Continued from: The Reason i write... Part 1
Forgiveness means as many times as the circumstance comes to memory, you bring in the remembrance of the grace of God and how good it feels to forgive. And your Peace is always coming from within. This is what forgiveness must feel like not just once but every time it comes before you.
Some people think they have forgiven. But every time they recall the instance they end up feeling bitter and miserable. There is a lack of Peace.
Some people retain certain aspects of the heated argument. They hold on to the resentment and the feeling of how ungrateful the other person was.
Do not hold on to bitter memories. Don't do that, no matter how miserably that person may have treated you. Let go.
There is a bright future no matter how long it could be. And say you have just a day to live, live it to the fullest. A day of living means so much to do. Therefore, do not waste your time on people who hurt you or think less of you. And for yourself, remember, to not think less of anyone.
FORGIVENSS means A Peace that flows like a river from me to you.
Unforgiveness is unreasonable and a way to Hell itself. And i say this, because from a heart that is unforgiving to one person and loving to others it does not take time for things to turn to hatred even if it is aimed to that one person. And hatred to that one person poisons the whole heart. And bitterness grows at a rate that cannot be controlled unless you listen to the voice of God-that is LOVE.
Love changes everything.
Love makes the world a beautiful place to live.
Love is all the colours of the Rainbow.
I know you would love to correct me saying, it is only one person and that cannot be termed as hatred. But my dearest, it does not take time for anger to turn to hatred. And in the meantime, every moment you live with this anger you are changing to something where goodness is losing its identity.
But 1 or 100 - Hatred is not based on percentage, and hatred is destructive.
We fool ourselves calling ourselves loving and God fearing but if we are God fearing then there would be no hatred to anyone no indifference at all. And mostly, i see this in people who think and declare they know God, but the deeds of love, I don’t see.
When you see the hatred in people, you cannot relate it to anything else in the world other than more hatred and complete wickedness. Today the world we live in, has its own rules, which one keeps reinventing to suit themselves and to live as they please in sin. There is so much hatred and so much envy, and you can't help but feel the motion of crumbling within.
We MUST take this as a matter of urgency, we need to bring in kindness and a whole world of love and forgiveness. Or else we are all doomed to HELL.
Help me my God! I need You! We all need You!
It is a firm belief that being aggressive means being confident, and being humble means being a doormat. Realistically people who think in this manner have very little understanding of what it is to be good and how being good feels.
Aggressive people are bitter within. And confident people are calm, for they know being aggressive won't get any work done.
If you speak lies all the time, one more lie will make no difference to you, because you are so used to it. A liar is a liar. RIGHT!
And maybe you are moody, abusive, aggressive-always putting people down. And here comes a person who listens to you and understands you and realizes that you have a short fuse, and you are nasty to everyone. But you my dear person, are so wrapped up in meanness, that this person who is trying their best to get along with you, you term this person as a coward. Is it fair?
Not to you and not to that person.
You could regret your words later or maybe not. But here is the thing that you need to understand, sin is just this, the ability to not understand how horrible the behaviour really gets.
When you are bad- aggressive movies, songs, films or indecent dressing does not seem wrong. Being aggressive is not goodness. You are blinded in the belief that you are right to live in this manner. It is easy to be aggressive. Sin is aggressive, it sees no wrong. It is easy to blame others for our shortcomings. Sin is just this, the failure to see the TRUTH-the blindness to the truth.
In the world we live in, we were taught that man is the hunter. We were also taught that it is a woman, who is meant to care and be gentle. And the children rely on their mother for that tender loving care.
But as the mother becomes the huntress, the natural order collapses.
Love in families is the most important factor of all of our lives. Everybody is about how I can outdo my neighbour. Maybe if we chose to outdo each other in our generosity to love and be of help to each other, that would be fantastic.
But no, as Christians, we compete with each other in the material wealth department. Who has more?
Most people get the charity concept wrong. Their understanding is:
That contributing money to the Church, means their sins no matter how many will be forgiven them.
