Category: perseverance

The Grace of Encouragement

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Tuesday, Week X, Year II, Feast of St. Barnabas, 11 June 2019
Acts 11:21-26;13:1-3 >< }}}*> >< }}}*> Matthew 5:13-16
From Google.

As we resume the longest season in our liturgical calendar called Ordinary Time, you give us a wonderful guide O Lord Jesus Christ in your Apostle St. Barnabas whose feast we celebrate today.

St. Barnabas lived out the meaning of his name, “son of encouragement” or “son of consolation” when he became instrumental in bringing Saul from Tarsus after his conversion to join the Apostles in Jerusalem. St. Barnabas was the first to vouch for the sincerity of Saul’s conversion who later came to be known as St. Paul.

When controversy arose among the early Christians, St. Barnabas encouraged St. Paul to join the discussions at the Council of Jerusalem so as to encourage too the Apostles to accept gentile converts into Christianity without going through the Jewish ritual of circumcision for men.

Eventually after that meeting, St. Barnabas encouraged St. Paul to direct their missionary efforts to the Gentiles that helped spread Christianity throughout the world.

When things went so wrong between him and St. Paul later due to their companion Mark at their second missionary journey that they have to part ways, eventually later before the death of St. Paul in Rome, St. Barnabas was able to encourage them to reconcile and let go of their differences before.

Grant us, Jesus Christ, the same gift of encouragement of St. Barnabas so we may be willing to transcend our weaknesses and sinfulness to cooperate with others to fulfill your work and mission.

We pray also for those losing hope, being discouraged by so many failures and events in their lives that push them to give up and abandon all your plans and dreams for them. Fill them with your Holy Spirit to be encouraged to persevere and to trust in you. Amen.

People with Disabilities being encouraged by Christian groups in Jordan to work in mosaic shops so they could hone their skills and earn for their family. Photo by author, May 2019.

Meeting Jesus (in a little while)

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul, Thursday, Easter VI, 30 May 2019
Acts 18:1-8 >< }}}*> <*{{{ >< John 16:16-20
From Google.

My dearest Jesus Christ, I am tired. There are times I just force myself to do your work, fighting off temptations of disappointments and disillusions. Like your apostles, I am baffled with your words:

“A little while and you will no longer see me, and again a little while later and you will see me… Amen, amen, I say to you, you will weep and mourn, while the world rejoices; you will grieve, but your grief will become joy.”

John 16:16, 20

A little while… you were with us, Lord. Not only during those 33 years you spent on earth more than 2000 years ago. A little while in times of joy and success, we feel you so close, Jesus.

But then, a little while, we no longer see you. Not only during those three days of your pasch from Holy Thursday evening to Holy Saturday but especially when we go through our own passion and little deaths.

And a little while later, we see you again in our little resurrections in life, every time we hurdle some obstacles here and there.

Give us the grace always, Lord Jesus, to persevere in our many hardships and trials in life to find you and meet you in between those “little whiles”.

Like St. Paul in the first reading, help us to move on, to accept this is your work and not ours, that our standards are different from yours when defeat for us is victory for you, or when loss for us is a gain for you.

Strengthen us inside, Jesus, so we may be focused on you alone, waiting to encounter you, to meet you in the Church, in your many Sacraments and signs. In these tensions of your being here and not yet, of your sure coming, may we be always on guard and present to meet you. Amen.

Stations of the Cross on the wall of the Catholic Church inside the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem. Photo by the author, 03 May 2019.
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The small door of the “little town of Bethlehem”

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Tuesday, Easter Week V, 21 May 2019
Acts 14:19-28 ><“)))*> <*(((“>< John 14:27-31
Pilgrims entering through the small door of the Church of Nativity in Bethlehem, 02 May 2019.

Lately, Lord Jesus Christ, doors have been fascinating me: more than passages where we come and go, or enter and leave, doors are indeed like you! Last week you claimed yourself to be the gate of the sheep with you, Lord as our door, we never leave but, simply, come and come.

