Peace In Our Hearts Always, a new prayer group for cancer patients and anyone with a serious illness. They will meet every week in Metairie, Kenner and the Westbank.
Metairie Chapter St. Clement of Rome (Richland & W. Esplanade in Metairie, LA) in the Parish Center Every Thursday from 7 pm to 8 pm
St. Mary Magdalen, 6425 W. Metairie Ave., Metairie Every Friday from 1PM to 2PM in the Chapel (accessible from Cardinal St.)
Westbank Chapter Mary’s Helpers Chapel - 4512 Seventh St., Marrero, LA. Every Friday at 6:30 pm
Kenner Chapter Our Lady of Perpetual Help Church - 1912 Short Street - The New Rectory Thursdays at 10 am
This group is also open to caregivers or family and friends of the sick. Please join us as we pray, share, and open our hearts to God's divine mercy and embrace the love that Our Mother, Mary, wishes to impart on each of us. For more information, please contact Madeleine at
or 504-452-5217 or Carol 504-832-0057; or contact Mimi at
or 504-849-2570 or Gayle at
or 504-348-7729.
HOPE Jesus, all of our hope is placed in You. In the midst of a world that looks hopeless we have Your love. We ask for the grace to see beyond the pain of this life, and to know if we place our hope and trust in You we cannot be disappointed. You suffered and died for us so that we can be with You forever. You alone give us reason to look to the future with joy. St. Paul tells us to hope for what we do not see and to wait with endurance. You know that can be hard for us to do, strengthen us my God. Help us to always look to the future with eyes that can see past this life, to the life we will share with You forever. In Jesus` name we pray . Amen
FAITH My God we ask You for the gift of faith. Help us to understand without a doubt, that You can do all things. Sometimes we feel like we are up against a wall, and it looks like there is no way out of the problems we find ourselves in. When the Israelites found themselves surrounded by the Pharaoh and his army it looked impossible for them to escape. Let us see that You are with us just as much as You were with them. There is no problem too great for you to handle, and if we place ourselves into Your hands we have nothing to fear. Please give us the faith of a child that knows if necessary, our Father can even part a Sea to save us. In Jesus` name we pray. Amen.
TRUST Jesus, This life is hard, seems each new day brings a new problem. At times it feels like darkness is closing in. Help us to see when we feel afraid it is because we have taken our eyes off of You. You are always by our side, and You will lead and guide us, if we allow You to. As Peter held Your hand and stepped out onto the water he was putting total trust in You. He was at peace and he was in amazement, defying even the laws of nature. But then he took his eyes off of You, and he began to sink. The same thing happens to us. If we put our lives into Your hands, and keep our eyes fixed on You, all things are possible. But like Peter if we look at the size of the waves and our circumstances we too begin to sink. Help us to remember when that happens to reach up for You hand and like Peter to ask for Your help. Please lead us day by day, and help us in our weaknesses. Hold our hands as we walk through this life, until the day we will be with You forever. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen.
COURAGE Jesus, Having an illness, or watching someone we love going through one is a cross. You asked us to pick up our crosses daily and follow after You. Lord, You alone know our hearts, our strengths and our weaknesses. Help us to see that even if there are things in this life that bring us worry and fear, You never leave us. Let that really enter into our hearts. Courage is not the absence of fear. It is going forward in spite of fear. Saint Paul told us to keep our eyes on the prize, help us to see beyond the pain. Teach us to keep our eyes fixed on You, and Your love. And let us truly understand Your words, “ I am the way, the truth, and the life.” In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen
Peace in Our Hearts Always My Lord Jesus, I love you so very much! I want to love you as you love me. I truly have nothing to give you but my love, everything belongs to You. I realize when I pray I am usually asking for a favor, seldom do I give praise to You. Lord, purify my heart, give me the grace to always seek your will above my own. Help me to trust You, and know your will is always best. I ask for peace in my heart, that no matter what storms I have to endure in this life, I will understand there is a reason for everything You allow. And to know one day I will be happy with You forever. In Jesus’ name, Amen
PRAYER FOR HEALING My Lord Jesus, We ask for the grace to truly know You. We want to really understand how much You love us, and how much You desire our love. You call to us each day in the quiet of our hearts, but most times we do not recognize Your voice. You are always trying to draw us to You, but so many times we pull away. Lord you are the Divine Physician and many times in the Bible You healed the people that asked for Your help. Today we ask for Your healing touch. We ask You to look deep within us, and heal us in the way that You choose. We ask You to increase our trust in You so that as we face these trials, we will grow closer to You, and never turn away from Your loving hand. In Jesus’ name we pray.
Madeleine's Meditations for the Sick
November 25, 2011 Advent It’s hard to believe but just next month we will celebrate Christmas! I do not mention this so that you will begin to worry about what to buy for Aunt Alice but to begin to prepare our hearts. Jesus came into this world over 2000 years ago and each year we celebrate our Savior becoming one of us. On that beautiful day, the love, truth, and light of the world came to us as a little baby. Think about that for a moment. The Creator of the universe loves us so much that He would have done anything to save us. Advent is a good time to meditate on the birth and life of Jesus and his mother Mary. Do that by recitation of the Rosary. Begin with the Joyful Mysteries and place yourself at Mary’s side as the Angel Gabriel appeared to her. He said, “Be not afraid Mary, you have found favor with God”. How do you think she felt? Initially she was probably afraid. Imagine how she felt to know that she was chosen to bring the Savior into the world! Mary is the model of humility and I am sure she never thought that she was special to God. She knew that her saying yes would forever change her life. Saying yes meant that she was giving all control of her life to God. But Mary had done that her entire life. Now it is time for us to meditate on our lives. Do we always say yes to God? Do we really believe that He loves us and wants the best for us? Do we place ourselves in His hands, even at times when we do not understand why things are difficult? Let’s all begin this Advent hoping to grow closer to Jesus during this time of Grace. Hoping at least to be somewhat changed.
July 30, 2011 When I am Weak... I think there are very few things in life that make us understand our dependence on God like sickness does. Most of us go through our lives thinking that we are in control to a certain point, I know that I felt that way. Whether we are healthy or sick if we are honest with ourselves, we will admit we are not in control of anything. I have found that as I am more and more aware of this, something wonderful is happening. If we let go of the wheel, God takes over. God will never force us to give up control, but if we are wise we will. No one ever has or ever will love us like God does. I think it breaks His heart to see us struggle trying to carry the weight of our problems by ourselves. If we listen closely we will hear His sweet gentle voice in our hearts, “Give that to Me, I will carry it for you, I love you so very much!” When we become aware of how very weak we are, and give to Him those struggles and problems that weigh us down, THEN and only then are we strong. It is His strength working in us that makes us strong! God is our Creator, our Father, He gives to us our very breath. So many people go through life struggling, trying to find peace. True peace is only found in God and in His will for our lives. St Augustine said it best: "Our hearts are restless until they rest in Thee, O Lord".
August 23, 2011 "The Journey" Last night I saw a wonderful movie about a group going to Medjugorje called “The Journey“. It brought back so many memories of my own trip there years ago, and brought tears to my eyes when I saw the faith of so many. Sometimes this life looks very bleak and we need reminders that for how ever long we are here it is a gift from God not to be taken lightly. We can get caught up in the day to day problems and at times it can seem overwhelming. We take our eyes off of Jesus. We need reminders like this movie that there is so much more meaning to our lives then we see. ALL of us have our own journey to God whether we are able to go to Medjugorje or not. Movies like this bring the experience of being there to those that cannot go. I have not been there since 1990 and I was so moved to see how many people were there for the 30th Anniversary of Our Lady‘s visits. So much faith! Thank You Jesus for sending Your Mother to bring us back to You and thank you Mary for always saying yes to God!
June 27, 2011 A Shower of Love Have you noticed in your life that many times you do not appreciate something that you have until it is gone? We tend to think things will always be as they are, until they change. This is a time in History like no other has ever been. God is calling us back to Him, He is literally showering us with His love and graces. He is sending our Mother to call us to Him. Over 2000 years ago, God used Our Lady to bring Jesus into this world, now He is sending her to try to bring the world back to Him. Never before has Our Lady come with messages everyday for 30 years. This is a period of grace from Almighty God. I will ask the same question I have asked before, are we understanding? We have just received Our Lady’s message for June 2011, if you were asked to tell someone what she said, could you remember most of the message? Do you remember a part of it? Do you remember one sentence? What about last months message, do you remember any of it? We are living in a very serious time, but do we notice the signs? She pleads and begs us to wake up, to believe. If we believe, our lives will be changed, if we believe we will do as she ask. Do we fast? Do we offer sacrifice to God for the conversion of others? It is one thing to say we believe, it is another to live the messages. I know that I have a lot of work to do. She calls it conversion of the heart, we all need to work towards it. It is not something that happens once, it is a daily conversion. It is always putting God’s will above our will. Do you know what the funny thing about submitting to His will is? Because He loves you and I so very much, His will is always best for us, ALWAYS. A shower of love is being given freely to us right now, let’s be smart enough to recognize it so that down the road we will not look back with regret.
June 7, 2011 "Dear Children" Dear children! I invite you to prayer, now, when Satan is strong and wishes to make as many souls as possible his own. So pray dear children, and have more trust in me, because I am here in order to help you and to guide you on a new path towards a new life. Therefore, dear little children, listen, and live what I tell you, because it is important for you when I shall not be with you any longer, that you remember my words and all that I told you. I call you to begin to change your life from the beginning, and that you decide for conversion, not with words but with life. Thank you for having responded to my call.” (October 25, 1992)
I was looking for something for a friend, and I came across this message from Our Lady from 1992. Do you hear the pleading in her message? How hard it is for her to watch so many being lost, so many confused even about Who God is. This month we will celebrate the 30th Anniversary of Mary coming daily to guide us, to love us, and to warn us. But the question we all have to ask ourselves is do we get it? Do we take her messages seriously, or do we read them and then tuck them away? In this message she reminds us that satan is strong, he wishes to destroy us because we are God’s children. All we have to do is turn on the news to see that we live in a very different time. So many things have become common place to us, abortion, child abuse, drugs, sexual unions outside of marriage, I could go on and on. Sin has existed since Adam and Eve but now it is accepted, there is no shame anymore. In fact it is the people who follow God’s laws that are considered different and strange. God is not happy.
