The Earth Is Full of God’s Goodness

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Thursday//25October2018//Week XXIX, Year II

Ephesians 3:14-21///Luke 12:49-53

Allow me, O God, to borrow St. Paul’s beautiful prayer for the Ephesians and make it my prayer to you this Thursday: “As I kneel before you loving Father in heaven, grant me the riches of your glory to be strengthened in my inner self with your Holy Spirit so that through faith rooted and grounded in love in you, Jesus Christ may dwell in my heart always. Grant me the strength to comprehend the breadth and length and height and depth of Christ’s love that surpasses human knowledge to be filled with all your fullness, O God. For it is only in Jesus Christ, through Him and with Him that I can accomplish far more than all I ask or imagine.” (Eph.3:14-21)

Indeed, “the earth is full of your goodness, O God,” but we miserably fail to discover and keep these because we always run away and hide from you in our sinfulness and selfishness.

Let us become one with your Son Jesus Christ in “setting the earth on fire by being one with Him in His baptism” (Lk.12:49,50) with our commitment to love and serve you, O God, by putting into practice your words and precepts, to make this world a better place to live in peace and harmony. Let us commit ourselves to Jesus Christ so we can build more bridges that unite us as brothers and sisters. Let us commit ourselves to Christ so we can build better and lovelier buildings of dwelling and work where we gather as one family in you, our Father.

Into your loving and merciful hands, O Lord, we commend ourselves today and forever. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022.

*Photo of Santorini by Dra. Mai Dela Pena. Used with permission.

God’s Call Is Personal But Not Exclusive

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Wednesday//24October2018//Week XXIX, Year II

Ephesians 3:2-12///Luke 12:39-48

Today, O Lord, I praise and thank you for the gift of your call that is always personal. Like St. Paul telling us today of his own experience in his call, I remember the mystery of the gift of your grace given to me in a very personal way that have touched me and others too. It is not just the gift of priesthood but most of all the grace of being loved by you despite my many sins.

Forgive me, Jesus, when this gets into my head, when I feel very exclusive like Peter asking you today in the gospel if your parables and teachings are “meant for us or for everyone?” (Lk.12:41) When you refused to answer his question by continuing with your teachings to stress the need to be wise and faithful stewards of your gifts and call, the more I am amazed with you as my Lord and Master: you play no favorites as you are very inclusive but at the same time personally relating with each of us full of love and mercy.

As I treasure your gifts, let me grow deeper in your love that I may faithfully serve you by sharing you with others. Let me own the song of the psalmist today, singing “God indeed is my savior; I am confident and unafraid. My strength and my courage is the Lord, and he has been my savior. With joy you will draw water at the fountain of salvation (Ps.12:2-3).” AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022.

*Photo by Mr. Raffy Tima of GMA-7 News in Iceland, 09 October 2018. Used with permission.

Continuing Christ’s Work

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Tuesday//23October2018//Week XXIX, Year II

Ephesians 2:12-22///Luke 12:35-38

Dear God:

Last night while praying I found myself in a very amusing situation over the words of your Son Jesus Christ telling us in today’s gospel to “Gird your loins and light your lamps.” (Lk.12:35)

Remember how yesterday at the meat section of the supermarket, the butcher was enticing me to buy some loins that are tender and tasty, good for dinner and how I struggled? Thank you for preventing me from falling into that temptation, a little victory in my daily battle of the bulge!

But, as I prayed on your words today, I have realized that is really how it is with life: we always have to gird our loins, to prepare and strengthen ourselves for what is to come. The loin is where our basic instinct and urges emanate from, always evoking pleasures in us that are so powerful and irresistible. And so, keep me always on guard like those faithful servants in today’s parable to gird my loins and light my lamps especially in continuing Christ’s work of reconciliation, of “keeping us all together as a sacred temple for God.” (Eph.2:21)

How sad that we always forget the beautiful preaching of St. Paul of how Jesus Christ have reconciled us all in you, O God, with His precious Blood. How sad when we destroy our unity by looking more at our many differences because we cannot control our urges, our loins. And it is most painful, O God, when we allow it to happen right inside your Church, the Body of Jesus Christ! Help us to embrace the diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds of everyone that we may become new persons in your Son our Lord Jesus Christ. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022.

*Photo by the author, from the inside of the Church “Dominus Flevit” (the Lord Cried) overlooking Jerusalem as background. How sad that Jesus continues to cry today because we are still divided.