When you told your disciples at your Last Supper in today’s gospel that you were going away and will come back to them (Jn.14:28), you were very much like a door, Lord: for how can our hearts be not troubled or afraid when you are going away only to come to another level of relationship and existence with us?

That is the beauty of the door in you, Lord: your going away in your Ascension is your coming to us in new form of closeness, of continuing presence that leads to peace within each one of us.

How wonderful to remember Lord Jesus why the door to your birthplace in Bethlehem is so small: we have to go down, we have to bow and be humble in order to enter you:

They (Paul and Barnabas) strengthened the spirits of the disciples and exhorted them to persevere in the faith, saying, “It is necessary for us to undergo many hardships to enter the Kingdom of God.”

Acts 14:22

Give us the courage and strength, patience and perseverance, Lord, along with faith, hope and love to enter through you our door so that we may always come out as better persons than yesterday. Amen.

View from the inside of the Nativity Church in Bethlehem of its small doors. Photos by author, 02 May 2019.
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Patient Like Jesus

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A street performer at the Tamsui Fisherman’s Wharf in Taiwan must have tried and failed so many times before getting his permit from Taipei officials to perform in public.  Photo by the author taken last January 29, 2019

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Wednesday, 20 February 2019, Week VI, Year I
Genesis 8:6-13, 20-22///Mark 8:22-26

Lord Jesus Christ, yesterday you taught me of your great love and mercy through your fidelity and patience in my being too slow in understanding your signs of presence.

Thank you very much, Lord, for bearing with my mindlessness.

But today, I praise and thank you twice, even thrice, in giving me the grace of being patient like you in my persevering to keep on trying and hoping for your love and mercy, healing and grace.

Like that blind man in Bethsaida you have healed gradually, you have taught me how things are not that clear right away at your coming.  Sometimes, everything seems to be so blurred when “I see people looking like trees and walking” (Mk.8:24).

Like Noah in the first reading after the rains and the floods, it takes time before plants sprout and bloom again.  So many times, I just have to be like Noah, always waiting, always trying until the floods have subsided.

Let me offer you a sacrifice of praise today O Lord through my kindness and patience with others just like you.   Amen.  Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

When Everything Seemed Lost

 

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Neptune, Uranus, and Pluto visible to the naked eye at dawn for those willing to go through the darkness of the night.  Photo by GMA-7’s Mr. Raffy Tima at Sampaloc Cove in Subic, Zambales, 20 January 2019.  Used with permission.

The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Monday, 04 February 2019, Week IV, Year I
Hebrews 11:32-40///Mark 5:1-20

           Thank you very much Lord God Almighty for this beautiful Monday.  So often, we get the blues on Mondays and yet even if our days get bluer, even darker than ever, there is always that glimmer of hope that you give us, O Lord.

           Like the author of the Letter to the Hebrews today, we recall not only the heroes of Old Testament but our very own trying moments too when we chose to bear all the pain and hurts and sufferings because we believe in you, we trust in you.

           Thank you very much O Lord God Almighty in sending us your son Jesus Christ at the nick of time when everything is out of control, when everything seemed to be dead… as if there is no more way out because it is all over as it seemed to be.  It is something very close with that scene at the Gerasenes where “a man had been dwelling among the tombs, and no one could restrain him any longer, even with a chain.  In fact, he had frequently been bound with shackles and chains, but the chains had been pulled apart by him and the shackles smashed, and no one was strong enough to subdue him.  Night and day among the tombs and on the hillsides he was always crying out and bruising himself with stones” (Mk.5:3- 5).

           O Lord, you know how many times we have gone through such situations when we felt a no way out, imprisoned and possessed by sin and evil, sickness and disease, so many problems and difficult situations when all we can do is hide in tombs and cry at night!

           Teach us today to always wait for that flicker of hope in Christ our light of salvation.  Most of all, teach us to value life over sickness and death, persons over possessions, and above everything else, Jesus Christ our Lord and God.  Amen.  Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

What a Loving God We Have

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The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Tuesday, 22 January 2019, Week II, Year I
Hebrews 6:10-20///Mark 2:23-28

            O God!  You are so loveable and so loving!

