January 9, 2022 civilwarrose5

Response

Over the course of the last few weeks we’ve been discussing the Gospel story, and with a lot of help from Fr. John Ricarrdo’s book Rescued; The Unexpected and Extraordinary News of the Gospel, and our part in all of it. We have learned why we were Created, how we’ve been Captured, and then how we were Rescued. The last part that we need to learn is our Response. How do you respond to somebody who has rescued you from a life of hopeless slavery? How can you possibly repay that person?

Obviously, you start by showing that person gratitude, or thanks, every day. You can’t give that person money or buy them a gift. After all, your life is priceless. Luckily for us, God doesn’t want jewels, cash or fancy cars. All He wants is YOU. He wants a relationship with YOU. Tell him thank you! Tell him how much you love him. Show him your gratitude. God’s mercy and love are a gift that we can not earn. It is a gift that he GIVES us. The way to thank him for everything he’s done for and given to us is to worship him and surrender our lives to him.

Before we go much farther, let me explain that Worship is not just the act of going to church. Is that important? Yes. Is it all you have to do? No. Worship involves our mind, body and soul. You can go to church, say all the correct words to the prayers and tithe each week, but if you don’t feel it in your heart then it’s not really worship. In fact, it upsets God when people only give him lip-service.

“Since this people draws near with words only and honors me with their lips alone, though their hearts are far from me, and fear of me has become mere precept of human teaching, therefore I will again deal with this people in surprising and wonderous fashion: The wisdom of the wise shall perish, the prudence of the prudent shall vanish. Ah! You who would hide a plan too deep for the Lord! Who work in the dark, saying, ‘Who sees us, who knows us?’ Your perversity is as though the potter were taken to be the clay: As though what is made should say of its maker, ‘He did not make me!’ Or the vessel should say of the potter, ‘He does not understand.'”
Isaiah 29:-13-16 (NABRE)

Think of somebody whom you love very much. Maybe a spouse, a parent, a friend, a child. Now think about how hurtful it would be if they said all the ‘right things’ to you, but their hearts weren’t actually behind the words. You can tell when somebody is just feeding you the information that they think you want to hear. When we worship the goal is to bring pleasure to God, not ourselves. You should be trying to put a giant smile on God’s face. And don’t forget, despite the words you are saying, God knows what is in your heart. He created you and knows everything about you. If you truly believe the Gospel message (Created, Captured, Rescued, Response) then loving God with your whole heart should be easy. Right?

Part of showing God our love for him is to surrender our entire lives to him. Some people might not appreciate the use of the term ‘surrender’. After all, that means to give up all of our personal control and free will, doesn’t it? Not necessarily. God gave us free will so we can use it as we please. When we surrender to God we are giving him control over our lives in the sense that everything we do is for his glory and praise, and we completely depend upon him and trust him to steer us through our lives. If you have control issues, like I do, then this is a difficult thing to do. If there is a problem in my life, then I have to fix it. I can’t just sit back and expect that God will take care of it. I HAVE TO DO SOMETHING. Yes, you have to do something, but that something is to put it in God’s hands, ask him to guide you to make the right decisions, and trust that no matter what happens God will take care of you. This isn’t easy to do, but every day you can decide, again, to surrender yourself into God’s hands.

How else can we respond to the great rescue mission that Jesus carried out on a cross? The great mission that has been entrusted to us is to go out and spread the message of God’s love and Jesus’ victory is by telling others about it. We are all sent to spread the Good News. After all, our mission is to sabotage Satan’s ultimate goal of turning humanity against God. The more people we can wake up and get them to understand what the ultimate life goal should be (eternal life with God in His Kingdom), the more that we take power and control away from Satan.

That might be easier said than done, though. Not all of us are meant to go on missions to other countries to tell the Good News through our faith and works. How does they saying go, “Charity begins at home?” What is your sphere of influence? Start in your own backyard. I can’t give you any advice on how to go out and spread the Gospel, but I can tell you to do it in love. You catch more flies with honey than vinegar. You don’t have to be a “Bible Thumper” or talk about Jesus so much that people try to avoid you as much as possible. Just live each day for God and everything you do let it be done for His glory. What could that possibly do? Well, a few years ago we had a young man in his 20’s decide that he wanted to go through my church’s RCIA program. He’d led a pretty rough life and was currently part of a faith-based program to help men overcome addiction and substance abuse. When he was asked why he wanted to become Catholic he said it was because he saw the light and inner peace that the other guys in the program had, who had surrendered themselves to Jesus, and he wanted it to. Wow. These other guys didn’t sit there and shout at the young man about Jesus and being saved. Instead, they lived their lives to glorify God and that was enough to prove to the people around them just what the saving love of God can do for you.