But Our Lady reminds us that prayer is our weapon against evil, the secret to staying safe spiritually is to stay close to God and to our Mother. In this message almost 20 yrs old she tells us that there will come a time when she will no longer appear to give us these messages. She wants us to remember her words when she stops coming daily to us, but do we remember them now? She calls us to conversion of the heart, not only with words. Words are easy, but without actions they are meaningless.
We do not know how much longer we will have Our Lady in such a special way. I remember the first time I read one of her messages. When I read the words, “ Thank you for having responded to my call”, I felt as if she was speaking directly to me. And you know, she was. Just as she is speaking to you today. We need to listen to her with our hearts, we need to take her words seriously, we need to pay attention.
May 3, 2011 God is Bigger than Any Sin Driving home from the store the thought came to me to write about God’s love, the love He has for those of us who are “Prodigal sons” or daughters. I decided to check my email before I began to write and there was Our Lady’s message. There was a line that jumped out at me, “I desire to help you to be free of the dirtiness of the past and to begin to live anew and differently.” That is what it is all about isn’t it? Many of us had gotten very dirty in the past, like children playing in mud. Remember the old saying, "You do not throw the baby out with the bath water"? Dirt washes off, if we choose to climb out of the mud. No matter what mistakes we have made in the past, God will forgive us, OF ANYTHING. There is nothing that you have done in your past that will shock God. He has watched you every step of your life, He already knows what you have done. He just wants us to come back to Him, He wants to give to us a new heart. Ezekiel - Chapter 36 26 I will give you a new heart and place a new spirit within you, taking from your bodies your stony hearts and giving you natural hearts. 27 I will put my spirit within you and make you live by my statutes, careful to observe my decrees. 28 You shall live in the land I gave your fathers; you shall be my people, and I will be your God.
The beginning of healing from past sins is confession. We should never fear to go and confess our sins, NO MATTER WHAT THEY ARE. When we go to confession, even though we speak to a Priest, it is God we are confessing to. Monsignor Guste said once that the worse sins confessed made him the happiest. He said that showed that God’s grace was at work changing that person's heart. When I first went back to confession in 1987, I had not been to confession for over 20 yrs. I had many serious sins to confess, but I remember feeling tremendous joy as I confessed. I knew my sins were forgiven and my Father was welcoming me home!
Then Our Lady brings up renunciation of the sins and things that separate us from God. The things that will as she said make us empty and unsuccessful. Only God can fill us and give us true peace. Never ever fear to approach your Father, He loves you without measure. He waits to welcome back every child that has wandered away, He loves us.
May 2, 2011 Picture This I was just sitting on my porch, looking at the blue skies and beautiful trees, God’s gifts to us. I was thinking if I were an artist it would be nice to be able to capture that beauty. But then, the thought came to me, that no matter how perfectly a picture is drawn it is not as beautiful as it is in real life. Even in a landscape, there is an element of beauty that cannot be captured on the canvas. I have never been to Heaven, but I have heard stories of people who say that they have been there. I imagine that there is a difference like that between Heaven and earth. As beautiful as God’s creation is here, there will be that element of life in Heaven that does not exist here. Everything here dies, it is all just temporary. In Heaven there will be no death, and everything will last forever. I believe that life will show through in a beauty we cannot begin to imagine. God is present with us here, but here we do not see all of His beauty. It is like a veil is over our eyes and at times we get a glimpse of His presence. How wonderful it is when that happens! Close your eyes and picture being in a place where you will always see Him, where there is no veil over your eyes. A place where you are safely wrapped in His arms forever!
April 24, 2011 Joy Light always chases away darkness, even in the natural world. No matter how dark a room is, even the light from a small candle will overpower the dark. Two forces cannot occupy the same space, one of them will be stronger. When God created us, He wanted us to be single minded, to be children of the light. Then sin came into our world. It brought with it pain, sadness, shame, and death. It brought darkness. God could have given up on us, but He loves us. We are not just creatures, we are His children. When the world was it’s darkest, God sent Jesus into it. Jesus is the light of the world. If we will just follow Him, He will lead us to eternal peace, happiness and joy. Good Friday is hard, we can see how ugly sin is in the sufferings of Our Lord. We see how dark it is. In the middle of all that pain, we see the purest, most beautiful love.We see the one true light of the world. We see our Savior. All we have to do is believe in Him, not just with words but with our lives. We have to become different, we are new creations.
2 Corinthians - Chapter 5 17 So whoever is in Christ is a new creation: the old things have passed away; behold, new things have come. 18 And all this is from God, who has reconciled us to himself through Christ and given us the ministry of reconciliation, 19 namely, God was reconciling the world to himself in Christ, not counting their trespasses against them and entrusting to us the message of reconciliation. 20 So we are ambassadors for Christ, as if God were appealing through us. We implore you on behalf of Christ, be reconciled to God. 21 For our sake he made him to be sin who did not know sin, so that we might become the righteousness of God in him.
Good Friday was filled with suffering, with Easter came Joy. The joy of knowing the light overcame the darkness. Our God Who is love, overcame sin and death for all those who follow Him.
Enter In… Isaiah - Chapter 53 7 Though he was harshly treated, he submitted and opened not his mouth; Like a lamb led to the slaughter or a sheep before the shearers, he was silent and opened not his mouth.
Oh, the love of our God! On this Good Friday He is asking us to “Enter in”. He is asking us to walk the road to Calvary with Him, to see the love He has for each and every one of us! We are so important to our Father, He gave His only Son for us. He gave His only Son FOR us! So much sacrifice, so much love… Although Jesus is God , He also allowed Himself to be a man. He felt every bit of the pain, and there was so very much pain! We cannot even begin to understand how much He suffered, this is the Son of God. Hell unleashed all of it’s fury on Him. The suffering was not only physical, satan taunted Him every step of the way. He reminded Him of our ingratitude, he reminded Him of all the souls that would still be lost, he told Him this sacrifice was not enough. But hell lost that day, satan's fate was sealed, the sacrifice of Jesus was enough. Although the devil causes so many problems now, he will be locked away in hell forever. And anyone that chooses to follow Jesus will have eternal life! Enter in and see the love God has for you…
April 21, 2011 Accepting Crosses Mark Chapter 8 34 He summoned the crowd with his disciples and said to them, "Whoever wishes to come after m must deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.”
I wonder sometime how much attention we pay to the words of Jesus. We love to quote the “comforting” Scriptures, but what about the “difficult” ones? The words of Jesus that at times made people shake their heads and walk away. The words were too hard to accept and difficult to follow. Jesus did not say this life would be easy, in fact He told us again and again that it will be hard. I am afraid that we still have an idea that we should not suffer, ever. That is just not true. In this life we will suffer many hardships, Jesus did and He is Our Lord. If our Master suffered why do we always think that we should not? During these Holy Days we should reflect on how very much God loves us, and because of that love He went to the Cross.
Hebrews Chapter 4 15For we do not have a high priest who is unable to sympathize with our weaknesses, but one who has similarly been tested in every way, yet without sin.
God did not promise to us a rose garden without thorns. What He did promise is that He will walk every step of the way with us. We can count on Him to never leave us or forsake us, no matter how narrow or dark our road becomes. This is not a life without pain, but it is a life where we can learn to trust that no matter what God allows in our lives, there is a reason.
April 6, 2011 Blessed Mother Blessed Mother, during this season of Lent I ask you to teach me to love Jesus as you do. God was and is always first in your life, “Do whatever He tells you to do”… You watched your Son, and your God endure unspeakable torture and pain. You stood quietly at the foot of His Cross and accepted all from God’s hand. You are the Mother of all of us, and your heart breaks when even one child is lost. You watched with your own eyes the price Jesus paid for our redemption, how much pain you must feel now when people turn away from such a gift! So many souls are lost in darkness, and you cry. Mary help us to see that everything here is passing, use us each day to bring others to your Son, to safety. In Jesus' name we pray. Amen.
March 8, 2011 Lent Today is Ash Wednesday, the beginning of Lent. Time to reflect on the sufferings of Our Lord, and to try in small ways to make reparation. It goes deeper than giving up sweets or TV, in order for it to matter at all, it must come from our hearts. This is a time for true sacrifice, not superficial offerings. God judges everything by our motives and sincerity. Just as Our Lady continually tells us to pray from the heart, so too must our sacrifices be from our heart. Father made this point at Mass, if we follow the Church’s rule not to eat meat on Fridays, but we go to the best fish restaurant for dinner, what sacrifice have we made? This is a time for real self denial, a time to grow closer to Jesus. Lent should also be a time for doing positive things, as well as giving up. How often do you read the Bible? Now is a good time to set aside a time each day to get to know God’s word, to know Him. Maybe you know someone that could use some help. Sometimes just a five minute call to someone who is alone can make a tremendous difference in that person’s day. “Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one of these least brothers of mine, you did for me”, Matthew 25:40. We are the only hands and feet Jesus has in the world today. Lent is a good time to become more aware of that, and to put our words into actions. February 15, 2011 Never Alone Do you feel lonely at times? I think Valentines Day can be hard for some, especially if you do not have a mate. Being sick in itself can make you feel alone. We all say the words, God is everywhere and God is always with us, but how many times do we forget that? Every word God said is true, and He promised He would never ever leave us. The air is around us all the time, but unless there is a breeze we cannot feel it, but it is still there. When we have those times when we feel all alone, we need to turn to Him. I promise He hears every thought and every whisper. God wants us to know that He is there, but more than that He wants us to turn to Him for comfort. The most important relationship we will ever have in this life and in the next is with Him. The next time you feel alone remind yourself of that - talk to Him, reach out for Him. No one ever will or ever could love you as much as God does - all He asks in return is our love.
