Connection between Glory and the Cross

Seventh Sunday of Easter - Year A

If you are a connoisseur of art, you would realise that the point of art and painting is not to represent things in the real world as how they should actually look. If this was the case, it would have been much easier to just a take a photograph. Representational art, when it is good, conveys to the viewer not just an idea of what the subject looked like, but some of the artists’ reflection or experience of seeing as well. At least this seems to be part of the reason why representational art has survived and is still valued, even in the age of the photograph, video cameras and of course, camera phones! Even though you may have several albums full of photos of your mother, nothing can substitute a good painting of her. This is because a good painting is not merely a representation of what someone or something looks like, but also a reaction to it. It says more about the subject than its appearance. It shares insights into the human meaning of what it represents.

These reflections on art have a certain relevance to the gospels, especially to the Gospel of John. Its purpose is not merely to give the story of Jesus, but to meditate on its meaning. Throughout the gospel, the historical Jesus is seen from the perspective of the resurrection and the giving of the Spirit. All of the gospels are more like paintings than like photographs, but especially John’s gospel. One might say that the Synoptics are more like Western Christian art form: certainly theological rather than merely biographical, but generally straightforward, realistic, narrative and historical. John’s Gospel, on the other hand, is more like Eastern or Byzantium iconography; stylised, with a complex set of symbols, consciously looking at things in the light of eternity, demanding deep personal engagement by the viewer.

Today’s gospel is a good example. The scene is once again the Last Supper, but it is portrayed poetically, not historically. Jesus, who has yet to meet his passion and experience the resurrection, speaks from eternity, from beyond the grave. In Jesus’ sacred, saving hour, a great liturgy of love emerges from the poetry of this prayer. Through his word and in the sacred bread of his body, all are drawn toward the Father to receive life and glory. A major biblical motif, “glory” (kabod) was used in the Old Testament to illustrate God’s goodness in providing for his people in the wilderness; for example God’s presence in the pillar of fire and cloud was called “glory”; God’s saving intervention was described in terms of manifesting his “glory,” and God’s presence as He alighted on the Tent of Meeting, also referred to his “glory.”

So, what did Jesus mean when he spoke of the hour of entering into his “glory”?  Such “glory” is certainly not equivalent to what man often desires - popularity, public acceptance, praises and a good name. Here lies the divine paradox of the gospel - when Jesus spoke of his own glory he was speaking about the cross. Throughout the gospel of John, Jesus and his ministry was portrayed as a progressive process of glorification, a process of preparation for the ultimate “sign” – the crucifixion, the culmination of God’s saving intervention in salvation history.

St. Peter must have finally understood the connection between glory and the cross after several failed attempts. At the time of his first letter, the early Christian communities were already experience persecution and suffering for their faith. The cross was no longer theoretical or symbolic, it was very real. And yet in today’s second reading, St Peter writes with great confidence and as a means of encouraging his fellow Christians: “If you can have some share in the sufferings of Christ, be glad, because you will enjoy a much greater gladness when his glory is revealed. It is a blessing for you when they insult you for bearing the name of Christ, because it means that you have the Spirit of glory, the Spirit of God resting on you.”

The other radical twist introduced in today’s passage is that Jesus speaks of eternal life not as some future or eschatological reality, something which you experience only after death. On the contrary, one can experience eternal life in the here and now. According to Jesus, eternal life is “to know you, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent”. To know connotes the intimacy of an immediate experience rather than cognitive knowledge. Such as, my family knows the real me! Therefore, “to know” God, means to be called into an intimate relationship with the Father, like the one that Jesus the Son already enjoyed. This provides another beautiful layer to our understanding Jesus’ hour of glory. In other words, knowledge of and intimate participation with Jesus in his hour, in his glory, or in the words of St Peter, sharing in the sufferings of Christ, one can already taste eternal life here and now.

Thus, the cross and suffering for our faith, continues to be mark of every Christian, his glory, his path to intimacy with God, to eternal life. Of course, practising our faith today, may not be as dangerous as in antiquity (unless you are a Christian living in the Middle East, Northern Nigeria, Pakistan etc), yet remains challenging, perhaps more challenging than the past. Today, we face a greater danger from modern society – the danger of being ignored or even rejected by secular culture. Its moral values, forced to compete in a free market of ideas, frequently seem unattractive, outdated or simply irrelevant to present day lifestyles.  Many, thus, have given in to the temptation of allowing its core teachings and values to be reshaped and moulded into a more politically correct and socially acceptable version that is to the liking of modern tastes. Social tolerance and relativism has led to the suspicion and rejection of the particularity of the Christian faith and the uniqueness of Jesus Christ as Saviour. Ultimately, it has led to widespread moral decline, and with that the world suffers the loss of beauty, the good and the Truth.