“I give you a new commandment: love one another. As I have loved you, so you also should love one another. This is how all will know that you are my disciples, if you have love for one another.”
John 13:34-35 (NABRE)

Think about it. Pray about it. Ask God to guide you on your mission to spread His love throughout your sphere of influence. And don’t forget to say, “Thank you.”

January 3, 2022 civilwarrose5

Rescued – Part 2

“Amen, amen, I say to you, I am the gate for the sheep. All who came [before me] are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not listen to them. I am the gate. Whoever enters through me will be saved, and will come in and go out and find pasture. A thief comes only to steal and slaughter and destroy; I came so that they might have life and have it more abundantly. I am the good shepherd, and I know mine and mine know me, just as the Father knows me and I know the Father; and I will lay down my life for the sheep. I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold. These also I must lead, and they will hear my voice, and there will be one flock, one shepherd. This is why the Father loves me, because I lay down my life in order to take it up again. No one takes it from me, but I lay it down on my own. I have power to lay it down, and power to take it up again.”
John 10:7-10, 14-18 (NABRE)

Over the course of the last few blog posts we have explored the reasons why Jesus came to earth. We have learned that God created us and loves us more than any of his other creations. We know that Satan wants to destroy us due to the position that we hold in God’s ultimate plan. He hates us and wants to degrade us as much as possible. God loves us so much that he’s come to earth to rescue us from Death’s grasp so that we will have eternal life with him. How does he do this? We know that Satan is not dumb. He’s not going to let two inept guards stand at the doorway and be tricked into letting God enter.

We already know how this story ends, but let’s take a closer look at it. Jesus defeats Death on the Cross. How? He’s crucified, dies, is buried and rises again. Is that the whole story? That sounds pretty boring. What we need to keep in mind is that the Cross wasn’t just two pieces of wood nailed together on which Jesus died. No. THAT was the battlefield! THAT was the trap! Read the next sentence, then close your eyes and think about it: God, the one who created the entire Universe and EVERYTHING in it, has been scourged, made to carry his own heavy cross, and nailed to it for everybody to see. He is covered in his own blood, naked and dying. Does that look like the most powerful being to ever exist? No! He looks like a pathetic man who is weak and powerless. This is the same man who had resisted the devil’s temptations in the desert, and here he is nailed to a cross. Can you feel the devil salivating as Death nears? Now go back up and re-read the scripture from John. Read the bold sentence a few times.

What does that tell us? It tells us that God ALLOWED himself to be tortured and nailed to the cross. This is God! He could easily have blinked us all out of existence. He could have easily resisted and avoided the suffering. But he didn’t. In order to save us he had to take on a human form, after all, God can’t die or suffer for our sins. Why would he have to die? Have you ever seen the movie Armageddon (with Bruce Willis and Ben Affleck)? If you have, you might remember that NASA decided they were going to detonate a nuclear bomb on the asteroid in the hopes of breaking it up enough that the pieces would not end up hitting earth, or if they did they would burn up in the atmosphere. The oil-drilling guys were confused as to why they were chosen instead of fancy astronauts. Billy Bob Thornton explains that they can’t just place the bomb on the surface because that won’t do the job. Instead, they needed somebody to drill a deep hole into which the bomb could be placed so that when it went off it could destroy the entire thing from the inside. How does God destroy Death? From the inside. To get in, he would have to die. That’s where the real battle took place, where Death was destroyed and we were set free.

Jesus has destroyed Death and set us free. What does that mean? We will still physically die. However, our death is just from our current state of existence. This is all temporary. Destroying Death means that we get to have ETERNAL life with our heavenly Father. We have been adopted into HIS family where we are given grace and mercy because of his love for us. We can’t earn those gifts no matter what we do. They are freely GIVEN to us through his love. His love recreates us, too.