February 9, 2011 All is Well Picture this scene, especially if you are a parent. You just tucked your little ones into bed for the night, your whole day has been spent watching over them and taking care of them. There were times you made some decisions that they did not care for very much, but you did them because you love your children and always want what is best for them. Maybe they really, really wanted something that you knew would be harmful to them so you said no. Or maybe you had to allow something that was painful, like a shot at the doctor's and they did not understand why you would let them feel pain at all. Now at the door you hear them talking to each other, they are worried and sharing their fear. The little one tells the oldest “ I am afraid what will happen tomorrow, you saw what she allowed today! When I told her I needed that new toy she did not get it for me, and I really needed it!”. The oldest now says “ Yes, I know exactly what you mean, She stood there and watched as I received that awful painful shot! If she cared she would have never, ever let me be hurt.” “ You know come to think about it, they fed us today, but what about tomorrow? Maybe we will go hungry, maybe we won’t even have a bed to sleep in tomorrow, what if??” As a parent how would you feel hearing these words from the ones you loved the most? Your heart would be broken. But little children do not think like that, but don’t we at times? God wants our trust, no matter how many times He says no to something we think we need, or how many times we have to go through pain. He loves us and watches over every second of our day. Our understanding of life is limited, just like those children, we do not see the big picture, but He does. He tells us to become like little children, we are to trust and believe and not worry… takes work, but it can be done. When we are able to KNOW that all He allows is for our good, and that He is with us every step of the way in this life, there really is nothing to fear. If you find your self afraid today, ask the Father to help you see how much He loves you. Ask Him to help you understand that every joy, trial, EVERYTHING that makes up your day today comes through His hands. If we are God’s children, even those things that the devil tries to hurt us with will be turned into something for our good. God is in control. Matthew 18 1At that time the disciples approached Jesus and said, "Who is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven?" 2He called a child over, placed it in their midst, 3and said, "Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. 4Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven.
Trust as a child does.
February 4, 2011 See You Later Death is hard isn’t it? A couple days ago I lost a friend of 20 yrs to cancer. We worked together for many years, she became sick four years ago, and I three years ago. We walked this road together and I will miss her very much. During my treatment in 2008 there were days that I was so sick I could barely raise my head. She would call and find me crying, and she would comfort me. On her difficult days I tried to be there for her, we understood how the other felt. Not sure if she heard me ( I believe she did), but on the day she died I told her this is not goodbye, it is see you later. Only our body dies, not our soul and as difficult as it is to watch someone we love lay dying, we know that is not the end of the story. Our life then begins and if we are a child of God, it is our transition into eternity with Him.
Childbirth can be very painful and difficult, but what a beautiful gift we receive when the pain is over! The gift of life. I believe death is like that, after the pain our souls leave these poor beaten shells and move on to new life with our Father. I was not with her when she passed, but when I receive the call it was like a relief, she suffered a lot especially those last two days. It then hit me that she was standing at that very moment in front of God! What a thought!
God placed us here for a time , but at the moment we are born He knows which day He will call us home, and that will be a happy day. As hard as this life can be, we must also keep in mind that He is with us every step of our lives, He never leaves us. We are the ones that drift from Him at times, if we wish to spend forever with Him we must choose to stay close to Him now. The more we come to know Him, the less we will fear, and we will have peace in our hearts.
January 29, 2011 Just One Day Matthew 6 34 Do not worry about tomorrow; tomorrow will take care of itself. Sufficient for a day is its own evil.
Luke12:6-7 24-25 6 Are not five sparrows sold for two small coins? Yet not one of them has escaped the notice of God 7 Even the hairs of your head have all been counted. Do not be afraid. You are worth more than many sparrows.
24 Notice the ravens: they do not sow or reap; they have neither storehouse nor barn, yet God feeds them. How much more important are you than birds! 25 Can any of you by worrying add a moment to your lifespan?
Philippians 4 6 Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God.
1Peter 5 7 Cast all your worries upon him because he cares for you.
These are just a few verses where God tells us not to worry, worry is not of God. Looking back in my own life I wasted so much time worrying about what could happen. And now I see that things were never as bad as I imagined them to be. That is why Jesus tells us, not to worry about tomorrow, because no matter how hard we try we just do not know what it will bring. Even if we did know, what could we do to change it? If we are worried about something, that means it is out of our control, maybe something bigger than we ourselves can handle. That is where God steps into the picture, there is NOTHING that God cannot handle. Jesus tells us that we cannot add even a moment to our lives by worry, but I can tell you from experience we can waste so much time on it. Before my conversion in 1987 I was a chronic worrier. To me the world was a very scary place, all the what if’s… then Our Lady entered my life and brought me to Jesus. I am not going to say I never worry now, but I am working on it and my life is so much different now. People that know me now cannot believe the person I use to be. God has made the difference in my life, I know that He loves me and watches over me. Before 1987 I suffered from anxiety attacks, they were at times crippling. Looking back, I did have a lot to be afraid of then, I did not know God at all. I thought He existed, but somehow I did not think He was apart of my life. I thought I was alone. I stumbled through life, looking for things to fill that empty space in my heart. But nothing worked, life was painful. When I began my conversion my first thought was “God is real! He exist!”. He went from being somewhere out there, to being a living God that loved me. I said my conversion began, because it is still in progress, conversion is God at work daily in our lives. Not one of us can say we have all the faith and trust in God that we need, just when we think we get it, something happens to show us how far we have to go. God is teaching us in this life, it is more like a schoolroom than a playground. But Jesus tells us a secret in Matt.6:34, He tells us to take life one day at a time. Do you find yourself jumping way ahead of time? If you do, just know that it is your own imagination at work, because no matter how hard you try to figure out what the future will be, you cannot. Only God knows. But no matter what life has in store for us, if we can place ourselves in God’s hands, there is truly nothing to worry about. Our God is a living God, He is love, and oh how He loves us! If we are His children we have nothing to fear, ever. "Fear is useless; what is needed is trust."( Luke 8:50, Mark 5:36 )
January 14, 2011 Joy And Peace EIn December’s message Our Lady spoke of joy and peace as she often does. She is the Queen of Peace and she wants to teach us to be at peace no matter what circumstances we find ourselves in. Life can be hard, whether you are well or sick, we all have trials. I believe when Mary our mother talks about having joy, she wants us to realize that does not mean we will always get what we would like. She is speaking of the joy and peace Jesus told us about in the Bible, the peace that is different from the “peace” of the world.
John Chapter 1427Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give it to you. Do not let your hearts be troubled or afraid.
In this He is saying, no matter what we have to face today, we can be at peace because He is with us. So often He says be not afraid, He wants so much to fill us with His peace and for us to trust Him. During the 33 yrs He spent in this world as a man, everything He did was out of love for us. He could not have done anymore to show His love. It breaks my heart to know that some will live and die without ever realizing how much they are loved by Him. We all need to pray to trust Him more.
Mary is our perfect example of complete trust in God. She always said yes to Him, she still does. The Rosary is the prayer she ask us over and over to pray. Saying the Rosary is not just reciting the prayers, it is a meditation on the life of Our Lord. Recently as I prayed the Joyful Mysteries, I noticed something I really had not seen before. Each of the Mysteries, although they are filled with very Joyful events also had some suffering. In the 1st Mystery, The Annunciation she is asked by Gabriel to be the mother of God. Can you imagine the courage it took to say yes? We become afraid of such small silly things and here this young girl said to do to her as He willed! Can you picture how she felt explaining this to Joseph, would he believe her? Would he still marry her? She placed all her trust in God. The 2nd Mystery The Visitation, traveling was very difficult, especially for a woman expecting a child. There was not any protection from the weather, just long stretches of land. But again it was as God willed. The 3rd Mystery The Birth of Jesus is filled with so much joy and love! But if you look closely not the best circumstances for giving birth to a child. It did not matter to Mary where they were or that they were sharing these quarters with animals, she was joyful because she was holding her God and her child.
The 4th Mystery The Presentation Our Lady and St. Joseph brought the baby Jesus to the temple to complete the rite of purification. Because they could not afford a lamb, they had to take the option for the poor and offer two turtle doves. Our Lady is then told by Simeon that a sword shall pierce her. The 5th Mystery The Finding of the Child Jesus, can you imagine how Our Lady felt while He was missing? It was joyful when He was found but I am sure those were three long painful days.
And so it is in our own lives, joy mixed in with pain. But the joy can remain in our hearts in spite of the pain, because we too have Our Lord with us, He never leaves us, He promised. Our Lady ask us to be carriers of that joy to others, so many live in constant pain because they do not know Him. They keep searching for how to fill that empty place in their hearts. Many years ago I was one of those people, I did not have clue. Our Lady ask us over and over to pray for the conversion of others. I believe it is because of the prayers of those that loved me that when Our Lady came to pull me out of the darkness I understood and believed. We also need to pray to be able each day to see God working in our own lives, and for the strength to always say yes to Him. Doing God’s will is what brings true peace and joy. Always remember how much you are loved, you have so much reason to be joyful!
December 30, 2010 We Are All Part of God’s Plan Every year I watch the old movie “It’s a Wonderful Life”. In it George ( the main character) reaches a point in life that everything seems such a mess that he decides to take his own life. In one scene he asked God for help, and God hears him and answers in a very unusual way. He sends an angel to show George what life would have been like for others if he had never been born. George was shocked to see how many lives he had touched and how much he was needed in God’s plan. God has made each of us unique, there never was and never will be another you. Even our fingerprints belong only to us, that thought amazes me. To me that says that it is important to God for us to know how much care was put into our creation. Each of us has work to do for Him that only we can do. Saint Paul said we are all part of the body of Christ, but we each have a different job to do.
Romans 12 4For as in one body we have many parts, and all the parts do not have the same function, 5so we, though many, are one body in Christ and individually parts of one another.
Like George, most of the time we touch others lives without realizing we are, each of us is important and needed in God’s plan. We all have talents and gifts God has given to us. Sometimes we allow those gifts to lie dormant for awhile. When we think of talents, we think of those that sing or dance or something really obvious. Maybe your gift is a loving heart, or maybe when someone is hurting you have just the right thing to say to them. Just like singers or dancers, we all should work at developing our gifts and finding out what they are. We all have gifts from God and He wants us to use them. None of us just happened to be here, we were placed at this exact time for a purpose we will not fully understand in this life. We will find out then how many lives we have touched. Like George we still have time to do the work we have been given. The important thing is never to give up trying to do His will. None of us knows if we have seconds or years left here. I was told three years ago to give up because what I have is not curable. Three years later, I am still here, only God knows how long we have here and He is in control. We will all go home one day, dying is not a punishment. If God cures one person physically it does not mean that He loves that one more than the person that goes home. Everything in His time.
