The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Tuesday after the Epiphany of the Lord, 05 January 2021
1 John 4:7-10 >><)))*> + <*(((><< Mark 6:34-44
Photo by author, 12 December 2020.
Dearest God our Father:
Today my heart has only two things to say:
First is, “Thank you for being love, for loving me!”
Beloved, let us love one another; because love is of God; everyone who loves is begotten by God and knows God. Whoever is without love does not know God, for God is love.
1 John 4:7-8
Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI wrote in his first encyclical Deus caritas est which was taken from this letter of the beloved disciple, that, what makes Christianity so unique of all other faith is the statement, God is love.
Indeed, in all the stories told about you in the Bible, in all our experiences in life, there is only one thing you have shown and given us from the very beginning that shall continue in eternity — LOVE.
The very coming of your Son Jesus Christ is all because of LOVE. Christmas is a story of love. Epiphany is also love.
It is all love, love, love… dear God! Please open our hearts, our senses to experience this love of yours you continue to pour upon us. Touch our hearts, open our minds, let us stop denying this truth that we are loved by You.
And so, my second prayer to you today is this: as a sign of thanksgiving, let me to share your love. Let me love like Jesus your Son, thinking more of others than myself – so unlike his apostles who wanted to send home the crowd hungry, worried at where to find food for them:
By now it was already late and his disciples approached him and said, “This is a deserted place and it is already very late. Dismiss them so that they can go to the surrounding farms and villages and buy themselves something to eat.”
Mark 6:35-36
Just for me to start thinking and feeling and acting like you when you saw the crowd like sheep without a shepherd (Mk.6:34, 37), worried for their spiritual and material hunger that you taught them so many things and then fed them with food is a good lesson to start loving like you.
O dear Jesus, fill me with your warmth and enthusiasm whenever I would look at you on the Cross so I may pass on the love you have given me to others. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Monday after Epiphay, 04 January 2021
1 John 3:22-4:6 >><)))*> + <*(((><< Matthew 4:12-17, 23-25
Photo by author, Lake of Galilee from the side of Capernaum in Israel, 2019.
Praise and glory to you, O God our Father on this first day of resumption of work and school. Many of us are so eager to go back to work and studies, hoping to make a good start for new year 2021. And your words today are so helpful to us all.
Beloved, do not trust every spirit but test the spirits to see whether they belong to God, because many false prophets have gone out into the world. This is how you can know the Spirit of God: every spirit that acknowledges Jesus Christ come in the flesh belongs to God, and every spirit that does not acknowledge Jesus does not belong to God.
1 John 4:1-3
In this age with an overload of information and influences from media, so many of us are led astray Lord because we have always forgotten to test all spirits that compete for our attention.
Give us the wisdom, Lord, as well as the perseverance and discipline to test all spirits, to discern them in silence and prayers that we may not be misled by false teachings and false hopes.
Open our eyes and our hearts in order to find you coming to us even in the most simplest occasions in our lives or in the most difficult situations we are into. Like the magi, may we have that keen sense of interest in observing things from the most usual to the unusual ones.
And let us start this discernment of spirits by first cleansing ourselves of our sins and impurities as we heed your call to “Repent, for the Kingdom of heaven is at hand” (Mt.4:17).
As we continue to retell and relive the story of Christmas, may we be like the town of Capernaum ready to welcome Christ’s coming with his light to dispel all darkness caused by our sins, frustrations and disappointments, pains and hurts especially from the past year so we may move forward through personal conversion in our Lord. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Sunday Recipe for the Soul
Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord, 03 January 2021
Isaiah 60:1-6 >><)))*> Ephesians 3:2-3, 5-6 >><)))*> Matthew 2:1-12
Christmas is the greatest exchange gift of all when God became human like us so that we in turn can become holy like Him. For some, it is something so unthinkable even impossible but history proves Jesus Christ did come while our faith continues to affirm this reality daily when we continue to tell and relive the story of Christmas through every new year.
And this we can only do if we become open and sincere to God who revealed Himself to us in His Son Jesus Christ. No need to hide things from Him. He knows everything but He does not force us to come to Him. He merely invites us. Just like the three wise men from the East or Magi who came to pay homage to Him in Bethlehem.