You Are the Handiwork of God

POPE JOHN PAUL II HOLDS CROSIER AS HE PRAYS

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Monday//22October 2018//Memorial of St. John Paul II

Ephesians 2:1-10///Luke 12:13-21

My heart is overflowing with praise and thanksgiving to you, O God our loving Father in giving us the wonderful gift of a saint who had lived during our lifetime, the great St. John Paul II whose feast celebrate today. Having lived during his pontificate, I have experienced your love and majesty, your presence, your reality. When I think and remember our beloved JP2, I cannot but be filled with awe that there is a loving, merciful and personal God like you!

In his own life, today’s words by St. Paul are evidently true that each of us is “your handiwork, created in Christ Jesus for the good works that God has prepared in advance, that we should live in them.” (Eph.2:10) When I recall the early childhood of St. John Paul II, his family, his Poland, his long pontificate along with his many travels and great speeches along with his bubbling sense of humor, the more I see your love and mercy, O God.

Here is a man with so much pains and sufferings until his death who never ceased to echo among us the call of Jesus to be not afraid. Here is a man who had showed us in his very life that “one’s life does not consist of possessions but of being rich in what matters to God.” (Lk.12:15,21)

Give us that grace too, loving Father in heaven, to be like St. John Paul II that we may also see you working in us and through us, despite our many brokenness, that we are not determined by our failures and sins in the past. Make us realize St. John Paul II’s teaching that we can only find fulfillment in your Son Jesus Christ who had come to bring us back into your loving arms. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com for free subscription.

*Photos from Google.

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Sealed With the Holy Spirit

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Friday//19October2018//Week XXVIII, Year II

Ephesians 1:11-14///Luke 12:1-7

It’s a Friday again, God our loving Father.

Thank you for the many blessings you have given us this week, especially for those gifts we never asked from you. Forgive me in failing to manifest you and show your glory in my work and in my life this week. Most of all, in failing to show the “seal of the Holy Spirit” we have all received from the redemption worked on us by your Son Jesus Christ (Eph.1:13).

Help me O God to always remember this seal of the Holy Spirit in me, of my task to praise and worship you always as my Lord and Master. Let me be careful with things that I say and whisper, with things I keep in secret and darkness because sooner or later, everything shall be revealed in your light for nothing escapes you (Lk.12:2-3).

Let me be like the northern lights at this time of the year, O Lord, when every little thing like air and humidity, gases and light, including every little degree of earth’s tilting all work in a dazzling symphony of lights that liven up the cold, dark nights of winter. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com for free subscription.

*Photo courtesy of Mr. Raffy Tima of GMA-7 News, Iceland Northern Lights, 08 October 2018. Used with permission.

We Are Evangelists of the Lord

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Thursday//18October2018//Feast of St. Luke, Evangelist

2Timothy 4:10-17///Luke 10:1-9

Today we thank you O Lord for opening our eyes through St. Luke in showing to us that what we need most in this world are people who would reveal to us and enable us to experience the mystery of your coming and presence among us. You never told us to pray for more machines or technology, more gadgets or more money for the abundant harvest. What we need are people – laborers – or evangelists who would write with their lives your gospel of love, your gospel of life like St. Luke.

“The harvest is abundant but the laborers are few; so ask the master of the harvest to send out laborers for his harvest.” (Lk.10:2)

Of your four evangelists, only St. Luke made known to us how he had “decided, after investigating everything accurately anew, to write it down in an orderly sequence” (Lk.1:3) everything about you and your teachings, O Lord. With his life and writings, we were able to have a glimpse of the mysteries of your life especially stories of your Annunciation and Birth up to your presentation at the Temple that have endeared the Christmas season to us.

It was St. Luke who always told us the many instances you have prayed to stress the need for an intimacy with God always in this life. He was the only one who told us the beautiful Emmaus story that has been a constant reminder of Easter burning always within our hearts. And it was also St. Luke who remarkably showed us how Mary has always been your model disciple until the Pentecost.

Give us, Lord Jesus, the same grace as a laborer and an evangelist which is the ability to see and communicate God working in our lives daily in the power of the Holy Spirit. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com.

*Photo from Google: “Saint Luke Drawing the Virgin” by Flemish painter Roger van der Weyden (1400-1464). It is one of the most important paintings from Europe in the United States now kept on display at the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston. It is a very lovely and very interesting painting too!

When Little Things Mean So Much

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The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe-Prayer

Wednesday//17October2018//Week XXVIII, Year II

Galatians 5:18-25///Luke 12:13-21

Lord Jesus Christ, you have taught us to be like little children, to be always the least. In you we have found the beauty of being small. And how wonderful when little things we often take for granted like the Holy Spirit can really mean so much for our growth and maturity!