“‘Behold, God’s dwelling is with the human race. He will dwell with them and they will be his people and God himself will always be with them [as their God]. He will wipe every tear from their eyes, and there shall be no more death or mourning, wailing or pain, [for] the old order has passed away.’ The one who sat on the throne said, ‘Behold, I make all things new.'”
Revelation 21:3-5 (NABRE)

He makes all things new. How does he recreate us? When you are baptized your “old” self is washed away so that your new self can take its place. This means that NONE of us are beyond redemption. We can change. “It is what it is,” is a bald-faced lie when it comes to who you are as a person. If you truly want to change who you are deep down, you can do it. You just can’t do it on your own. You have to surrender yourself to Christ and ask for the Holy Spirit to dwell in you and help to make you new. It’s not easy because Satan is still out here tempting us, but with Jesus on our side we can’t lose! When you are picking teams you ALWAYS pick Jesus first!

Isn’t all of this news great?! We can’t lose! God is on our side and has told the Devil to take a hike so that we can be with God forever! But wait a minute… why? Why would God do all of this for me? He can create a universe out of nothing. He can destroy Death. He creates billion of stars at unfathomable distances away from us. God is AWESOME. So why me? I’m only one tiny little microscopic speck in all of his creation. Why would he care about doing any of this for me? I’m insignificant. Do you still not understand? God loves YOU. He thirsts for you. You wants to always be near to you.

“You formed my inmost being; you knit me in my mother’s womb. I praise you, because I am wonderfully made; wonderful are your works! My very self you know. My bones are not hidden from you, When I was being made in secret, fashioned in the depths of the earth. Your eyes saw me unformed; in your book all are written down; my days were shaped, before one came to be.”
Psalm 139:13-16 (NABRE)

Remember, God is perfect and doesn’t make mistakes. He made YOU. On purpose, with a purpose. Even if you don’t know what your purpose is, He does. He knows the real you and LOVES you. Embrace him, surrender to him, and recreate yourself anew. It’s never too late.

Take some time to think about what you’ve read. Open the Bible and see what God has to say to you. After all, the Bible isn’t a History textbook; it’s a love letter to you from God. Read his words. Feel his love. See what he has done for you. Listen to the song “You Are Near” by Dan Schutte as you think about what God has done for you.

What is your response?

December 26, 2021January 3, 2022 civilwarrose5

Rescued – Part 1

I am writing this blog post the day after Christmas. The day on which all Christians celebrate the birth of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. It was on this day that we were given the gift of hope and new creation. Why? Exactly why did Jesus come to earth? Was it merely to teach us parables and give us new commandments? No. He came to RESCUE us. I am sharing what I have learned from a tremendous book by Fr. John Riccardo. Rescued: The Unexpected and Extraordinary News of the Gospel is an amazing book and one that you should definitely read. Today I want to discuss the third part of this book.

Remember, in the last two posts, we learned how we have been captured by Satan because he HATES us. Satan’s ultimate goal is to destroy, degrade and enslave us. He’s doing a pretty good job at it, too. What did God do? Did he send others to see if they could free us? No. He came HIMSELF. We are so important to him that the creator of everything came to earth to fight for us.

“”The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, because he has anointed me to bring glad tidings to the poor. He has sent me to proclaim liberty to captives and recovery of sight to the blind, and to proclaim a year acceptable to the Lord.” Rolling up the scroll, he handed it back to the attendant and sat down, and the eyes of all in the synagogue looked intently at him. He said to them, “Today this scripture passage is fulfilled in your hearing.””
Luke 4:18-21 (NABRE)

Why would he do this? Why did Jesus take on human form? He did this to fight for you and me.

“Whoever sins belongs to the devil, because the devil has sinned from the beginning. Indeed, the Son of God was revealed to destroy the works of the devil.”
1 John 3:8 (NABRE)

Wow. Jesus came down to destroy our enemy and set us free. If this was a movie we would see him getting into his uniform, gathering his weapons, putting on his face paint, and really gearing up for the battle ahead of him. The inspiring rock music would let us know just how serious and courageous this warrior really is and the big task that he has ahead of him. He would be muscular, athletic, and undaunted. Just looking at him would reassure you and make you think that everything will be okay.