When Jesus was born in Bethlehem in Judea, in the days of King Herod, behold, magi from the east arrived in Jerusalem, saying, “Where is the newborn king of the Jews? We saw his star at its rising and have come to do him homage.”
Matthew 2:1-2
The meaning of magi and star.
After the Nativity of the Lord and the solemnity of Mary, Mother of God we celebrate this Sunday the third major feast of the Christmas Season called the Epiphany from the Greek term that means manifestation or appearance of Jesus to pagan wise men symbolizing the peoples of the world.
So much attention has always been given on the magi and the star that we sometimes forget that the stories in the Bible are not pure accounts in history that are factual to satisfy our curiosities; it is not that they did not happen at all but the most important thing is the meaning they impart to those reading the Sacred Scriptures.
As we have noted during our Simbang Gabi, Matthew has the most unique in beginning his gospel account with “the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham” (Mt.1:1) to show right away to his readers that Jesus is the fulfillment of the promise of God in the Old Testament. Recall how behind every name in the genealogy of Jesus is a story and history full of meaning and significance.
Matthew continues this in his story of the epiphany to show us again that Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s promises since Abraham by using the story of Moses as his framework.
See how the story of Jesus resembled that of Moses, the greatest figure of the Old Testament: the flight to Egypt, the threat of murdering all infants in the time of the Pharaoh and then of King Herod, and the saving act of God in the exodus which is fulfilled in Jesus Christ’s Passion, Death and Resurrection.
See my dear Reader that in the story of the epiphany of Jesus is also found glimpses of His crucifixion and death: at His birth, the magi were the first to recognize Jesus as the new King of the Jews while at His death, there hung above Him the sign “Jesus of Nazareth, king of the Jews” with a Roman centurion, another pagan like the magi who would declare to himself, “Truly, this was the Son of God” (Mt.27:54).
Here we find Matthew’s infancy narratives of Jesus are not only appealing to our sentiments and emotion but on a deeper level, these stories reflect how we Christians have always believed based in our experiences and faith that indeed Jesus is the Emmanuel of God, His presence among us who truly walked this planet and continues to guide us in the power of the Holy Spirit after His Ascencion into heaven, making Him truly a star above us guiding us in this life’s journey.
Unfortunately, for some people, it is something unthinkable and even impossible, choosing to live in their own follies and blindness like King Herod and yes, some Christians who claim to believe and know God.
When King Herod heard this, he was greatly troubled, and all Jerusalem with him. Assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born. They said to him, “In Bethlehem of Judea, for thus it has been written through the prophet… Then Herod called the magi secretly and ascertained from the time of the star’s appearance. He sent them to Bethlehem and said, “Go and search diligently for the child. When you have found him, bring me word, that I too may go and do him homage.”
Matthew 2:3-5, 7-8
Jesus calling us to our "epiphany".
I like that part when Matthew tells us how “Herod called the magi secretly” to inquire further to them about their knowledge about Jesus and the star. How ironic and tragic that they in Jerusalem were the ones who did not even notice the unusual star above them and worst of all, with the information and knowledge they have, not to have known the birth of Jesus Christ!
How sad that so many times, we keep on looking so far without even noticing those nearest to us!
Most of all, of our blindness and refusal to accept what is obvious, what is so clear like the love and mercy Jesus pours on upon us despite our sinfulness.
See at how some government officials are making a mockery of our laws and of their very selves, trying to cover up their wrongdoings, trying to defend their mistakes and sins not knowing the more they sink in their follies with all their lies and secrecies.
Keeping secrets can sometimes be needed for a good reason; but most often, to act in secret is often indicative of something sinister like in our story today, of Herod calling the magi secretly to snoop around and eventually launch his evil plot.
What a shame that Jesus, Mary and Joseph were never in hiding yet here were people secretly plotting something against them — just like inn our own lives, in ur own time when we try to deceive even those dearest to us, hiding in our so many secrets and lies that eventually come out in the open.
How sad that while Jesus keeps on revealing Himself to us but we still hide many secrets from Him as if he would not know!