That contributing money to certain charities will have them healed of their sickness.
In Mangalore, The Church committee members and all have made it about festivities.
Lent is a time of quiet reflection, of looking deeper into oneself and admitting one's own shortcomings. But not so with these people.
The last time i was in Mangalore, they had a get together (dinner) in the season of Lent. And the eating part of it goes on through the year. Their festivities - their lavish celebrations at the cost of the Church are never ending.
There is a time of Judgement. They squandered the money on what they delight in - food (the things that perish).
When we delight ourselves - more than needed and forget our suffering brothers or sisters, we will be judged for the things we failed to do for the poor. Too much festivities is unnecessary spending which is not required. This selfish behaviour paves the way to Hell.
And many are going to Hell not just because of mortal sins, but because of the lack of love. When i fail to do good to my brother or sister, i failed to love. It is the disobedience to the Love commandment.
Being obedient is never the easiest thing. It is difficult but not impossible. Obedience is learnt with the Grace of God. Like i have written here. 1Step at a time.
If you don't fail, you won't learn.
We learn gradually! But when you don't listen to what God is saying, you fail, and when you fail, it hurts, but it hurts God even more.
As a Father, He wills you to succeed. Obedience is a Pre-requisite. We are never alone-we are never without God.
If i lose, i know God hurts for me. I don't want Him to be hurt. So i learn in being obedient, i make Him happy.
If i think great of myself and do not listen to my elders or people God has placed in position, then i hurt God again and i hurt Him deeply. I do not want to hurt God ever.
God works through anybody, everybody and all-who listen to His Voice. So God's best for me could come from anyone. I have to know that and believe in that. I have to listen and follow. Being obedient always to all of God's instructions.
Do not resist trials, do not get mad with God. Accept the trials with humbleness and with all OPENESS that God has a definite reason and a Plan for my life. God always wills His Best for me. I have to trust Him through all the trials with love, knowing always God is in Charge. Do not resist, in this you please the Heart of God, for you say i Trust You, i know You are watching over me.
Obedience does not lower your status, whatever it is in society.
Don't be a people pleaser. There is nobody who is infallible.
Only God is Perfect! Only God is Just!
We have sinned; we have to recognize our sins, our faults when the Holy Spirit brings it to our notice. We have to ask God for His help! We have to seek His forgiveness. And we have to believe that God forgives.
We are meant to carry our Cross daily and follow our Master, Jesus.
The most important of all, charity begins in one's own home.
Have you ever considered being kind to your Parents, husband-wife, kids, uncles-aunties, nephews-nieces, grandchildren or friends and neighbours-next door and most important being kind to our Priests?
All the above are also my neighbours.
They are every piece that makes my heart.
Matthew 22:37-39 - 37 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. 38 This is the great and first commandment. 39 And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself.
Jesus gave us two commandments in One.
First Jesus says, Love the Lord your God, with all your heart and soul.
I cannot say, i love God and hate my neighbour, for then i'm a liar.
I do not understand the love of God.
There is no argument on this, you may love the whole world and hate 1 person or just be indifferent, (Indifference is nothing but hatred.) that still is disobedience to the commandment given by Jesus.
Because the second part of the commandment makes it very clear, Jesus says, Love your neighbour as yourself.
When there is hate, it means there is no forgiveness.
In The Our Father, we pray...and forgive us our sins, as we forgive those who sin against us...
The emphasis is - that i forgive whoever hurts me or does bad to me and i know that when i forgive the person the error done to me, God, our Heavenly Father will forgive me for the wrongs i do.
That is why the commandment to love is so important. For this reason it is a command. Because when you truly love God, you will love your neighbour and to love means to have forgiven. Please for the good of your soul forgive.
One who loves God, cannot hate his or her brother or sister. Because in God, we are all His children. Therefore, we are brothers and sisters, and God is our Father. We are One Family.