           You are the truest lover of all… so “nakaka-in-love” and so “kilig” as we say.  You are so undeniably real, so personal, always my loving Dad, the only one who truly knows me and would always do things just to let me rest and have a break from all my worries and burdens in life.

          As I prayed today’s readings, I could feel your strong presence that made me wonder what the author of the Letter to the Hebrews must have experienced when he wrote “God is not unjust so as to overlook your work and the love you have demonstrated for his name by having served and continuing to serve the holy ones” (6:10).

          What he had written has always been true.  So many among us at this very moment or past days are feeling so low, crying in silence, grappling with anger within while bearing all the pains of the continuing lack of love and respect, kindness and concern, even civility by some of those around us who feel so entitled in this world.  Then out of nowhere, you are suddenly here beside me, coming like a lover, embracing me, hugging me, or simply touching me softly or just   tenderly glancing at me full of love and affirmations.

              Sometimes like the Twelve we get so tired and hungry following Jesus that we would pick the heads of the grain while passing through a field on the Sabbath when the holier-than-thou people around us would object like the Pharisees saying that is unlawful to do on a Sabbath (Mk.2:23-24).  But Jesus would readily defend us because you are “not unjust so as to overlook our work and the love we have demonstrated for your name by having served and continuing to serve the holy ones” (6:10).

              Thank you, dear God.  Thank you.  Help us to persevere in doing what is good in your sight, in fulfilling your will no matter how difficult it may be.  Let us never doubt that you can never be outdone in kindness and generosity.  Amen. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

Photo from Google.  During my prayer period, I remembered the song “Like a Lover” that partly inspired me in writing this prayer.  Good morning vibes and hope you love it!

God Wants Only the Best For Us

jimmarpaboat
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Friday after Epiphany of the Lord, 11 January 2019
1 John 5:5-13///Luke 5:12-16

            Lord Jesus Christ, today I feel like that leper in the gospel, coming to you, humbly prostrating before you, asking you, “Lord, if you wish, you can make me clean” (Lk.5:12).

            “If you wish”… sometimes that is all I can pray to you when I feel so low, so tired, even so dirty and so sick that I feel like giving up.

             “If you wish”… sometimes that is all I can pray to you because I am so afraid to come to you, so timid to be near you though deep inside me, I know you only wish the best for me for “Beloved, who indeed is the victor over the world but the one who believes that Jesus is the Son of God?  This is the one who came through water and blood, not by water alone, but by water and Blood.  The Spirit is the one who testifies, and the Spirit is truth.  So there are three who testify, the Spirit, the water, and the Blood, and the three are of one accord” (1Jn.5:5-8).

             Only you O Lord Jesus Christ who is able to overcome all of life’s pains and miseries, including death because only you have joined humanity with divinity referred to by the beloved disciple as “the Spirit, the water and the Blood.”

            Remove O dear Jesus everything that prevents me from coming to you despite your efforts to be near me.  Help me dear Jesus to be faithful to you in all things because you only want the best for me.  Thank you.  AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan.

*Photo by Jim Marpa.  Used with permission.

“Bagong Taon, Bagong Panahon”

Lawiswis ng Salita ni P. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Ika-01 ng Enero 2019

 

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Maraming pong salamat
Mga ginigiliw kong tagatangkilik
Nitong dati kong panaginip
Maisatula aking mga tilamsik ng pag-iisip.

Madalas tuwing bagong taon
Sa pagharap natin sa mga paghamon
Lagi nating tugon ay new year’s resolution
Na kalauna’y mga pangakong nababaon.

Hindi tayo makakasulong taun-taon
Kung parati mayroon tayong mga rason
Alibi at mga dahilan para bigyang katwiran
Iba’t ibang sitwasyon kaya tayo hindi makaahon.