Ecclesiastes 3 2A time to be born, and a time to die
Just as He knows how many hairs are on our heads, He knows the exact amount of time we have in this life. He always knows what is best and wants the best for us.
December 25, 2010 Christmas I try to understand God’s love for us. A love that would have our God and King allow His only son to be born as a man with the purpose of suffering and dying to save us. Jesus is begotten from the Father, He was not created as we were, He and the Father and the Holy Spirit are one. God owns everything, but not only did He come into this world as a man, but He was born in the most humble of places. This world rejected Him from the beginning.
Luke 2:7 And she gave birth to her firstborn son. She wrapped him in swaddling clothes and laid him in a manger, because there was no room for them in the inn.
After His birth Our Lady laid Him in a manger on a bed of hay. Close your eyes for a minute and imagine that, that perfect, beautiful little baby laying on a bed of hay, in a stable surrounded by the animals. God with us, Emmanuel. I try to think of how Our Lady felt, looking into the face of that infant knowing He is God. Mary is our model of perfect humility and submission to the will of God always, in everything. The joy she must have felt! No matter that she was in a stable, she was looking into the face of God! What a responsibility to be given, but she trusted God was able to take care of her and her newborn child. Even though the beginning was rough, think about it, how would you have felt without even a crib to lay your baby in? She accepted everything as the will of God, she never questioned Him, just accepted. So many lessons for us to learn from her, so many times we struggle when things do not go our way. We forget that we cannot see the future, but God can, and He always has a plan. Even when things look so bleak and life is painful, He is working things together for our good. Who would have thought that the birth of a baby to a poor couple would have given us the Savior of the world? Things are not always as they appear, God takes the things, like illness that appear so bad and turns them into good. He sometimes uses these things to bring us closer to Him, and no matter where we find ourselves, in bed sick or maybe a hospital room, God is with us. Just as He was with Mary in that stable. Just like Jesus and Mary we will have many things to suffer in this life, but if God is with us, we can be at peace and have joy. Our God loves us so very much! He is with us today just as He was the day He was born! We have so much to be thankful for. Merry Christmas!
December 12, 2010 Winter Have you ever noticed how dead a tree can appear during winter? All of the leaves have fallen, all the life appears to be gone from it. Sometimes our lives may look and feel like that to us. There are many “winters” in our lifetime, times when things appear bleak and gray and hopeless. Sometimes we have to just keep going forward even though things appear very dark. That is what faith is, believing in what is not yet seen. In my own life if I did not believe in God, I would have given up long ago. Without Winter there would not be springtime, there would not be any growth. The strongest trees are those that have survived many hard freezes, the roots to those trees are the deepest. The same is true for us, suffering gives us "deep roots", no matter how long and hard pain is we know that spring will follow.
The reason a tree loses it’s leaves is because as winter approaches the tree actually cuts off nourishment to the leaves to save itself. That is what Jesus wants us to do, he said if our right hand offends cut it off, He did not mean that literally. But we should look at our lives and see which things we need to cut off, things that will drain us of eternal life. The winters in life can be hard, illness, losing a loved one, financial problems, the list could go on and on. During this time of advent we need to look at our lives and see what draws us away from God and cut it away so that we can stand strong through the problems. Knowing that God is with is and springtime is just around the corner. Take some time during this busy season to be quiet and listen to what God wants to tell you. Turn off the TV, put down the phone and ask God to show to you what things you are holding onto that are keeping you from really knowing Him. No matter how long our life will be, it will go by quickly, we should not waste any of it.
December 6, 2010 Isaiah 49: 15-16 15 Can a mother forget her infant, be without tenderness for the child of her womb? Even should she forget, I will never forget you. 16 See, upon the palms of my hands I have written your name; your walls are ever before me
We will not fully understand the love God has for us while we are in this life. The comparison to the love a mother has for her infant is a powerful one. A mother will usually put her child’s needs above her own, if her child hurts she hurts more. So many things God tells us in the Bible, needs to soak into our hearts, so many times we just do not get it. The words that He will NEVER forget us, never. That means that we are always on His mind, always in His heart. We should feel the same for Him, always have Him in our hearts. Our Lady said recently that He is a suffering God, think about that. The God that gave His only Son for us because He loves us so very much, suffers because of us. Most prayers are petitions, I sometimes think of how we must sound to Him. “ God I need, I want, I have to have”. There is nothing wrong with asking God for help, He wants us to. But we have to remember to give Him thanks and praise. We have to try our best to love Him as He loves us. We have to try to understand that love, not take it for granted. Doesn’t it break your heart to think of Him suffering? He does not want one of us to be lost, but so many are. Everyone that believes in God has a responsibility to bring Him to others. He tells us we are our brother’s keeper. Jesus was not ashamed of us, he died the most shameful death on a cross for us. He was despised , beaten, spit upon, laughed at and then He hung three painful hours on that cross. We should never be afraid to speak up for Him. Christmas time is actually an easier time to share your faith with someone, it is almost His Birthday! Somehow this world has managed to take Him out of His own celebration. As Christians we should stand up for the true meaning of Christmas. All of the things that make up the “ Holidays” came from Christian beliefs. Even the word Holiday actually means Holy Day. The idea of Santa comes from Saint Nicholas, and today ( Dec. 6th) is his feast day.
Candy canes have a Christian beginning too, The candy is hard because God's church is founded on the rock, white because of Jesus’ purity (or his virgin birth), peppermint flavored as a reference to cleansing hyssop, and curved to represent a shepherd's staff and/or the letter "J" for Jesus. Accounts vary regarding the red stripes, though they all agree that red stands for Christ's blood. Depending on which story you read, three small stripes might represent the Trinity, or small stripes could mean the stripes by which we're healed, or our small sacrifices in comparison to Christ's ultimate sacrifice (represented by a large stripe).
The evergreen trees we put up symbolize eternal life, and remind us that winter will not last forever. The lights that we use symbolize that Jesus is the light of the world.
How did we as Christians allow people to take Jesus out of His own Birthday? Why do we still allow it? We cannot stop the others from not giving to Him the love and praise that He deserves, but we can share with those in our lives the real meaning of Christmas. Think of what gifts you will give to Jesus this year. More than any gift, He wants your love. Try this year to spend more time in the Chapel, let Jesus speak to your heart. Do not lose sight of the God that loves you so very much.
November 22, 2010 Abba Father When you hear the word mountain an image comes into your mind. Even if you have never seen a mountain up close you have seen pictures of them so a very definite picture comes into your mind. If you hear the name of God what do you see in your mind? I am afraid many see a harsh judge just waiting to punish them for their sins. Others may say they see Him as their Father but they think He is cold and distant. What would you say if I told you He is your Daddy? In the Bible Jesus referred to Him as Abba Father, that means Daddy. He also made it clear that God is our Father too.
What I am about to say will probably make no sense to you at all, being sick has allowed me to experience God’s love for me in a deeper way. When I pray to Him now I call Him Daddy. I do not see Him as a distant judge, He is my closest friend. He is just as real to me in my everyday life as a person I can see. I now know that everything that comes to us through His hands comes out of love. I trust Him. Nothing about God should scare us, we should respect Him and love Him. That is what I believe fear of the Lord means, respect Him and understand who He is and who we are. When we realize that He is really, really with us and that He really loves us and has the power to take care of us, what should we fear? When we read the Bible, we should read it slowly and realize that it applies to our lives.
23rd Psalm 4Even when I walk through a dark valley, I fear no harm for you are at my side; your rod and staff give me courage.
Sickness can be a dark valley, or it can be a means to grow closer to God, the choice is ours. I say over and over again I could never have gotten to know His love for me in this way without the cancer. I am nothing special. God loves all of us the same, He does not have favorites. So many have no idea how special they are to Him, we all are. Do you know that you make God smile? Think about that, you are the apple of His eye. None of us is less or greater in His eyes. He created us and He calls each and everyone of us to be holy. The same God that placed the stars in the sky loves you without measure! No matter what you have done, or where you have been, He loves you, and wants you to return to Him. I speak of this through experience. Nothing we have done, or nothing we could do is greater than God’s forgiveness. Read that again, nothing we have done or nothing we could do is greater than God’s forgiveness! I do not know about you but sometimes I feel very unlovable, I have many faults. We all do, we all sin. The devil will try to make us believe that our sins are too big for God to forgive, do you know that thought is really pride? God is all knowing, all powerful, all loving, how could we ever do anything too big for Him to handle? If you look around just at the world, we are very small, and not powerful at all. In fact we are very fragile. Isn’t it a comfort to have a Father that takes care of us? One that tells us to cast all of our cares on Him, because He cares for us. All we have to do is accept His love, love Him, and do our best to obey Him. God is so very easy to love, once you really understand who He is. You do not even need any special methods of prayer to speak to Him. Just go to Him, and tell Him what is in your heart, He longs to hear from you. You do not have to be in a Church to pray, I speak to Him all day long. In so many ways He shows me that He hears me and is watching over me. Having cancer has never made me think He loves me any less or that He is punishing me. I understand that there is a reason for all that He allows in our life, and that reason is His love for us. I believe He will never leave me or forsake me, or you. We are His children.
November 8, 2010 These Times I believe these are very special times we are living in. I believe with all my heart that Our Lady appears in Medjugorje, and that her messages are urgent. Over 2000 years ago Jesus came into our world through Our Lady, she now wants to bring us to Jesus. God is giving us so many graces through her hands, but we have to cooperate. She tells us over and over again to pray and fast but so few listen. People are always wondering if these could be the end times, what they do not realize is anyone of us could have our last moment on earth today. No matter how healthy someone is, they could die. We always think we will have more time, but none of us knows, why gamble?
