Tag Archives: grace

Judgment Day Distractions? – Another Mercy!

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The Anchoress gave new hope for Judgment Day saying:

Well…be not afraid. If that day comes, everyone else will be looking at the records of their own lives being exposed. It may well have the effect of bringing us – finally – together, as we realize that we are all faulty, flawed, capable of great good and great evil, creatures of lightness and dark. It will emphasize that “none are perfect save Christ.” Remember what Michel Montaigne said:

There is no man so good, who, were he to submit all his thoughts and actions to the laws would not deserve hanging ten times in his life.

Phew!!!!!!!!!!……  It’s great to imagine everyone being so distracted.

I heard one rendition of the Day in which everyone is trying to outdo each other with the greatness of God’s Mercy for what He’d forgiven them. Actually, I remember some prayer meetings which made me feel as though no one would be interested in my story after hearing the soul-curdling tales of conversion of some of our bunch.

Comfort, Give Comfort

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Isaiah speaks the words I need to hear this morning.

Comfort, give comfort to my people, says your God.

Speak tenderly to Jerusalem, and proclaim to her that her service is at an end, her guilt is expiated; Indeed, she has received from the hand of the Lord double for all her sins. Isaiah 40: 1

The day is new and as they say” hope springs eternal.” The world has definitely been heavy on my mind. I need to turn the page if only at the beginning of this day.

Hope springs eternal in the human breast:

Man never is, but always to be blest:

The soul, uneasy and confin’d from home,

Rests and expatiates in a life to come. (Alexander Pope – An Essay on Man)

This is a gift to myself today.  It speaks to the heart of love and memory that even crosses the line between Man and Beast.

Have a wonderful day!

Understanding Only Now

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Writing as she must because that’s just the way she is and she just has to….Amy Welborn shares from the bottom of her heart and from the pain of her grief. I don’t like prying into someone’s soul, so I’m one who waits for words to be forthcoming to help me understand the meaning of a look, action, or a time of life.

Amy has a way of revealing the very real with a sympathy for herself, as though she were just watching instead of living it.  Thank you, Amy. I don’t understand the way you do now, but I understand as a friend can from a safe distance.

Amy writes:

“I understand how, if one had been married for decades and decades, the death of a spouse would just take it all out of you and propel you on the same road. I felt it very strongly that first day  – a sense that I do not want to be here, that I would rather be with him, I would rather just follow than stick out another day here. I understand how married people die within days of each other.”

My Imitation of Christ

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The Voice of Christ:

“COME to Me, all you that labor and are burdened, and I will refresh you.

The bread which I will give is My Flesh, for the life of the world.

Take you and eat: this is My Body, which shall be delivered for you. Do this for the commemoration of Me.

He that eateth My flesh, and drinketh My blood, abideth in Me, and I in him.

The words that I have spoken to you are spirit and life.”


The Offering of Christ on the Cross; Our Offering

The Voice of Christ:

AS I offered Myself willingly to God the Father for your sins with hands outstretched and body naked on the cross, so that nothing remained in Me that had not become a complete sacrifice to appease the divine wrath, so ought you to be willing to offer yourself to Me day by day in the Mass as a pure and holy oblation, together with all your faculties and affections, with as much inward devotion as you can. What more do I ask than that you give yourself entirely to Me? I care not for anything else you may give Me, for I seek not your gift but you. Just as it would not be enough for you to have everything if you did not have Me, so whatever you give cannot please Me if you do not give yourself. Offer yourself to Me, therefore, and give yourself entirely for God — your offering will be accepted. Behold, I offered Myself wholly to the Father for you, I even gave My whole Body and Blood for food that I might be all yours, and you Mine forever. But if you rely upon self, and do not offer your free will to Mine, your offering will be incomplete and the union between us imperfect. Hence, if you desire to attain grace and freedom of heart, let the free offering of yourself into the hands of God precede your every action. This is why so few are inwardly free and enlightened — they know not how to renounce themselves entirely. My word stands:”Everyone of you that doth not renounce all that he possesseth, cannot be My disciple.” If, therefore, you wish to be My disciple, offer yourself to Me with all your heart.



Reluctant Prophet

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I’m thinking about Jonah, the reluctant prophet.  He usually pops up in the readings of the Liturgy of the Word during Lent.  He made his appearance yesterday and has been wondering in the back of my mind giving his prophetic word, “Repent!”

Jonah needed to be hurled into the sea (a place of chaos) before he realized there was no escaping his responsibility before God.  Jonah needed a second chance to get it right. Fortunately, for the people of Nineveh (the worldly city of sinners), having gotten Jonah’s attention, God called the prophet a second time.  God was not going to fix things without his servant’s cooperation.

How like Jonah I am.  I need to be carried kicking and screaming to the Lord’s will.  How slow I am to remember that the only sign I’m going to get is the Now of my life.  I do want Resurrection without the Crucifixion.  So, here I sit in the belly of the whale,  my only sign, the sign of the Cross.  As Jonah spent three days in the belly of the great fish (a sign for Christ ) so Jesus spent three days in the tomb, and I must be there with Him waiting with faith.  Maybe, my Now says I have to do something.  Maybe it says I have to change.  Three days with Jesus in the tomb will prepare me for both mission and mercy.

“Who knows, God may relent and forgive, and withhold his blazing wrath,
so that we shall not perish.”
When God saw by their actions how they turned from their evil way,
he repented of the evil that he had threatened to do to them;
he did not carry it out. Jonah 3: 10

Light up the World!

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These are days that pull me in directions I don’t want to go.  My day starts with prayer and reflection.  That sets a tone I want to preserve. You probably know how things go from there. The world tries to be the boss of me.

The best I can come up with as an image to sustain my wholeness is that of an oil lamp, full and lit, sitting on a stand.  The world changes around it, winds blow, it’s light burns brightly at times;  at other times it’s flame flickers and it needs it’s wick lengthened or trimmed; depending.   What I see is that there’s no confusion about it’s being.  It is not the world and it is not the turmoil.  It is a light on a lamp stand.  If it could feel, it might feel threatened, inflamed, dampened.  The reality is,  it remains a lamp on a stand with one reason for being.

So here I sit on my stand (pc at hand),  resolute and responsive to the day, unconquered and unyielding.  Whether darkness prevails around me,  in some small way, does depend on me and others like me.

So everybody, how about it?  In chorus now!  “This little light of mine…..”

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