The Holy Spirit often means so little for us because it is the Person in your Blessed Trinity who is least known, least understood. But as St. Paul tells us today in the first reading, a little of the Holy Spirit that can hardly be imagined or visualized lead to a harvest of great fruits in us of “love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, generosity, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control.” (Gal.5:22-23)

On the other hand, small thoughts of sin and evil always lead to our own destruction like “immorality, impurity, licentiousness, idolatry, sorcery, hatred, rivalry, jealousy, outbursts of fury, acts of selfishness, dissensions, factions, occasions of envy, drinking bouts, orgies and the like.” (Gal.5:19-21)

There are times we are like the Pharisees and the scholars of the law you have scolded in the gospel today who “pay tithes of mint and rue and every garden herb” forgetting the more essential demands of love for God through others, of always seeking seats of honor when our lives are empty and rotten inside like graves or when we burden those around us with many demands while we refuse to lift even a finger to do the same (Lk.12:13-21).

Yes, we are guilty O Lord of making little things of nothing into something, forgetting the little things that mean so much. Give us the grace to spice up our lives with great little things of your Holy Spirit like St. Ignatius of Antioch who preached the unity of the Church by emphasizing the importance of every little community united in you and the Pope. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com.

Photo by Fr. Nick F. Lalog II, Church of St. Agnes garden in Jerusalem, 20 April 2017.

The Heart Is Also the Hearth

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Tuesday//16October2018//Week XXVIII, Year II

Galatians 5:1-6///Luke 11:37-41

Praised be O God, our loving Father!

So many times, we are like the Pharisee in the gospel, always inviting Jesus your Son who readily comes to us. Unfortunately, like that Pharisee, we are concerned only with externalities than what is inside. We invite Jesus only into our house but never into our home, only to be beside us but never in our hearts! True hospitality is when the heart is also the hearth.

“Oh you Pharisees! Although you cleanse the outside of the cup and the dish, inside you are filled with plunder and evil. You fools! Did not the maker of the outside also make the inside?”(Lk.11:39-40)

Help us, O Lord to have what St. Paul preached to the Galatians, “faith working through love” (Gal.5:6) when we welcome you into our hearts to fill it with your warmth of love and mercy for everyone, giving life to others in a world that has gone selfishly cold with pride. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com.

*Photo by Dra. Mai Dela Pena in Germany. Used with permission.

Only God Suffices

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Monday//15October2018//Week XXVIII, Year II

Galatians 4:22-26, 24-27, 31-5:1///Luke 11:29-32

Today, O Lord, let me take into my heart the notes in the breviary of your blessed St. Teresa of Avila whose feast we celebrate today: “Let nothing disturb me… only God suffices.”

So many times, Lord Jesus, I feel like the Galatians who always doubted your mercy and love for me, your gift of freedom and salvation that I always feel nothing is enough in this life. And that is even if I have experienced so many times how you have never abandoned me, seeing for myself how true were the words of St. Teresa that “only God suffices because God never changes.”

So many times, Lord Jesus, I feel like your contemporaries who keep on asking for signs from you not because I want to feel and experience you more but for more of my own personal needs and gains. Grant me peace and stillness, to let nothing disturb me and let me patiently endure every darkness and desolation like St. Teresa of Avila so that eventually, God may possess me. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com.

*Photo by Dra. Mai Dela Pena, a rose in the Carmelite Monastery during a Holy Land Pilgrimage. Used with permission.

The Works of the Lord

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Friday//12October2018//Week XXVII, Year II

Galatians 3:7-14///Luke 11:15-26

On this weekend, I join the psalmist in giving thanks to you, O Lord, for “great are your works, exquisite in all their delights.” (Ps. 111:2) As I prepare myself for the welcome break of Saturday and Sunday, I look back with joy for all the wondrous things you have done to me this week.

I am contented with my life, O Lord; there is no need for me to join those long lines to super lotto betting stations. Your majesty and glory are enough to delight me of the beauty of life while your justice assures me of eternal rewards. Most of all, you have always provided me with everything I need as you always remember your covenant forever (Ps. 111:3-6).

Forgive me O Lord for the many times I doubt your fidelity, when I am like the Galatians who feel your works are not enough as if our works could amount to something at all. Give me that strong faith, like Abraham’s, to believe in you and your promise. Cast away my doubts, O Lord, so I may not be like the Jews of your time who thought you have the power of Beelzebul or asked you for signs to prove your divine omnipotence. Make me whole in faith, hope and love in you, never be divided lest I fall prey to evil and sins. AMEN. Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II, Parokya ng San Juan Apostol at Ebanghelista, Gov. F. Halili Ave., Bagbaguin, Sta. Maria, Bulacan 3022. E-mail to lordmychef@gmail.com.

*Photo by Mr. Raffy Tima of GMA-7 News, Iceland Northern Lights, October 2018. Used with permission.