1 Thessalonians Chapter 5 1Concerning times and seasons, brothers, you have no need for anything to be written to you. 2For you yourselves know very well that the day of the Lord will come like a thief at night. 3When people are saying, "Peace and security," then sudden disaster comes upon them, like labor pains upon a pregnant woman, and they will not escape. 4But you, brothers, are not in darkness, for that day to overtake you like a thief. 5For all of you are children of the light and children of the day. We are not of the night or of darkness. 6Therefore, let us not sleep as the rest do, but let us stay alert and sober.
We are children of the light, and Mary is Our Mother and she loves us so much! It breaks my heart to think that she cries for us. As her children we should be helping her to spread the messages. If we are truly children of light, we need to be different than the children of darkness. We cannot go along with the world as it is, do not be afraid to speak up for God. We are to be hands and feet for Jesus, we have to try to make a difference. If God has opened your heart to understand how much He loves you, you need to share that with others. We are His instruments.
October 17, 2010 God’s Work If you are still here, God has work for you to do and things for you to learn. When you were born God had a plan for your life, He still does. The first step in seeing what that plan is, is to draw close to Him. God sends us all sorts of signals and messages each day to guide us, we just have to be open to what He is saying. And I can promise you what He has planned for you is so much better than what you would plan for yourself. To draw closer to Him, you have to turn away from sin. Sin is darkness, it blinds us so that we go further and further from the truth. We can convince ourselves of anything, and I think so many times we get tunnel vision and place ourselves first. God has given us many tools to grow close to Him, confession is a good starting point. I am afraid many people have convinced themselves that confession is not needed anymore. Confession is not manmade , it is a sacrament given to us by God.
John 20: 22-23 22And when he had said this, he breathed on them and said to them, "Receive the holy Spirit. 23Whose sins you forgive are forgiven them, and whose sins you retain are retained."
Jesus always meant the words He said, and in these verses He gave to His first priest the power in His name to tell us we are forgiven of our sins. In this life we have three enemies, the world, the flesh and the devil. All of these go against us humbling ourselves and confessing our sins. Jesus told St Faustina to never judge the Priest that He is using to hear your confession. He said it is really Him we are speaking to.
Mass is another way to grow closer to God, it is the closest to Heaven we can be while on earth. The Bread and Wine Become Our Lord, they are not symbols. We have to understand that we do not understand everything. To our senses they still look like bread and wine, but we have to look past that. We say we believe in Jesus, that means we have to believe what He said and act on those words. Our Lady said in her last message that we need to act more, and speak less. For 29 years she has been trying to guide us to be closer to God, she repeats over and over again the ways we can go to Him but we still do not listen. We do not want to stand before God and realize that we did not pay attention to Him, or fill the purpose He had for us. If you are too sick to go to the Priest call your parish and he will come to you. When I was too ill to go to Mass, I would watch it on tv. When we are too sick to participate in the things we would like to do, our job is to pray and offer up our sufferings to God. We all have a reason we are here, pray and ask God what He would have you do to build His Kingdom, I promise you, He has a place for you there.
October 15, 2010 Praying With Your Heart Over and over again our Mother Mary tells us to pray with our hearts, what do you think she means by that? Have you ever sat down to pray and your mind goes in a thousand different directions? You know, “Our Father Who art in Heaven, I wonder what time we will go to dinner tonight… hallowed be Thy name, oh I forgot to make the reservations… They kingdom come, Thy will be done, did I pay that electric bill?…” At times we do not pray, we recite words with no meaning. How do you feel if you are with someone and they are not paying attention to you? Does not make you feel very good does it? Now think back to when you had a need, maybe the doctor just gave you news that you are very ill, or maybe a loved one is, how different is your prayer then? It becomes much more intense, now you are thinking about what you are saying to God, that is praying with your heart. When we pray, whether we are asking God for a need, thanking Him for what He has done for us or praising Him, we are speaking to almighty God. He deserves our attention and respect. When we sit down to pray we need to try to turn off all the other thoughts, focus on Who we are speaking to. I say try to because we are human sometimes that is a struggle. We work very hard to get the things we want in this world, we should also work for spiritual things. In your life there will never be anything as important as coming to know God, and how much He loves you. I am afraid many realize at the end of their life how much they have missed out on worrying about things that will not matter then. If you were dying and someone put a billion dollars in your hands you would see it is only paper. But if at the end of you life if you can look back and know that you have stayed close to God, you will not fear the future. That is so much more valuable than money or things. God wants us to really know Him, not for us to see Him as a distant and uncaring God. If we draw close to Him, He helps us to see things more clearly, to know what is really of value. Read about Jesus, no one will ever love you as much as He does. He really would have suffered that much for just you, John 15:13-15 13No one has greater love than this, to lay down one's life for one's friends. 14You are my friends if you do what I command you. 15I no longer call you slaves, because a slave does not know what his master is doing. I have called you friends, because I have told you everything I have heard from my Father
Right now, close you eyes and speak to God as you would to a friend. Ask Him to open your heart so that you can understand His love for you, and what is truly valuable. Speak to Him from your heart, not just with words.
October 13, 2010 Singing in the Dark The sun has not yet risen, it is still very dark outside. Lying in bed I could hear a little bird singing now and then. Birds do not have a roof over their heads, or the promise of their next meal but yet they sing. Even when there is no light at all, they do not worry. Jesus told us to look at the little sparrow and how Our Heavenly Father takes care of even him. Matthew 6:25. Look at the birds in the sky; they do not sow or reap, they gather nothing into barns, yet your heavenly Father feeds them. Are not you more important than they?
We have so much to learn from them, trust. God is our Father, and His eyes never leave us. If we really understand and believe that, there is never a reason to worry. My favorite Saints are St. Therese and St. Faustina, both of them learned to sing in the dark, like the little birds. Both of them suffered very much in this life, but they kept their eyes on Jesus and the life to come. If you have never read the lives of these Saints, please do. The "little way" of Saint Therese is something we can all work towards. We all have sufferings and pains we can offer up to God. Jesus told Saint Faustina that we do not understand the value of suffering, and when we die we will understand, but then we will no longer be able to offer up our pain. Suffering has value, God used the suffering of His only Son to save us. If there would have been a better way, He would have done that. Jesus is always with us, and He understands pain and darkness. He also knows, if we just hang on, and do not give up, we too will be resurrected. There will be no more darkness, ever. I pray to my two favorite Saints to help me to be strong, and trust always. I believe both of them do, the Saints want to help us love God , and they want to bring us closer to Him. Being sick gives us more time to learn, use that time to read about God`s Saints, and how they learned to sing in the darkness.
October 12, 2010 Seeking Eternal Treasures Have you noticed how easily we are distracted, until something happens that makes us pay attention? Our lives always have things happening that demand our attention, and I am not saying they are not important. God gave us our families to love, our jobs to do our very best with, and friends to share our lives. But our lives here will pass in a blink of an eye, at the end of this life comes eternity, forever. I do not think many people think about that much. Most people are kept busy from the time they open their eyes, until they fall asleep. If something happens, like maybe when we see someone our own age die suddenly, we stop and think a little deeper than what shoes we will wear out to dinner tonight. Jesus told us to store our treasures in Heaven, Matthew 6:19 - 21 19"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. 20But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. 21For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be.
How do you think He wants us to store treasures in a place we have never been? We work so hard to gather things we can not keep and will one day not even be ours. Have you ever heard the old saying you never see a U-Haul truck after a hearse? No matter how many things we collect, in the end they do not belong to us, it makes sense to do what Jesus said. The things that make God smile are the very things the world leads us away from. Luke 10:27. "You shall love the Lord, your God, with all your heart, with all your being, with all your strength, and with all your mind, and your neighbor as yourself."
Most of us do not follow that, as humans, we can be very self centered. We worry so much about getting “ahead” in this world, we lose sight of the next life, that forever one. Read Luke 10:27 again, stop and think about what Jesus meant. Just like it takes work to succeed in this life, it requires work to grow closer to God, but it is so worth it. I hope before you go to sleep at night that you pray, we really do not know when Our Lord will call us. Tonight as you lay down to rest, give those words Jesus said some thought. Ask Him to show you in your own life how you can store treasures that will really be of value. When Jesus said to ask and it will be given you He meant spiritual things, then ask Him to help you to follow through. He will.
October 10, 2010 God Still Does Miracles I have many health problems that make it very difficult for the doctors caring for me. My Oncologist calls me "complicated". Recently I had to undergo more test for my heart and I am very allergic to the dye used for the Angiogram. When I was about twenty they did a test on my kidneys and when I was given the contrast dye I went into shock, stopped breathing and turned "as gray as the pillow I was on." I was told then never to receive that dye again. Well as they say never say never, now I was told the only way to do the Angiogram is to receive this dye. The test was to be done on a Thursday so on Wednesday they started large doses of steroids and benadryl. Two hundred and forty mg. per day! I am not sure if you have ever had to take Prednisone, but the usual dose is about 5mg to 60 mg depending on what is being treated. I should mention that I am a diabetic. Before all the chemo. I was a very slight type two, I took one pill a day and my blood sugar was perfectly normal. The chemotherapy can work miracles with cancer but it can also damage other things. It made my body very insulin resistant and my pancreas just does not work like it should. If you know anything about diabetes, you know it does not mix with steroids. When I was given 20mg years ago my blood sugar went to almost 400. I thought taking this high dose would certainly put me into a coma. My son was with me and I gave him instructions to call 911 if I passed out or if he could not wake me. I started taking the medicine and although my blood sugar went up, it was so much better than last time I took small doses. The test was done on Thursday and even with the steroids, there was a problem. My allergy caused my heart to go into what is called Atrial Fibrillation. I was to be kept overnight and the plan was to cardiovert ( Shock) my heart the next morning. I was laying there talking to a friend on the phone when I noticed I was starting to wheeze, I heard an alarm start, and the nurse came running in. My heart rate was 150 then 160, then 177 then nurse ran out of the room to get help. I started to feel very weak and I laid back in the bed, in my heart I felt something say "ask Him." Out loud I said "God, help me, please help me." Within a few seconds the alarms stopped. The nurse came running in looking at my monitor and said, "What did you do?" My heart rate was now 112 and normal sinus rhythm. I smiled and said "I asked God for help and He did, but I do not guess you will chart that." She just kept staring at the monitor, and I asked her if it normally does not happen like that. She knows I am a Respiratory therapist and she said, “ You KNOW it does not usually happen like that!" I will be honest, it was the most dramatic answer from God that I have ever seen. I will say again that God always does what is best for us, and if it would have been for my best He would not have turned things around, and I would have accepted that answer. There will come a time, when it is my time to go to Him that it will not go the same way. Our time here is short, and when our work is done we go home to Him. I know in my heart that any physical miracles are wonderful, but temporary, we all die one day, but to go home to Him is the biggest miracle of all!