Yet, I’ve never heard my church portray this version of Jesus. Have you? Is this new information to you, too? You hear about how Jesus is love, how he is compassionate and heals the sick, he teaches us parables so that we know that God loves us and forgives us no matter how bad we’ve been in the past, and that we can get to our Father only through Jesus. To be completely honest, I had always pictured Jesus as a wandering hippie who was trying to turn everybody’s heart to God. This Jesus in my mind was mild-mannered, softly spoken, and not very interesting. Boy, was I wrong!! Maybe it’s because when I read the stories about Jesus turning water into wine, giving the blind sight and raising people from the dead, it doesn’t seem “real” to me. It’s similar to when you were in history class and your teacher stood there telling you about past events in a flat voice that almost lulled you to sleep. Yet, how many times have you read a different approach to the same event and saw it in a completely different (and much more fascinating) manner?

Instead of just reading the words, let’s use the Ignatian method of reading scripture and actually put ourselves in those moments. There are so many examples, but I want to focus on just one. Let’s take a look at the woman with a hemorrhage.

“There was a woman afflicted with hemorrages for twelve years. She had suffered greatly at the hands of many doctors and had spent all that she had. Yet she was not helped but only grew worse. She had heard about Jesus and came up behind him in the crowd and touched his cloak. She said, “If I but touch his clothes, I shall be cured.” Immediately her flow of blood dried up. She felt in her body that she was healed of her affliction. Jesus, aware at once that power had gone out from him, turned around in the crowd and asked, “Who has touched my clothes?” But his disciples said to him, “You see how the crowd is pressing upon you, and yet you ask, ‘Who touched me?'” And he looked around to see who had done it. The woman, realizing what had happened to her, approached in fear and trembling. She fell down before Jesus and told him the whole truth. He said to her, ‘Daughter, your faith has saved you. Go in peace and be cured of your affliction.'”
Mark 5:25-34 (NABRE)

You may need to read that a few times, but feel the emotions of hoplessness that the woman must have felt after suffering for so many years. She had spent EVERYTHING she had in order to be cured, but nothing worked. Then, somehow, she hears about Jesus. He can heal the sick. Others talk in amazement about the leper who was cured and the other man who had been possessed and how easily it seemed that Jesus was able to cure them. If he could cure leprosy and exorcised demons, then maybe he could cure her, too. She didn’t have money, but she had hope and faith. When she saw him in the crowd something made her go up and touch his cloak, knowing that just the slight touch would cure her. She had THAT much faith. And it worked!

Now flip it around and imagine being in the crowd trying to catch a glimpse of this Jesus character. You’d heard all the stories, too, and you were curious. What did he look like? How did he act? Would you be able to tell that there was anything special about him just by being near him? Then you see him stop and ask who had touched him. Hmmm, this was interesting. Where was this going? The guys traveling with him seemed to dismiss this reaction, but you can see on Jesus face that something happened. You notice a woman come out of the crowd to fall down in front of him. You are close enough to hear her story and read her face, which convinces you that every word she has spoken is true. This is amazing! The joy, amazement and awe on her face clearly beams out for everybody to see. Then lovingly Jesus tells her that her faith has saved her and to go in peace. What feelings do you experience from having witnessed this exchange? Can you imagine how much more powerful it would be if you were actually there?

The feelings that were experienced as crowds witnessed these actions were what caused Jesus to be so interesting. Yet, how often are we bored in church wondering how busy the breakfast place is going to be after we get out? How often do we dismiss the miracles that Jesus did? How often are we afraid to even say his name because it might ‘offend’ somebody? He wasn’t just a random hippie blowing through these various towns. He was awesome. He did things that nobody had ever seen before. The tales that went raging ahead of him had to seem unbelievable until you finally saw him and could absolutely believe everything that was said. This was a guy who caused tax collectors (the greediest, most affluent, and wealthy people in a town), prostitutes, gamblers and others who were only out for their own pleasure, to drop what they were doing and follow him. He drew crowds of thousands!! People had to tear open other people’s roofs in order to get their sick friends close enough for healing. Back when the population wasn’t very big, this was a huge deal. Think of Elvis, the Beatles, New Kids on the Block, Backstreet Boys, and One Direction all rolled into one. That’s the kind of presence that Jesus had. In fact, he had such an aura of power about him that the Pharisees instantly hated him and wanted him killed; Herrod had been so afraid that he had ordered all males under the age of 3 to be killed (and this was when Jesus was just a BABY). What person has that kind of power that exudes from him so that all can feel it without having to be IN his presence? This is Jesus, our Lord and Savior, who has come to destroy Satan’s hold on us. As I leave you this week with these thoughts to mull over I want to add just a little more kindling to the fire.