Christian faith continues to present a different picture of glory, one which requires us to see the world, its trials and tribulations, through the lenses of eternity. It calls the world to transcendence, to appreciate once again the need for beauty, goodness, and truth. But if this message is to be heard, there must be Christians who are disciples that are willing to live out the message of today’s gospel. This means living a life in the world that already goes beyond it and resists being reduced to its conventions. And it is intrinsic to this way of life that it be lived not merely by isolated individuals, but by a community. Thus, the essential need for our BECs, our Basic Ecclesial Communities, or perhaps, our Catholic Students' Society (CSS), to bear witness to the gospel message. Where we reject community living, we in fact reject the gospel, and we become anti-witnesses of its message. Thus, community life should not only communicate a message of about communion and love, but also show its truth and beauty. In this sense, Christian life must be a work of art – it must be sacramental, it must be beautiful. For if the message of Christ’s triumph over death is to be convincing – even to ourselves – we must show in living it that it is beautiful, good and true, that the vision it shares is about what really is, and that apprehending it leads to fulfillment and joy.  

The Cross is Our Salvation

Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross 

The Feast of the Exaltation of the Holy Cross, celebrated every year on September 14, recalls three historical events: the finding of the True Cross by St. Helena, the mother of the emperor Constantine; the dedication of churches built by Constantine on the site of the Holy Sepulchre and Mount Calvary; and the restoration of the True Cross to Jerusalem by the emperor Heraclius II. But in a deeper sense, the feast also celebrates the Holy Cross as the instrument of our salvation. This instrument of torture, designed to degrade the worst of criminals, became the life-giving tree that reversed Adam's Original Sin when he ate from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil in the Garden of Eden.

The Cross of Christ, the centre and pinnacle of God’s saving work, is also the centerpiece of our faith. The cross reveals the most profound depths of God’s love: “God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son” (John 3:16). Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI tells us that “the cross … is the definitive sign par excellence given to us so that we might understand the truth about man and the truth about God; we have all been created and redeemed by a God who sacrificed his only Son out of love. This is why the Crucifixion … is the culmination of that turning of God against himself in which he give himself in order to raise man up and save him. This is love in its most radical form.” (Deus Caritas Est, 12)

Nevertheless, the cross remains a sign of contradiction – it is both an unthinkable disgrace and yet a potent source of grace. It has inspired confidence in armies to march into battle and others to sue for peace; it has been used as a palpable symbol of power as well as powerlessness. And so it is both despised as well as coveted by one human power or another – Constantine used it as a talisman of power in the civil war with his brother and the Persians claimed it as their greatest battle trophy over the Byzantines.

So, how is the cross a symbol of power and powerlessness? The symbolism of power hidden in the cross is often lost on us, and is only revealed as a mystery of revelation. The Cross represents the Sovereign authority of God and his providence. This is certainly difficult to comprehend. Yet, what seems to us to be failure is, in God’s eyes, the victory of sacrificial love. It is on the cross, that Christ receives the highest exaltation from God, ironically, at the moment he suffered the greatest humiliation at the hands of men. As Christ was lifted up on the Cross, now by means of the Cross, he lifts up humanity, and indeed all creation. As today’s gospel reminds us, “for God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through him the world might be saved”. The Cross possesses the power to forgive sins which are hidden, the power to heal consciences and human hearts. It is there that we have been set free of the debt of sin and liberated from the clutches of death.

But paradoxically, the cross is also a symbol and an instrument of powerlessness. There are few things that can match the depravity of this instrument of torture and death. For a brief moment, where hours seem like eternity, the Son of God gave up His access to the powers of the universe so that He could die at our hands. On the wood of the cross, the most powerful being in the universe chose to be powerless. The Lutheran theologian and martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, describes the profound significance of this moment, “God allows himself to be edged out of the world and onto the cross. God is weak and powerless in the world, and that is exactly the way, the only way, in which he can be with us and help us.” So what God has done is that He took an instrument of evil, an instrument that brings death and transformed it so that it gives life, brings goodness and healing, and that’s what we hear Jesus saying about himself, “When I am lifted up, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, then I will give life.” The instrument of death becomes an instrument of healing, life and salvation.

The power and the powerlessness of the cross provide us with the necessary lens to view our own suffering, our daily crosses. St John Paul II, who prophetically wrote his first encyclical on Suffering, and would later suffer that fate in the last years of his pontificate, uses the cross to formulate his answer to man’s perennial dilemma – Why do we have to suffer. The saintly Pope stated, with piercing simplicity, that the answer has "been given by God to man in the cross of Jesus Christ." Each of us is called to "share in that suffering through which the Redemption was accomplished." Through his only-begotten Son, God "has confirmed His desire to act especially through suffering, which is man's weakness and emptying of self, and He wishes to make His power known precisely in this weakness and emptying of self."