September 16, 2010 In God's Hands To know and trust God in this life is a grace from Him. So many times we are like Peter walking towards Him on the water, with the waves can come fear if we stop looking at Him. We are children of God, and fear has no place in our hearts, ever. Last week I had a day that so many problems came up and I started looking at the wind and waves in my life. I took my eyes off of Jesus, then came the fear. I was Blessed that in a short time I saw what was happening and reached up for Jesus to take my hand, and He did. He is always only a whisper or thought away. He wants us to really understand that He never ever leaves us, and wants us to have peace no matter what is happening in our life. The peace that God gives does not mean we will be free from troubles, but it does mean that we can have peace, true peace. The "peace" that the world gives is not peace at all, it is not lasting and it depends on our circumstances. If a problem arises the " peace" is gone. That is not the peace our God gives to us. His peace only leaves if we stop trusting Him. Tonight I am actually facing many more problems than I had last week, but I know He is with me and I am not afraid. I love God so very much and I know that whatever tomorrow brings, He is in control, that is all I need to know. It is so good to have a loving Father that we can know watches us every second of every day, with a love we cannot even begin to understand. Our thoughts are not His thoughts, our ways are not His ways, but we can rest in His hands knowing that whatever happens will be for our best. :).
September 11, 2010 Divine Mercy Jesus I trust in You. Those are the words Our Lord told St. Faustina to place at the bottom of a portrait of Him. For the last four years of her life Our Lord appeared to her, with messages of His love and mercy. He told her she would be His secretary of mercy for eternity. Jesus granted her union with Him, something not many experience. Her heart was a resting place for Him, she offered all her sufferings to God to be used for the salvation of others. Our Lord taught her the Chaplet of Divine Mercy, this comes from St Faustina’s Diary: When I entered my solitude, I heard these words: at the hour of their death, I defend as My own glory every soul that will say this chaplet; or when others say it for a dying person, the indulgence is the same. When this chaplet is said by the bedside of a dying person, God’s anger is placated, and unfathomable mercy envelops the soul, and the very depths of My tender mercy will be moved for the sake of the sorrowful Passion of My son. Oh, if only everyone realized how great the Lord’s mercy is and how much we all need that mercy, especially at that crucial hour! In April, 2000, Pope John Paul declared her a saint. I know her prayers help us today. She is very special to God, and has so much to teach us. Her entire diary is now available on this web page. I hope you will read a little each day. The messages Jesus gave to her concern us, and our future with Him.
September 11, 2010 Not Accepting Fear First of all I want to say that fear never, ever, ever comes from God. Never. Jesus told us so many times “Do not be afraid” and “ Fear Not, it is I “. He was speaking to US. There are many things in this life that wish to distract us, to take away our peace. We cannot control the storms that come our way, but we can control our reactions to them. Trusting, like forgiveness, is an act of our will. In other words we may not “ feel” like we are trusting God, but we tell Him we do, and we go forward in that trust. He is there right beside us, wanting to help us through our problems, if we will only let Him.
I am having an additional heath problem and yesterday when many problems seemed to be building, I started to cry. All the “what if`s” started playing in my head. After about 5 minutes it hit me , WHAT are you thinking??!! God has shown me so many ways in my life and the lives of others His tremendous love for us. I know that if we are His children, He controls everything in our lives. I say it again and again, that does not mean that things will not happen that we would not choose, but it does mean He will do whatever is best for us. No one will ever love us as much as God does, and we are in His hands. “ Fear Not it is I…” Let those words really enter your heart, He remains with us until the end of time and He loves us so very much! Looking back in my life I remember trying to learn to trust Him, my knees would be shaking, but I would say “ My God I trust You”. Sometimes that was so hard to say, the winds of the storm would be blowing and things looked impossible, but you know what He never let me down. People become afraid to say the words “ Thy will be done” but those are the safest words we can ever say. God sees the big picture, we only see the moment. Look at a crucifix, that is love. So if God can see the future, AND He loves us more then we can ever understand, as Jesus said, “ Oh you of little faith, why did you doubt?” He wants to give us peace in our hearts, always.
August 28, 2010 The Peace of God Philippians Chapter 4 4 Rejoice in the Lord always. I shall say it again: rejoice! 5 Your kindness should be known to all. The Lord is near. 6 Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. 7 Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. 8 Finally, brothers, whatever is true, whatever is honorable, whatever is just, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is gracious, if there is any excellence and if there is anything worthy of praise, think about these things. 9 Keep on doing what you have learned and received and heard and seen in me. Then the God of peace will be with you.
There is so much wisdom in these verses! First, that we should always rejoice in the Lord. The word always means just that, in everything. Because God loves us so much, we can trust in Him to do whats best for us. That does not mean things will always go as we would like them to. If we truly want His will, not ours to be done, and we place ourselves into His hands, all will be well. God loves us so deeply, we cannot even begin to grasp it. When we read the sufferings Our Lord endured for us, we know that God loves us more than any human could. Our love, at times is flawed, many times it depends on actions. Jesus loved the people that beat Him and crucified Him. He also loves us even though it was really our sins that caused Him so much pain. We can trust Him to want what is best for us, even though sometimes what is best may be painful.
The next verse is important too, we should be kind to one another, as Paul reminds us the Lord is near. He sees all, hears every whisper.
Then he tells us not to have any anxiety at all, to ask Our Father for what we need,and then to thank Him. The thanksgiving is important. We are thanking Him in advance for doing what is best for us. Again, that does not mean we will always get what we ask for.Sometimes just like little children we ask for the wrong things.
Then he tells us that the peace that surpasses all understanding will guard our hearts and mind. There it is. If we are living God`s will, we will have peace. That is what this prayer group is based on. I found in the beginning of my illness, that when we pray as Jesus did, " Father not my will but Yours be done", God gives us a tremendous peace that really surpasses understanding. In my own life I find that peace is a gauge to see if I am doing His will. If I become anxious, or worried I will stop what I am doing and pray. Anxiety, worry and fear never come from God.
Then St Paul tells us to think about good things. In this world that is hard sometimes. But if we look closely we will find many good things to think about. God`s hand is at work each day in our lives. That in itself is such a good thing!
He then tells us to keep doing what we have been taught. God has made it easy for us, He gave us His Commandments.If we read the Gospels, Jesus gave us so much help in knowing how to follow the narrow road. Our job in this life is to listen to Him and follow Him. He will lead us to Himself.
August 17, 2010 The Cross Tonight I attended the presentation on the Shroud of Turin given by Mr. Jack Sacco. I am convinced that the shroud was the burial cloth of Our Lord. I believe He left this as a visual reminder of His suffering and death. A reminder of His love. The shroud shows all the wounds that we know Jesus suffered. Mr Sacco said the scourging was actually worse than in the movie "The Passion". I remember having to close my eyes, because that scene was so brutal. The shroud shows over 120 deep gashes in Our Lord's back. The whip had metal or stone on the ends. It acted like a hook, with each blow, it would tear His skin. The usual amount of strikes were 39. A person would die just from a scourging, loss of blood, internal injuries... We have to keep in mind, although Jesus is God, He allowed Himself to be human. He felt every bit of the pain. He allowed the people He had created to strip Him of His clothes, tie Him to a pillar and beat Him close to death. With our limited understanding of love, we can't even begin to understand. How many of us would continue to love someone that treated us that way? But He does.
After the scourging they wove the crown of thorns. We were told it was more like a helmet. The thorns were very large and once they placed it, they beat it to make it go deep into His sacred head. They then placed the tunic on His bleeding, torn, bruised shoulders and back. All these things can be seen by studying the shroud.
We were told a cross would weigh 600 lbs, Jesus carried the cross beam. From the shroud they determined Jesus weighed about 175 lbs, a cross beam was about 150 lbs. Mr Sacco said Jesus fell many times, not just three. The walk to Calvary was 600 yards, about six football fields. I can't help but wonder what thoughts He had. The very people he was dying for were torturing Him. And He had to look into the eyes of those closest to Him. Mary is the first to come to my mind. In every way during her life she submitted to God's will, but how her own heart was pierced! This was her God too, but also her child. The son she held when He was sick, or laughed with as He took His first steps. Now she had to watch Him walk to His death.
When Jesus made it to that hill, He willingly stretched out His arms. The nails were placed into His wrist and feet. The pain He felt when they stood that cross upright!.There was over 250 lbs of pressure on His arms. As He hung on that cross, it was almost impossible to exhale. He had to push Himself up with His feet for a few seconds to be able to let out a breath. This went on for three hours. Before Our Lord took His last breath, He asked Our Father to forgive us.
After Jesus was taken down from the cross, He was laid on the shroud and it was placed over Him.They can tell the shroud was around Him for 36 hrs.
He gave us the shroud not only as a testimony of His love, but also a hope for us. We all have crosses to carry in this life, but just like Jesus, one day, if we follow Him, we too will be resurrected. One day we will have bodies that will never be sick,or feel pain. But more important than that, we can spend all eternity with someone that loves us so much more than we can ever understand. We can spend forever loving and praising Him.