This Epiphany Sunday while Jesus appears to us in His words and in the Eucharist, He invites us to open up to Him, to be sincere and have our own epiphany too. May this prayer help you in discarding your many secrets that are after all, very known to Jesus who merely waits for us to come to Him in our openness and sincerity.
Lord Jesus Christ,
in so many instances this past year 2020
You have continued to reveal Your presence among us,
in my own life, in keeping me safe from so many harm,
in healing my sickness, in providing for my needs,
in obviously being my Lord and my God;
You know everything in me, my many secrets
that I continue to hide from You.
Forgive me Jesus in hiding from you
even if I know you know better than I am.
I have no gold, frankincense nor myrrh
but this Christmas help me offer to you
my many "secrets" I hide from you and others
so I may fully experience your love and mercy poured out
since that first Christmas when you first came to us.
AMEN.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Thursday, Seventh Day in the Christmas Octave, 31 December 2020
1 John 2:18-21 >><)))*> + <*(((><< John 1:1-18
Photo by Ms. Ria De Vera, sunrise in our Parish amid the summer lockdown of 2020.
O God our Father, on this last day of 2020, we thank you so much for all the blessings you have given us these past 365 days. Yes, we shall always remember this year as the most difficult and most life-changing we ever had but we are grateful to you.
No matter how much people would ridicule and play jokes on 2020, despite its being so heavy for many of us who have lost loved ones, lost jobs and livelihood, and forced us to change plans and directions in life, we still thank you Lord for letting us make it through.
The problem, Lord, is not the year 2020 which means “perfect vision”; the problem is us who have lost all our vision for moral and upright living, decency, and good governance. We have lost vision, of the ability to see beyond the surface of things we have gone through this year.
How sad when many of us have seen only the year, the days and the months without realizing the deeper meaning of the events that resulted from our poor and wrong decisions, inactions and indifference to the calumnies and lies dished out daily by those in power.
Open our minds and our hearts that the presence of so many antichrists in our midst who lie and speak without thinking so well what they say signal the final hour of Christ’s coming and judgment as well as the final hour for us to do something concrete to end the reign of evil.
Children, it is the last hour; and just as you heard that the antichrist was coming, so now many antichrists have appeared. Thus we know this is the last hour.
1 John 2:18
Let us claim, dear Jesus, on this last day of 2020 and into the coming new year the two great gifts you have given us in your coming — light and life (Jn.1:4).
Your light has always been there present among us. Give us the courage to bring out your light, sweet Jesus so there may be more truth, goodness, justice, love, beauty, compassion, kindness, freedom, and peace in this world that have ironically reached great new heights in science and technology but has remained inside the caves of evil and malice.
May we rediscover anew the value of every life, that one life being lost is too many, whether due to the pandemic or the war on drugs.
On this last day of the year, may we do something so good, so kind, so true as if today were also our last day on earth. Amen.
Photo by author, Gaudete Sunday (13 December 2020).
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday, Fifth Day in the Octave of Christmas, 29 December 2020
1 John 2:3-11 >><)))*> + <*(((><< Luke 2:22-35
Photo by Mr. Marc Angelo Nicolas Carpio, 06 December 2020.
As we leave 2020 and approach the new year, we pray dear Jesus to let us walk and live in your light of love. Your beloved disciple is right in saying that it is not enough that we know you in our minds, in our intellect; that we must keep most of all your commandments.
Whoever says he is in the light, yet hates his brother, is still in the darkness. Whoever loves his brother remains in the light, and there is nothing in him to cause a fall. Whoever hates his brother is in darkness; he walks in darkness and does not know where he is going because the darkness has blinded his eyes.
1 John 2:9-11
How sad, O Lord, that these days everybody is claiming to be speaking of the truth, of having the light, of knowing you and yet all they do is spread lies and animosities among people, instead of bringing together they draw us apart from each other.
And worst, is how many of those in authorities disregard the laws of the land, selecting only to follow whatever suits their personal needs and agenda.
We pray, O Lord, to please end this darkness looming above us. Enlighten the perpetrators and supporters of all these lies and inanities being spread by those in powers.
Purify us with your light and law of love, of loving like you even if we have to suffer and die for what is true, just, and good.
