

Easter Morn

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EASTER MORN

Holy Mother Mary,
I invite Your presence in my life.
As you look on my days,
Listen to my prayers,
Watch my growth through the years,
Touch me with the graces
Of.your Motherly prerogative,

You who walked the way of the Cross
With your Holy Son,
From the instant of His Incarnation
In your sacred womb,
Be beside me
In my every moment.
Meet me in my joys and sorrows
And impart your maternal blessing.

May my soul grow holy,
As you rush to lift me,
When I fall,
Just as you interceded
For Jesus in His Passion.

He fell under the weight of my sins,
And you cried out to heaven.
Hear now my heart
Beseeching thee.

Standing by His Cross,
See me in His Suffering
And receive me as your own.

Take the moments,
And all the years,
Of my existence,
In your arms,
As you did the Body of your Son,
When He was lowered from His Cross.
He wrought my Salvation
In that fearsome Hour.

Wrap my years in His shroud
And when I wake,
Rejoice in this,
My Easter morn.

Pope Francis visits the Holy Land – Water of Peace- a Poem Prayer

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As Pope Francis visits the Holy Land, I offer a prayer as we accompany him in spirit:

Water of Peace

Jesus, enter the waters of our lives.
As at the Jordan,
You made holy
The water of Baptism,
Renew, in all men of good will,
Life, that flows from the God of Heaven,
Your Father, our Father, my Father.

May Your Holiness
Infuse the elements,
That compose all created things.
By the Water,
Cascading from the Temple,
Your pierced, open, and hallowed Side,
Prepare here a place for all men to abide.
Amen

Copyright 2014 Joann Nelander

Joann Nelander
lionessblog.com

Kindling and Sacrifice

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Light a fire in my lowly heart
That I may love Thee
More and more.

Accept my straw as kindling.
Ignite me as a sacrifice.
To be consumed.

Breathe on me in the furnace
Of your desires
For this child of Your creation.

Blaze to transform
By grace and Thy Holy Spirit,
My base metal into the finest gold.

Enflame my yearning heart
That love may burst forth,
Forevermore.

copyright 2014 Joann Nelander

Joann Nelander
lionessblog.com