Blog Post 10-31-2024 – Our World and the World to Come?

In Aleteia on 8/29/2024 Philip Kosloski asks, “How our present world is a sign of the world to come.”  He speculates, “The earth as we know it will pass away, making way for the new Heavens and the new Earth, where all of our deepest longings will be met and fulfilled. As much as we may want to hold onto this world, it won't last forever and our time here is very brief when compared to the eternity that awaits us.  God designed this world to give us a hint of what is to come, as he is preparing an even better world for us at the end of time.”

The world to come Guadium et spes explains [this reality] in the following way: “We do not know the time when earth and humanity will reach their completion, nor do we know the way in which the universe will be transformed. The world as we see it, disfigured by sin, is passing away.  But we are sure that God is preparing a new dwelling place and a new earth … the Church teaches that it will surpass our wildest dreams: the new Earth will take everything that is good right now and perfect it. This is how our current world is a sign of the world to come….  [God] is preparing a gift for us that we will enjoy for eternity.

Our world is passing away, but we need not fear because Jesus has conquered the world.

May God Be Praised.

Blog Post 10-30-2024 Take My Yoke upon you …

 

In the Gospel of St. Matthew Jesus offers us this beautiful invitation: “Come to me, all you who labor and are burdened, and I will give you rest.”

“Rest” for Matthew means the achievement of joy, not the fleeting joy of materialism but the profound joy of allowing one’s life to be totally guided by God.

When we are yoked to Jesus, we are yoked to His humble obedience. We are no longer alone. His Yoke requires self-denial yet His Yoke is easy, burden light, because we share it with Him.

The yoke shown above is an invitation to walk with Jesus each day.

 

May God Be Praised.

 

Blog Post 10-29-2024 Are You Doing God’s Work?

 

“There was a man, a baker by trade, who taught Sunday school at his church and served on a church committee. One day, while riding a train, he was approached by an overzealous woman he’d never seen before who was trying to evangelize people. She asked him, ‘What work do you do for God?’

He replied, ‘I bake bread.’ She said, ‘I don’t mean your trade, but what service do you do for our Savior?

‘I bake bread,’ he said. She tried again, ‘I mean, how are you seeking to glorify Christ and spread his gospel?’

‘I bake bread,’ he said once more. Because of the way he viewed his calling, that answer was exactly right.’”  [Proclaim Illustration]

Is your life’s work, is what you are doing for a living your work for God? Blessed is the one whose work here, whose actions here and whose life here is their work for God, blessed indeed are they, if you have not yet joined them, today please do.

 

May God Be Praised.

Blog Post 10-28-2024 - Measuring the Christian life.

 

Pope Francis “… the Christian life is “measured against Christ”…. This means that the measuring stick is Jesus and his Gospel — not what we think, but what he says to us. "

Today review your life against the Gospel, use Matthew’s Sermon on the Mount as your measuring stick: https://bible.usccb.org/bible/matthew/5

 

May God Be Praised.