Give us the courage to abide always in you, sweet Jesus, to remain faithful to what is true and just. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul
Monday, Feast of the Holy Innocents, 28 December 2020
1 John 1:5-2:2 >><)))*> + >><)))*> + >><)))*> Matthew 2:13-18
Photo by Ms. Janine G. Lloren, metal engraving of the flight to Egypt by the Holy Family on one of the doors of a church in Florence, Italy taken in 2015.
In this time of COVID-19 pandemic with news of a new and more vicious strain possibly now spreading, I have come to realize this Christmas how you also went through worst scenarios during your birth and infancy.
From the moment of your birth, Lord, you have experienced so much dangers and uncertainties just like us today with many women giving birth in harsh and hostile situations like in the middle of an armed conflict or in a refugee camp, or maybe while being held hostage in human trafficking.
When I imagine how difficult it must have been during your time when you fled to Egypt because of Herod’s murderous ways, I feel so sad at how things have not really changed yet, of how such things continue to happen daily in so many parts of the world.
But with your coming, Lord Jesus, though there are still those dark clouds looming above us as Pope Francis had noted in his latest encyclical, hope and joy abound.
Beloved: This is the message that we have heard from Jesus Christ and proclaim to you: God is light, and in him there is no darkness at all.
1 John 1:5
So consoling are the words of your beloved disciple, Lord! Let your light shine on us! May our love and kindness to one another dispel the many darkness around us specially this year. And yes, forgive us too, Lord Jesus, at how we have been “treating” and calling this year 2020 with so many taunts and ridicules.
If there is one thing we have always been good at, it is the blaming game – we keep on blaming others except ourselves. Like Herod. At such great costs.
As we near the closing of this year, help us to remember how with your coming you have sanctified and made us all holy like you. Each year is always a blessed and good year from you. It is us who make it so bad, so defiled. We caused this pandemic. Long before it came, we have been distant from one another, have always washed hands, refusing to take a stand for what is true and just. Most of all, we have stopped looking at each other’s face to see you again.
May this pandemic be an “Egypt” for us all —- a time to pray and reflect about your light and coming, Lord Jesus. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Tuesday, Advent Week-III, 15 December 2020
Zephaniah 3:1-2, 9-13 >><)))*> + <*(((><< Matthew 21:28-32
Photo by Mr. Red Santiago of his youngest son, 21 November 2019.
Dearest God our Father: Lately our social media giants were having problems, one by one, had gone down for several hours with glitches that could not be accessed. And everybody is complaining that in less than a week, Messenger, GMail, and YouTube have landed on headlines in the world.
What is happening?
A new religion? A new god everybody is following?
Almost everyone is crazy risking one’s life for the sake of remaining in the web because even children declare, “wifi is life”!
It may be funny but thought-provoking at how we would always want our internet, apps and gadgets perfectly working, doing good all the time.
If we could just be like our internet, apps, and gadgets, Lord, to be simply good as persons, everything would flow smoothly especially our relationships with everybody happy and nobody complaining.
But we are more than internet, apps and gadgets, Lord!
This Season of Advent, teach us to be simply good, to stop all debates and complicated discussions on so many things in life like those people in Jerusalem both during the time of Zephaniah and Jesus Christ.
“Purify our lips” (Zeph.3:9), Lord, that we may “walk our talk” like the first son in the parable: though he said no to his father’s request, he changed his mind and obeyed him (Mt. 21:28-29).
Let us be good brothers and sisters, good neighbors, good classmates, good colleagues, good Christians who reflect more of your presence than what we know or whatever is in our minds that we always insist.
Let us be kind and caring, never judging others, always respecting one another, and trying to find what is good than what is wrong. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II Monday, Memorial of St. John of the Cross, Doctor of the Church, 14 December 2020 Numbers 24:2-7, 15-17 >><)))*> +++ <*(((><< Matthew 21:23-27
Photo by author, Gaudete Sunday. 13 December 2020.
Time flies so fast, O God our Father. We are now at the penultimate week before Your Son’s birth and sadly, we seem to have been catapulted here without us realizing even earlier because we have been insensitive to your presence.
We have been impatient in awaiting Your daily revelations in little things and not so good experiences happening to us.