August 12, 2010 God's Gifts God gives us so many gifts each day! I've realized that so many times I do not notice them. As I write this, I am flying home from Houston. I am amused at the shapes of the clouds. I just saw one that looks so much like an elephant! Seeing it made me smile. I remember when I was a child, I would lay on the grass and watch the clouds go by. Boats, dogs, birds, so many things. I also remember the day I left Medjugorje in 1987. Our bus had a flat tire so we had to sit and wait for our driver to change it. God gave all of us on that bus a farewell miracle. Someone pointed to the sky and said " Look!", I looked up and there was a large cross in the sky. A few seconds later, that disappeared and we saw one shaped like Our Lady. That one faded and we saw one in the shape of Our Lord with His hands extended. I should explain these did not act like regular clouds.They were just suddenly there, then gone. We all saw the same thing at the same time. When it was over we all became very quiet, we knew we had just been touched by Almighty God. If we pay attention to our surroundings we'll see He touches us everyday. So many miracles if we will just notice them, a baby s smile, a butterfly, a flower, I could go on and on. When we pray we should thank Him for all He sends, even the clouds.
July 25, 2010 God wants to Comfort Us I love Our Blessed Mother so very much. She brought me back to Jesus many years ago through Medjugorje. In fact I know in my heart she placed it in my heart to start this prayer group. She is a loving Mother and just as she brought Jesus into the world over 2000 yrs ago, she now wants to bring us back to Him. The morning I woke up feeling I needed to start a prayer group, I started to cry. I felt they were her tears, I was feeling her sadness. We are God`s children, and we also belong to her in a special way. Her only motive in all that she does is love, love of us but most of all love of God. She does not ever want us to feel lost or confused. Over the centuries her message to us has always been that God loves us so very much. She always gives us the tools to grow closer to God and to learn to trust Him. She never sinned, but she knew how it felt to be human. I remember as a child whenever I was sick, it made me feel better just to know my Mom was there. Ever since I became aware of our Mother Mary`s love, I turn to her in the same way that I did as a child toward my earthly Mother. It comforts me to know she is at my side. When you are feeling sick or lonely know that she is right beside you. Call to her, she wants to bring God`s love to you and His Peace.
July 18, 2010 Our God of Love It gives me so much comfort to know my Father watches over me every moment of my life. He walks with me through the valleys, He holds my hand when I am sick, He is with me on the mountaintops when I am happy. He is with you too, always, even when you can not feel Him there. When I am not feeling well I think of Jesus, He allowed Himself to be human, He became one of us in everyway except sin. There were times He suffered too. He felt hunger, sickness, loneliness, all the things you and I feel. He became angry, he cried at times too. He came to us in such a humble way, not even having a room to be born in. Whenever you feel life is not fair look closely at the life He lived, and He is God. He is with us every step of our lives, He wants to spend eternity with us. He loves us.
Do you remember as a child we were told to offer up our sufferings? We can really do that. Suffering has value, we should not waste it. Our Lady has said many times offering up our sacrifices and pain can convert others. If you say the morning offering each day you are offering all to God:
Morning Offering O Jesus, through the Immaculate Heart of Mary, I offer You my prayers, works, joys and sufferings of this day for all the intentions of Your Sacred Heart, in union with the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass throughout the world, in reparation for my sins, for the intentions of all my relatives and friends, and in particular for the intentions of the Holy Father.
Amen.
July 12, 2010 Five Stones Do you remember the story of David and Goliath? The Israelites and Philistines were at war. The Israelites were God’s chosen people, but the Philistines had a man that was 9 feet tall in their army named Goliath. For 40 days he taunted them saying if they could find a man that could kill him in battle, the Philistines would surrender and be the servants to the Israelites. But if he killed the man that challenged him, the Israelites would have to surrender. Everyone was afraid of him because of his size, and boldness, except little David. David was a shepherd boy and his father sent him to bring some food to his older brothers, who were in the army and see how they were. When David reached his brothers Goliath was shouting and daring the Israelites to have someone fight him. Picture that, a 9 foot giant of a man that had been a warrior since he was a child asking for a fight. David was the only one brave enough to take the dare. David had never been in battle, in fact he would not even wear the armor. All he had were 5 smooth stones and a sling shot but he was not afraid because he knew God was with him. He said "The LORD that saved and delivered me out of the claws of the lion and out of the claws of the bear will deliver me out of the hand of this Philistine named Goliath.” He trusted God, he knew that by himself he would not stand a chance. But the key is he was not alone, and he knew that.
Do you ever feel you are facing a giant? Maybe it’s illness, finances, family problems, or maybe all of those. Our Blessed Mother gave us 5 stones to defeat the Goliaths in our lives. They are; 1. Prayer of the Rosary, prayer with the heart 2. The Eucharist 3. The Bible 4. Fasting 5. Monthly confession.
The 1st stone, the Rosary is so powerful! When reciting it, you are meditating on the life of Jesus. Many years ago that is what started my conversion back to Our Lord. Try to say it daily. The 2nd stone, the Eucharist is Jesus Himself! We can receive Him daily if we choose! Our God comes to us under the appearance of bread and wine, that is such a gift. The 3rd stone, The Bible. How can we know God if we do not read His word? God wants you to know Him, not to feel like He is far away from you. To love someone you have to know them. The 4th stone, fasting. Our Lady recommends fasting on Wednesdays And Fridays on bread and water if you are well. If you are sick you should find other ways to fast. You could give up something you enjoy on those days and offer that to God. The 5th stone, monthly confession. I’m afraid many Catholics have gotten away from this. Confession is a Sacrament, given to us by Our Lord Himself. It is not optional. Saint Paul said to receive Our Lord unworthily will bring condemnation. If you have not been to Confession in awhile, move this to the top of the list.
We are so Blessed to have a Mother that loves us so much! Please read her messages and I promise you she will lead you straight to her son, Jesus. David said, " I will lie down and sleep in peace, for Thou alone, O Lord, hast established me in hope." Let these be your words too.
July 9, 2010 “Blessed are the poor in spirit for theirs is the kingdom of heaven” We always think of the word poor as meaning a bad thing, poor health, poor in finances, poor memory… but Jesus said Blessed are those who are poor in spirit. I believe when He said this He is referring to humble people. As much as God loves us and we are His children, we have to always remember that we are creatures. We were created from the very dirt of the earth. We depend on Him for our every breath. Satan`s big fall came because he wanted to be equal with God, but he too is only a creature. God wants us to use all the gifts He has given to us, our intelligence, our physical ability, our artistic ability etc. But we must always remember these are all gifts from Him. It came to my mind awhile back that if a car could think, and began to compare itself to other cars it might start to feel proud. It might be faster, or shinier, or maybe even have better gas mileage J. But in truth the car has nothing to be proud of, the one that built the car does. If the owner would not maintain the car, it would soon fall apart.
This world teaches us to be proud, it tells us that nothing we do is a sin. It tries to make us believe we are equal to God and we may do as we please. Humble is looked at as a bad thing, but Jesus always went against what the world teaches, He still does. God loves us so very much, but we always need to keep in mind He is God, we are not.
July 5, 2010 Finding God in the Darkness When I was a child, the darkness was a very scary thing to me. Seems I always had one of those little nightlights. The darkness represented the unknown. Sickness can be like that. So can watching a loved one go through it. I remember having tears stream down my cheeks as they set up my first chemo treatment. Darkness, the unknown. I have learned since that day, that I still have a light to chase away fear. I think that what Jesus means when He says He is the light of the world. This life is full of unknowns isn’t it? At times so much darkness, but God never changes. We can count on Him to be there and on His love. Wherever we are, He is there. Even if you are in the darkest valley, He is walking next to you, many times He carries you. To find Him in the darkness, all we have to do is reach out our hand to Him. If you are hurting and afraid, call to Him. He does not want us to struggle alone in the dark. All we have to do is ask, and He will be there. That is more comforting than any nightlight. :).
June 25, 2010 Romans 8:28 “For we know that all things work together for good for those who love God, who are called according to His purpose.”
What a loving Father we have! This is such a wonderful promise. It means that as long as I love God, and try my best to live according to the purpose He created me to do, ALL things will be for my good. The word “all” means just that. It does not mean I will like everything that happens in my life, but it means even the things that appeared to be bad will be for my good. As I try each day to walk closer with the Lord, I can see what He is saying. Cancer by itself is a horrible thing, but God has shown me the many ways it has brought me closer to Him. When we are hurting sometimes we pull away from God. The further we get from Him the more pain we feel. If we can go to Him even if we do not understand the reasons why things are like they are, we will feel His love and receive His peace. We will never in this life understand how deep God`s love is for us, if we did we would never question Him. He wants us to spend eternity with Him, think of that, forever and ever! I feel that whatever pain I have in this life will be nothing compared to living in His love forever. Jesus told us we would have to carry crosses in this life. He went before us to save us and to give us an example of how to carry our crosses. Father not my will but Yours be done… In that sentence is the secret of peace in this life. You may find that really hard to say, but I promise you He really wants what is best for you. Find an Adoration Chapel and go sit with our Lord. Whenever I am hurting I look at a crucifix, Jesus understands pain. He loves you so much He truly would have died just for you. I will pray for you, that each day will bring you closer to the Lord. I'll ask you to keep me in your prayers too, that I never lose sight of the goal.
June 25, 2010 The Eyes of Faith Have you ever see a child the night before Christmas? Their little eyes shine with happiness and expectation. Even though all they see under the tree is a tree skirt, they know in the morning there will be all sorts of surprises for them. They may believe it is Santa that will make all of this happen, but we know it is their parents love. God wants us to look beyond the “empty trees” in our lives, and to know He wants to fill them with good things for us, His children. I also remember raising my own sons. that there were times they asked me for things that I knew would not be good or sometimes even safe for them to have. When that happened I would substitute a better gift for the one they thought they wanted. Isn`t that what our Father does at times? We think we know what we need so we ask God for what we think is good. When He does not give them to us we think He is not answering our prayers. We start to think He doesn`t hear us, or worse we may think He does not care. So many times people say they ask and ask but God will not answer their prayer. Anyone of us that are parents know that no is an answer too. Wait is also an answer. The secret to having peace in this life is to trust our Heavenly Father. To understand that we cannot see our future but He can, and His goal is to take us down the road that will bring us safely home to Him. Isn`t that really our goal too? We just have to understand that He knows that the only way is the narrow, sometimes painful road. The road we would never choose on our own. But in the end it is the road that brings us closer to Him.