 

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Bagong taon, bagong panahon
Bawat pagkakataon ay isang paghamon
Ng pagpapakatotoo sa ating pagkatao
Kung ibig nating lumago, iwanan nakaraan,
Mamuhay sa kasalukuyan, pag-aralan mga dating kamalian;
Mga sugat nating kinasaktan, huwag nang takpan
Bagkus pahanginan sa kasalukuyan upang tuluyang gumaling
Para ating maibaling mga paningin sa mga dapat gawin at ayusin.

Bagong taon, bagong panahon
Pumalaot sa mga dakong di nasusubukan o napupuntahan
Magsagwan kung kinakailangan
Sa gitna nitong ilog ng buhay na walang katiyakan
Maliban sa tahakin landas ng kabutihan at kababaan
Tulad ng pananalangin sa awa at habag ng Maykapal;
Hindi magtatagal lahat ng ating pagpapagal
Sa ati’y dadatal mga dasal nating inuusal.
*Larawan ay obra ng Bulakenyong pintor na si Aris Bagtas; pinili ko ang larawang ito upang maipakita ang pakikibaka ng may tuwa sa bagong taon ng 2019.  Ginamit ng may kapahintulutan.

Advent is Answering God’s Call

guadalupe1
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe-Prayer
Wednesday, 12 December 2018, Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe
Revelation 11:19; 12:1-6, 10///Luke 1:39-47

            Thank you very much, O loving Father, in giving us in this season of Advent the wonderful feasts of Mary and the saints who inspire us to always create a room for your Son Jesus Christ in our hearts.

            On this feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe, we remember your wondrous way of calling the Blessed Virgin Mary, her cousin Elizabeth, and St. Juan Diego for your specific mission.  All were “ordinary” people just like most of us.  Mary was a young maiden from an obscure town you have chosen to be the Mother of Jesus Christ while Elizabeth her cousin was already old and barren when you blessed her to conceive the Lord’s precursor, John the Baptizer.  Like these two women of simplicity and humility was St. Juan Diego, an Aztec Indian who became the visionary of Guadalupe.

               Like Elizabeth, I always ask myself and, you, O Lord my God, “how does this happen to me that you my Lord should come to visit and call me (Lk.1:43)?”  St. Juan Diego also asked the Blessed Mother to call somebody else for her mission but she replied, “My little son, there are many I could send.  But you are the one I have chosen.” 

               Loving Father, please bear with me if I always ask you with many whys, always unbelieving in my abilities to do your work and fulfill your mission.  Help me to keep following you, cover me with your mantle of grace and protection like the Blessed Mother as seen by John, “a woman clothed with the sun” (Rev.12:1) so that like her I may “to give birth to Christ” (Rev.12:2) to this  world deeply in sin, totally forgetting you.  Wrap me also like St. Juan Diego with your mantle of love and affection so that from my words and deeds would come the fragrant blooms of your kindness and charity in serving others.  AMEN.Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II,Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria,Bulacan 3022.

*Photos from Google.

guadalupe2

Advent is the Comfort of God

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The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe-Prayer
Tuesday, 11 December 2018, Advent Week 2
Isaiah 40:1-11///Matthew 18:12-14

            I can strongly feel your words today, God our loving Father:  “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.” (Is.40:1-2)

            If there is one thing I long for today, Lord, one thing I strongly desire from you is comfort.  I am so tired and exhausted.  Nobody seem to care at all for your ways or for what is good except for what is self-serving.  Deafening and maddening are the cacophony of so many voices shouting for what should be, insisting on everyone’s own idea of what is good that at the moment it is better to be silent in your presence.

              Strengthen me, Almighty God, for that is what comfort is, “cum fortis” – with strength. Give me comfort to carry on, to strive, to be patient, to bear all pains in silence so that in due time as you shall will, I may rise to strike in your perfect time my enemies who try to divide your flock.

               Like your Son our Good Shepherd, Jesus Christ, give me determination to seek the lost and the tenderness to carry them back on my shoulders to your fold.  AMEN.Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II,Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria,Bulacan 3022.

*Photo by Jim Marpa, 2018.  Used with permission.

LMC