“For when peaceful stillness encompassed everything and the night in its swift course was half spent, your all-powerful word from heaven’s royal throne leapt into the doomed land, a fierce warrior bearing the sharp sword of your inexorable decree.”
Wisdom 18:14-15 (NABRE)

October 17, 2021 civilwarrose5

Created in Love

Last week I wrote about how God created everything in the universe, plus He created us. Out of everything that He has ever created, or will ever create, we are his most beloved works of art. How do we know this? Because he made us in his own image and even blew air into our lungs. He is part of us. We weren’t made just to be loved, though. We were made TO Love. That’s part of us being a representative of God on earth; we are made to love one another as he loves us.

“When the Pharisees heard that he had silenced the Sadducees, they gathered together, and one of them [a scholar of the law] tested him by asking, ‘Techer, which commandment in the law is the greatest?’ He said to him, ‘You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your mind. This is the greatest and the first commandment. The second is like it: You shall love your neighbor as yourself. The whole law and the prophets depend on these two commandments.'”
Matthew 22: 34-40 (NABRE)

When Jesus was asked about the greatest commandment he didn’t say that it was to keep the Sabbath holy or that you shouldn’t eat meat on Fridays. No, he said that you will love each other as God loves you. Jesus even tells the parable about the Good Samaritan who saved a man who had been severly beaten and left for dead. Did the good Priest, a man of the cloth, stop to help the critically injured man? No, because if he had touched the man the Priest would have been considered “unclean” and wouldn’t be able to enter the Temple. Do you think God really cared if the Priest was “unclean?” No! He wanted the Priest to help his fellow man by loving him enough to stop and get him help.

Even when we mess up, God still loves us. Even when that Priest walked by the man in the ditch, God still loved him. He loves us so much that he gives us so many chances to ask forgiveness. None of us are beyond redemption. We may have to pay the consequences of our sins, but we can still be redeemed and know that God loves us. Have you ever heard somebody describe their child as an “oops”? How many people grew up being told that they weren’t planned and therefore they were an accident? I wish that parents wouldn’t tell their children such things because NONE of us were accidents! God knows us all by name and He even knew us before he knit us in our mother’s womb. God gave you life and put you on this earth at this point in time for a purpose. NOBODY was an accident! If that were the case, do you think he would have given his only son to die for our sins so that we might be reunited with Him? Absolutely not. None of us are really worthy of that kind of love, and yet God gives it to us every single second.

That’s the problem with addiction and listening to the negative voices. They convince us that we have no purpose and that we are worthless. That there isn’t a God and that nobody will ever love you or can ever love you. Don’t listen to the lies! I know it’s hard to drown out and sometimes it’s a battle just to keep from falling into the pits of despair, but always fall back on the fact that God loves you no matter what! Because you are redeemable. Because you are lovable. Because you are a child of God and he lovingly created you to be the person that you are right now at this time.

I want to ask you to please make sure you pick up a copy of Rescued; The Unexpected and Extraordinary News of the Gospel by Fr. John Riccardo. Read it and take it to heart. We need to be the Good Samaritans for those people who have been beaten up and left bloody by the negative voices. It is our job to pick them up and show them the healing Word of God, for the Truth will set you free!

October 10, 2021 civilwarrose5

Created

Today’s post is going to be a little different than normal. Instead of going right to scripture I first wanted to introduce you to a book that I have found to be completely fascinating. I first listened to it as an audiobook that I borrowed from my local library. After listening to it three times I realized I needed to bring it to my small faith group, so I bought copies of it for all of us. Now I want to introduce you to it. If you can pick up a copy, or listen to the audiobook, I HIGHLY recommend it! It’s called Rescued: The Unexpected and Extraordinary News of the Gospel by Fr. John Riccardo.