June 19, 2010 Happy Fathers Day! Happy Fathers Day God! Thank You for loving me and calling me Your child. Thank You loving me enough to always do what is best for me, even when it does not make you very popular. Thank You for never leaving my side, even on those dark days when I do not feel Your presence. Thank You for all the many gifts You give to me each day, and for forgiving me when I do not notice them. Thank you for all the people You have placed in my life, even those I do not care for because even they will help me to grow. Most of all Daddy, thank You for the gift of life You have given to me, the life now, and the life I will share with You for all eternity.
May 23, 2010 For I know well the plans I have for you... Before I became ill to be honest I had not really noticed this scripture. Jeremiah 29:11. Right before I was diagnosed with cancer it seemed to be everywhere, on pens, cards that were given to me, books I would read, just everywhere. Not only that but the words seemed to jump out at me, it became “my scripture”. During times of pain or confusion I would recite it out loud. I have come to realize this scripture belongs to all followers of Jesus. It Begins, “ For I know well the plans I have in mind for you” says the Lord, “Plans for your welfare,not for woe! Plans to give you a future full of hope.” When our Father created each one of us He had a plan in mind for our lives, He still does. I do not know about you but I know there have been many times I have gotten off track of what He made me to be. This life is full of distractions, we can lose sight of what is important. I have come to realize before my cancer I had become lukewarm. On days off from work my focus was on “relaxing”. I no longer went to daily Mass, even when I could have. I am not saying that Our Lord does not want us to rest, but He does want to be the center of our lives. We are the center of His life, we are His focus. He gave up His very life for us, and I think when He looks at what this world has become, He weeps. “For I know well...” The good news is no matter how far we have strayed from the plans God has for us, we can turn back. This world has been very effective in confusing us about what sin is. It has convinced us that if something makes you “happy”, then it is ok. I have lived long enough to know in the end, even if we try to convince ourselves the sky is green, it is still blue. I have also learned that even if we convince ourselves that the way we are living is ok, we will never have true peace living outside the will of God.
Our Mothers Love - May 17, 2010 Mary Our Mother has never grown tired of calling us back to her son. I am looking back at her messages and I am touched by her love. She never gives up on us, she repeats over and over again the ways we can come back to God. She points out that this life is passing and that we should look toward the eternal things...
Message of March 25, 2008"Dear children! I call you to work on your personal conversion. You are still far from meeting with God in your heart. Therefore, spend all the more time in prayer and Adoration of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament of the Altar, for Him to change you and to put into your hearts a living faith and a desire for eternal life. Everything is passing, little children, only God is not passing. I am with you and I encourage you with love. Thank you for having responded to my call." She calls us back to reading God`s word...
Message of January 25, 2006"Dear children! Also today I call you to be carriers of the Gospel in your families. Do not forget, little children, to read Sacred Scripture. Put it in a visible place and witness with your life that you believe and live the Word of God. I am close to you with my love and intercede before my Son for each of you. Thank you for having responded to my call." She reminds us to pray, and to turn away from sin...
Message of January 25, 2002"Dear children! At this time while you are still looking back to the past year I call you, little children, to look deeply into your heart and to decide to be closer to God and to prayer. Little children, you are still attached to earthly things and little to spiritual life. May my call today also be an encouragement to you to decide for God and for daily conversion. You cannot be converted, little children, if you do not abandon sins and do not decide for love towards God and neighbor. Thank you for having responded to my call." She ask us to attend daily Mass and reminds us that satan is a real enemy. She gives us a blueprint of how to grow closer to God... Prayer, fasting, daily Mass...
Message of January 25, 1998"Dear children! Today again I call all of you to prayer. Only with prayer, dear children, will your heart change, become better, and be more sensitive to the Word of God. Little children, do not permit satan to pull you apart and to do with you what he wants. I call you to be responsible and determined and to consecrate each day to God in prayer. May Holy Mass, little children, not be a habit for you, but life. By living Holy Mass each day, you will feel the need for holiness and you will grow in holiness. I am close to you and intercede before God for each of you, so that He may give you strength to change your heart. Thank you for having responded to my call." She always speaks of conversion of heart...
Message of September 25, 1998"Dear children! Today, I call you to become my witnesses by living the faith of your fathers. Little children, you seek signs and messages and do not see that, with every morning sunrise, God calls you to convert and to return to the way of truth and salvation. You speak much, little children, but you work little on your conversion. That is why, convert and start to live my messages, not with your words but with your life. In this way, little children, you will have the strength to decide for the true conversion of the heart. Thank you for having responded to my call."
Lovingly she repeats herself over and over again, because we do not live her messages. I was sitting in the Chapel at Mary`s helpers yesterday. There is a painting of Our Lady looking up to God, in the background were the 3 Crosses on the hill of Calvary. I was thinking how much trust she had in God. Her only son was dying in front of her eyes and even though she accepted it as God`s will, we can`t begin to understand how her heart was being torn to shreds. She has so much to teach us, but we do not listen. The good news is it is not yet too late. I invite you to look back over the years of messages and open your heart to her, let her love you.
He Never Changes - May 10, 2010 St Paul said Jesus is the same yesterday, today and forever. I was thinking today what good news that is for us. Not only does it mean that everything He said still applies to us today, but it also means he is just as active in our lives as He was in all the lives He touched over 2000 yrs ago. Have you ever thought that you wished you would have been alive when He walked the earth? I have wished that many times, but as I was thinking of this sentence in the Bible I realized I am. We truly have Jesus present in the Blessed Sacrament, and He is also present in us and others. He did not make these statements lightly, Jesus meant every word He said. As humans we tend to rely on sight, and feelings, we forget that we are limited. If you have any doubt He is present in the bread and wine ask Him to let you know that He is there. Pray also to be able to see Him in others, and in yourself. What would say to Him if He were sitting next to you now? Would you ask Him questions, ask Him to help a loved one or maybe you would just tell Him how you are feeling. Jesus sits and waits for you to speak to Him , you can speak to Him at any time or anywhere. Know that He hears you. Sometimes if we do not get what we are asking for, we think that means He does not hear us. Sometimes it means we are asking for the wrong things, other times He might say to wait. And yes many times He says yes. Pray for Him to open your heart to trust Him completely. How would you feel tomorrow if on TV they said Jesus was at your Church in the flesh. I have no doubt there would be traffic jams and people pushing to try to get into the Church. He is there, and He waits for you.
Our Father’s Love - May 7, 2010 When we were children we often did not understand why we could not have our way. So many times things just did not make sense to us. I can remember after Hurricane Betsy the truck coming around to give Tetanus shots. I ran to the closet to hide, thinking my Mom would help me escape the pain of that shot. Imagine my surprise when she took me by the hand and brought me to the truck and stood there while they gave the shot to me. In my mind this made no sense! I was sure there was no way that I needed that shot, I thought she was being unreasonable. Many years later I brought my son in for a checkup, when the doctor checked his records he saw it was time for the flu shot. When the doctor left the room to give the nurse the order my little one stood with his arms braced up against the door and called for me to come help him hold the door so that she could not enter. I’ll never forgot the look on his young face as I proceeded to gently pull him away from the door so that the nurse could enter and give him the dreaded shot. He was so upset with me, just as I had been with my own Mother many years before. I knew he was thinking, “I thought she loved me, but she allowed me to be hurt.” He was so angry he did not speak to me after it was over except to tell me of the terrible pain he was feeling because I allowed it. Nothing I said brought him comfort, he only understood he was hurting, and I allowed it to happen. My heart hurt for him. I think sometimes that God’s heart hurts for us. He loves us so much. But for reasons we do not understand there are times He must allow us to suffer. Somehow, in ways we do not understand now these pains will be for our good. No matter what pains you and I are going through, there is a reason. Our Father in Heaven loves us so much more than we could ever understand. Even if you are in the darkest valley you have ever experienced, know that He is with you. Call to Him, He loves you. Trust Him even if it makes no sense to you. When Jesus died on that cross I’m sure it looked to His followers that all was lost. What sense could possible be made of His suffering and dying? It seemed to them that everything they had worked for was over. Made no sense - until Easter. Suddenly the pain had meaning. I promise you, that is how it will be when our lives here are over. We will see that our loving Father has been there every step of the way, and has only allowed our pain because it was for our good. Trust Him! He loves you!
You belong to Me - May 3, 2010 I was thinking today, if God would have asked me 2 ½ years ago if I would like to have cancer, no doubt I would have said no. If He came to me today and said” Madeleine would you like to go back in time? You would pick up where you left off, you would not even know you had been sick. Everything would be as it was.” I realize that I would now say no to that. When we experience suffering we have 2 choices. We can become bitter and become angry at God or we can draw closer to Him. There are many things we will not understand in the life, but I have learned to trust Him and love Him so much more than before my illness. He has shown me how trustworthy He is. He loves us so very much! He loves us enough that sometimes He says no to one of our prayers. Only He knows the future, and He hand picks what is needed for us to make it safely home to Him. I would not trade the love He has for me or the love I feel for Him for anything, not even health. Recently, sitting in the Adoration Chapel I felt Him say in my heart “ You belong to Me.” That was not just meant for me, He is saying that to you too. Take a few minutes to sit down and talk to Him. Speak to Him as you would a friend. Tell Him if you are afraid, or lonely. Ask Him to let you know He is near to you ( He always is). God speaks to all of us daily, we just have to listen and trust Him, He will do the rest. Madeleine
April 27, 2010 My God, In our daily life we have so many decisions, we start to think we are in control. When we become sick, or a loved one becomes ill we realize that we truly do not have control at all. If we understand You, we will see that is a blessing. You alone know our future, we cannot see beyond this moment. Just like the good shepherd, Your eyes are always on us. You want each one of us to make it safely home to You. There are many dangers in this life, and like little sheep we are not always aware of what they are. Father, we trust You, and we ask You to take complete control of our lives. Remind us each day to offer all to You. Always guide us along the right path, the narrow road that leads us to You. Help us to know right from wrong, and never to sin against You. Place a love for Your word in our hearts, so that we will really know You. We ask to learn to love You, as You love us. In Jesus name we pray. Amen.
The MIR Group - Messages, Events and Pilgramages to Our Lady of Medjugorje, Powered by Joomla!; free resources by SG web hosting