The heart is deceitful. Jeremiah 17:9
We cannot love anybody from our own heart. Because we cannot by ourselves understand the meaning and the depth of love and what love does or is capable of doing.
Therefore to each one of us, Love originates in the heart of God and when we are open to God, His love grows in the heart that is open to Him. And when one is open to God-one understands love. Love is the giving of self completely. Love holds nothing back. Love trusts. Love is the beginning of everything and the end to nothing. Love is timeless, Love is Eternal for God is Eternal.
Therefore no human being can love more than God.
Therefore God is our First Love.
Therefore we keep God First Place. And rightly so.
From The Heart of God, we can reach to others-our family members, our relatives, our friends and all. Because our understanding of love comes from the heart of God. We could not love anybody more than God loves each and everybody.
When we understand the Love of God, we are in obedience to His commands, for we know how important They are.
Failure to understand makes us indifferent to others.
Failure to understand makes one chose a partner of another religion.
When a person is married to someone of another religion, everybody understands it to be love. But in the case of a Catholic person to marry outside the religion it also means to love the other person above God.
When we love and keep God first, we are saying nothing is above you.
But when anything takes the first place, God cannot be placed second. The First of the TEN COMMANDMENTS state: I am The Lord, Thy God, thou shalt have no other Gods before me.
And to many of us Catholics, everything is more in priority than God. We mean to keep the commandments, but we fail to understand our basic necessity is always God, not the money, not the things of the world that which we love so much.
Keep God First. Let God be your every thought, not just in the Lent Season but through the year. And only then will you not in your thoughts alone but also in your heart keep God First.
1 John 4:19 - We love, because he first loved us.
Gods Divine Nature is Love.
(5 instances of The LOVE CMMANDMENT--EMPHASISED)
Deuteronomy 6:4-5 “Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God is one Lord; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your might.
Mark 12:29-31 Jesus answered, “The first is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one; and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind, and with all your strength.’ The second is this, ‘You shall love your neighbor as yourself.’ There is no other commandment greater than these.”
Matthew 22:37-40 And he said to him, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the great and first commandment. And a second is like it, You shall love your neighbor as yourself. On these two commandments depend all the law and the prophets.”
Luke 10:25-28 And behold, a lawyer stood up to put him to the test, saying, “Teacher, what shall I do to inherit eternal life?” He said to him, “What is written in the law? How do you read?” And he answered, “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength, and with all your mind; and your neighbor as yourself.” And he said to him, “You have answered right; do this, and you will live.”
John 13:34 A new commandment I give to you, that you love one another; even as I have loved you, that you also love one another.
The stress is on Love the Lord your God with all your heart-with all your soul-with all your mind-with all your strength. Just LOVE! Love deeply. AGAPE!
Failing to love God - when and when it is a command - is the highest form of disobedience.
Adam and Eve's disobedience got them out of Paradise.
For us disobedience could cost one Heaven!
KEEP GOD FIRST PLACE!
Would it ever occur to you that being rude and unkind really hurts and tears the people who love us. Well, it hurts other people too. But the thing here is kindness and healing begins at home and from the home front it moves to the world.
Ever wonder why there are so many casualties of cruelty happening in the world these days.
If you look at from where they start, you will see the cracks beginning from home, something that started in their childhood and was further enforced by more cruel learning at home. Home is where the heart is, but the heart was crushed and forgotten, where love is extinct and memories null, there is nothing to hold one back.
The lack of Love is the lack of God. For God is LOVE!
But who can tell a woman?
A woman these days seeks power in the different roles she plays in the outside world.
But the real power-is not in the outside world, for at the end of life, God will not look at what great position, she occupied and what her salary was, and how much more than her husband she earned. No. The question-she has to answer would be on how she accompanied her husband in the struggles of life.
What lessons did the children learn by watching her?
If the Parents are loving and kind, children watch and learn, and as grownups they will be what their parents once were.