I have heard the gospel many times at mass and I’ve read it on my own. Never before had I heard it told like Father John tells it in his book. It showed me another side of the gospel that I had never heard before and it gave me a completely different idea of exactly what Jesus did for all of us. Since this book has had such an impact on me I wanted to share a little of it with you. I’m not going to quote from it, and I’m going to do my best not to plagiarize, but you need to take a look at this, too. Hopefully I can do it in a way that makes sense without infringing on Father John’s work.

In a world where so many people have lost themselves and feel that there’s no hope we need to re-introduce them to Jesus who died so that they might have life. In order to do this, though, we need to start at the beginning.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
He was in the beginning with God.
All things came to be through him, and without him nothing came to be.
What came to be through him was life, and this life was the light of the human race;
the light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.”
John 1:1-5 (NABRE)

Is that too lofty? Does it sound confusing? Are you still trying to figure out what is being said? I always have to read that passage through at least three times before I feel like I’ve got my arms halfway around it. Let’s simplify it a little more. In the beginning there was only God, but he was the Triune God (three-in-one) so Jesus and the Holy Spirit were there, too. They were just hanging out when one day God said to Jesus, “Hold my beer,” and he created Earth. What? You don’t think God was drinking? How do you explain the platypus and giraffe? Or the belly button?

Okay, so maybe God wasn’t drinking, but he did create the heavens and the earth. And it was good. Then he created the waters and the sky. And it was good. After that came dry earth and sea. And it was good. God thought that the earth needed a little color so he created plants and trees and flowers. And it was good. Then he realized we would need something to tell time by and help the seas ebb and flow, so he created the sun, moon and the stars. And they were all good. At this point God realized that he had a giant aquarium and terrarium, so he filled the seas and skies with creatures. And they were good. (Although, the penguins probably felt like they got a raw deal since they weren’t able to fly nor were they in a warm land.) Then God decided that there needed to be weird creatures like opossums and adorable fuzzy little kittens, so he made creatures for the land. And they were good. Then God made man. Man and woman were created in his image to have dominion over the lands, seas, skies and all living creatures. And they were good. As my priest likes to say, “God doesn’t make junk.”

But man wasn’t just another creature that God made, otherwise we would have been lumped into the group in Genesis 1:24. Instead, not only did he make us apart from the other creatures, but he also blew life into us (Genesis 2:7). The author of Genesis didn’t write down every single step that God took to make everything else, which means that these two facts are very important to our story. God could just bring things into being. Yet, he lovingly formed us and breathed life into us. Why? Because God LOVES us. After he created Adam and Eve he spent time with them in the Garden of Eden. Now, maybe he also spent time out on the plains playing with the deer and antelope, but we are specifically told of the time he spent with humans.

Think about a very important day of your life. When you tell somebody about this day do you tell them what time you woke up, what shampoo you used, or what television program you watched that day? Only if it’s important to the story and the overall picture of what happened, right? You talk about what is important and what made the day special, or what really stuck out to you. This is why we know that God creating man and woman is SO important to him. He wants us to know just how much we mean to him and how important we are in his plan. The first part of Genesis doesn’t name the planets or stars that he made, but it does name Man and Woman. Don’t get me wrong, God is very proud of everything he has made, but his pride and joy are humans.

Think about something that you are really good at doing or making. Maybe you make the BEST pies or perhaps you build the most comfortable furniture. Whatever it is, think about it and how proud you are whenever somebody tells you how great it is. Now, if you’re a parent this is going to be easier, but think about when a person holds their first child in their arms and looks down at that gorgeous face and those tiny little fingers. Can you feel the overwhelming love just pouring out of them as they gaze upon their child? THAT is how God looks on every one of us. You. Me. Your neighbor. Even that really weird looking guy who works with you. He doesn’t look on ALL of creation like that. Is he proud? Sure, but God loves us all as if we were his first born child. It is the only time that a parent can honestly claim to love all of their children equally. God doesn’t play favorites.

I have more that I want to say about God and his creation, but I think I’ve gone on for long enough. Next time I’ll do a little more with Creation. In the meantime, pick up a copy of Father John Riccardo’s book. It is amazing.

Kerry'd by Faith

Fr John Riccardo