How sad that we your people have kept our eyes closed from seeing you coming, doing wondrous things for us like what the pagan diviner Balaam had seen for Israel. He was supposed to curse them but was compelled to bless them upon seeing You and Your great plans for them in the future that included the coming of the Christ.
I see him, though not now; I behold him, though not near: A star shall advance from Jacob, and a staff shall rise from Israel.
Numbers 24:17
In the gospel, the learned people of your time also refused to see and accept Jesus Christ’s coming, preoccupied with what they knew and only wanted to see just like us today.
Bless us, O Lord, to imitate St. John of the Cross in finding you and your bright future in the midst of the Cross. May these last two weeks of Advent be moments of reflections and prayers for us to find You, to experience You, and see Your bright future in store for us as we follow you to the Cross.
The soul that longs for divine wisdom chooses first, and in truth, to enter the thicket of the cross.
St. John of the Cross, Office of Readings, 14 December 2020
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Friday, Second Week of Advent, 11 December 2020
Isaiah 48:17-19 >><)))*> + >><)))*> + >><)))*> Matthew 11:16-19
Photo by author, Advent 2019.
Forgive us, O Lord, for not being alert for your coming in our lives. Indeed, your words are so true!
Jesus said to the crowds: “To what shall I compare this generation? It is like children who sit in marketplaces and call to one another, ‘We played the flute for you, but you did not dance, we sang a dirge but you did not mourn.’ For John came neither eating nor drinking, and they said ‘He is possessed by a demon.’ The Son of Man came eating and drinking and they said, ‘Look, he is a glutton and a drunkard, a friend of tax collectors and sinners.’ But wisdom is vindicated by her works.”
Matthew 11:16-19
Being alert is more than being vigilant; it is being open to see and test everything, even take risks to verify whatever is at hand.
So many times, Lord, we are caught flat-footed not exerting any effort, even doing nothing, in being aware and conscious of your presence, of your coming.
Give us a healthy mistrust of our feelings and knowledge sometimes. May we try to listen in our hearts, to find where we are at peace for wherever there is peace, there you are found.
Being alert is also listening intently to you, O God, following your commands that lead us to fulfillment and fullness in life. So often, we find your voice too simple even repetitive without realizing your words are always borne out of love. Like the Israelites thrown into exile, we would rather follow the strange gods than You without noticing, without being alert, of the many dangers we are being led to.
Heighten our awareness of your presence in us, in others and in the things happening around us. Amen.
The Lord Is My Chef Breakfast Recipe for the Soul by Fr. Nicanor F. Lalog II
Thursday, Second Week of Advent, 10 December 2020
Isaiah 41:13-20 <*(((><< +++ >><)))*> Matthew 11:11-15
Thank you dearest Father in making us all “risible” – the ability to laugh, the gift of having sense of humor for, if there is truly any sign of being alive, it must be when we laugh. And it must have only come from you, O God, for you are the fount of wit and wisdom.
Just like today. You are so Fatherly in telling us,
I am the Lord, your God, who grasp your right hand; it is I who say to you, “Fear not, I will help you.”
Isaiah 41:13
Then, suddenly like most human fathers, you tease us while declaring your love,
Fear not, O worm Jacob, O maggot Israel; I will help you, says the Lord; your redeemer is the Holy One of Israel.
Isaiah 41:14
You are so funny and witty, Lord! You assure us of your love and like kids, you called your chosen people worm and maggot?!
Thank you for making us laugh, dearest Father as you tease us full of affections, calling us “worm” and “maggot”.
Thank you for the gift of wit and humor that while teasing us for who we really are, so low and dirty due to sins, we feel deeply inside how much you love us. You are not mad nor exasperated with our sinfulness but simply telling us how we have truly behaved. And that is what most funny about — you still love us, you still call us, you still want to save us even if we are not worthy.
So true are the words of our responsorial psalm: “The Lord is gracious and merciful; slow to anger, and of great kindness.”
Indeed, we are so blessed that even if we are “the least in the Kingdom of heaven, we are greater than John the Baptist” who was the greatest of all people born of women during the time of Jesus because we have lived in your time of coming and salvation (Mt.11:11).
May we always be open and humble before you, O God, to be able to see the many joys of living tucked in our sense of humor that helps us recognize your Advent in the midst of many darkness. Amen.