A wife is to be obedient to her husband. Obedience to the husband does not mean that the husband treats her bad. No. But what it does mean is, she-the wife is working through her role in humbleness the way, God has asked of her. That is her strength-surrendering to God and the Blessings will follow.
The Love to her husband in her way of listening to him, that is what makes a good marriage and brings forth children that are a blessing and the children learn obedience from what they watch their mother do. She in her way, becomes the strength that ties them together in love. She keeps her husband feeling strong and loved. Her children know they are loved by the love the parents share.
Look at Mary, the Mother of Jesus-the Mother of God.
Mary listened to Joseph. She did and followed Joseph as they made their way to Egypt and then when time came, they made their way out of Egypt. Mary followed Joseph.
The Holy Family represents The Trinitarian God.
At Christmas, families send their family picture as greetings to each other wishing Merry Christmas and that is okay. But it would be Perfection when we would wish each other through The Holy Family - Jesus, Mary, Joseph.
We must remind each other of the Most Perfect Family that ever lived, Jesus, Mary, Joseph.
We are not perfect, and we can't pretend to be a picture-perfect family. We can pray for the grace of God to be like The Holy Family. We need to remind ourselves, that the most Holy Family had troubles coming to them from all corners and troubles much worse than what we can imagine, but Mary is not screaming her lungs or retaliating her husband Joseph.
We have a lot to learn from The Most PERFECT Family, Jesus, Mary, Joseph!
Please also read Love Prevails!: Jesus, Mary, Joseph!
This is so very important to understand.
I have mentioned this before and I will say it again, all material possessions are not given to spend lavishly on oneself. God gives it so you will make good use of it. God is never stopping you from spending on yourself or your loved ones, but God always hopes you will remember your poorer brothers and sisters after you have what you want:-
Do you ever think of people living in extreme poverty?
And do you know the repercussions of the ongoing wars or natural calamities?
And do you know the repercussions of the ongoing wars or natural calamities?
- Do you know what it feels for Families to go hungry to sleep.
- Have you experienced a heat wave? Do you know when the climate falls to minus, the skin burns. For a lack of roof and the right clothing, these people suffer tremendously.
- It pains to see little children who are orphaned and are lost and you want to hold them? It pains to see parents holding their lifeless babies in their arms and there is no comorting word that will take their pain away?
- Have you ever wondered how people still continue to live with fear and trembling in war torn areas and areas hit with natural calamities? They cannot eat, they cannot sleep, at times there is no place to run.
- Does the pain or cry of these people matter to you? Or are you the kind of person that things don’t affect simply because it happens somewhere else, and this is not your concern at all.
I do not remember the day, but i put before us the Words of Fr. Reuben Tellis.
Let us spread the Word of Charity, share our bread multiply our love
Poverty is a scandal.
And when the Lord returns, He will settle the accounts with us, in the words of St. Ambrose, He will Say to us, why did you allow so many of the poor people to die of hunger, when you possessed Gold to buy food for them.
Why were so many slaves sold, and mistreated by the enemy, without anyone making an effort to rise on them?
Let us pray that each of us according to the gift we receive, and the mission entrusted to us, let us strive to make charity, bear fruit and draw near to some poor person.
Let us pray that at the end of our journey, we can welcome Christ, brothers and sisters, with whom He identified Himself, we may too hear it said to us, well done, good and trustworthy Servant, enter into the Joy of your master.
Gods Talents are precious they cannot be wasted.
Please also read:
AND
680ccc Christ the Lord already reigns through the Church, but all the things of this world are not yet subjected to him. The triumph of Christ's kingdom will not come about without one last assault by the powers of evil.
681ccc On Judgment Day at the end of the world, Christ will come in glory to achieve the definitive triumph of good over evil which, like the wheat and the tares, have grown up together in the course of history.
682ccc When he comes at the end of time to judge the living and the dead, the glorious Christ will reveal the secret disposition of hearts and will render to each man according to his works, and according to his acceptance or refusal of grace.
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