And this is the way we experience God’s power here on earth, sometimes to our great frustration, and this is the way that Jesus was deemed powerful during his lifetime. The Gospels make this clear. Jesus was born powerless, and he died helpless on a cross. Yet both his birth and his death show the kind of power on which we can ultimately build our lives. The cross of Christ, therefore, teaches us that we can find power in weakness, in that which makes us vulnerable and even seemingly powerless.

Perhaps, what makes it so difficult to accept the good news of the cross, is that we are stubbornly hold on to power; we want to have a “sense of control.” Henri Nouwen writes, “What makes the temptation of power so seemingly irresistible?  Maybe it is that power offers an easy substitute for the hard task of love.  It seems easier to be God than to love God, easier to control people than to love people, easier to own life than to love life.” Most of us fear our powerlessness in the face of illness and death. We would like to retain an element of control, even though we realise that dying often involves the very opposite: a total loss of control, over our muscles, our emotions, our minds, our bowels and our very lives, as our human framework succumbs to powerful disintegrative forces.

Even when those disintegrative forces become extreme and our suffering may seem overwhelming, however, an important spiritual journey always remains open for us. This path is a "road less traveled," a path that, unexpectedly, enables us to achieve genuine control in the face of suffering and even death. The hallmark of this path is the personal decision to accept our sufferings, actively laying down our life on behalf of others by embracing the particular kind of death God has ordained for us, patterning our choice on the choice consciously made by Jesus Christ. As no one had ever done before, Jesus charted the path of love-driven sacrifice, choosing to lay down his life for his friends. He was no mere victim in the sense of being a passive and unwilling participant in his own suffering and death. He was in control. No one could possibly take his life from him, unless he chose to lay it down.

Jesus foresaw that his greatest work lay ahead as he ascended Calvary to embrace his own powerlessness and self-emptying. Paradoxically, it was when he most seemed powerless, that he was most powerful. The cross would prove victorious when meeting our ancient enemies on the battlefield – sin, death and evil would be defeated by the very sacrifice of Christ himself. Jesus' radical embracing of his Passion — and our radical embracing of our own — marks the supreme moment of a person, whose life seems otherwise spinning out of control or into chaos, as God assumed control of one’s life and destiny through our willing immersion into His hope-filled and redemptive designs.

TGIF- Thank God It's Friday

Good Friday 2016

Social networking, the likes of Twitter and Facebook, has enabled many of us, to articulate what we would have normally kept private. We give vent to our pent-up frustrations by ‘shouting out’, expressing every emotion for the world to see.  Just take a look at Twitter box or Facebook page on a Monday morning and count how many times you see a similar statement like this: “I can’t wait until the weekend,” or “When’s it going to be Friday,” And of course the familiar initialism at the close of the week, ‘TGIF’ (or ‘Thank God It’s Friday’, for the uninitiated).

What is it about Fridays that makes them so special? Why this euphoric fascination with Friday? Here are some reasons why people think Friday is cool: We get to stay up late. It’s an opportunity to catch up on much needed sleep. It means having drinks with the guys at the local watering hole. It’s that much needed break after a tiring and often bad week. Or as Rebecca Black sang on that YouTube music video that had been described as “the worst song ever”, ‘Friday’ means “Party, Party, Party!”

But for us Christians, there is one supreme reason that beats all the rest. We say without hesitation, “Thank God it’s Friday” because it was on Friday that Our Lord Jesus died for us. “Thank God it’s Friday” because the instrument of death, the cross, became the means of our salvation! Good Friday marks the day when wrath and mercy met at the cross. The Cross which put God to death became the Tree of Life which brought man to life.

The most quintessentially Catholic object of devotion is a crucifix-a cross with the image of Christ's body nailed to it. It’s possible, likely in fact, that you have the positive thoughts about the cross, even warm feelings about the cross. Over the years, many Christians have suffered from a cultural romanticisation or sanitisation of the cross. It no longer evokes horror or terror, only loving endearment and pious devotion.  We regard it as a sign of blessing, and certainly not as a symbol of a curse. You see Jesus hanging there and see a wonderful example of compassion and sacrifice. You find in the death of Jesus an inspiration to forgive and be kind to others. And for others, the overriding emotion in your heart in pity. You feel sorry for Jesus. It’s common for people to turn the cross into nothing but a sad martyrdom or a sentimental statement about love.

But these sentiments do not begin to explain the cross. The readings for today, especially the Passion taken from the Gospel of St John, point however to a far more profound theological truth that extends beyond our emotions of sadness and pity. I dare say that most people know something about Good Friday, but not enough, and often get distracted by the lesser or more trivial things. Well here’s the central truth: on the cross Christ redeemed us from the curse of sin by becoming a curse for us. That Christ became a curse is what makes Good Friday good.

What did it mean to be cursed? Think of the scene in the Garden of Eden in Genesis 3. God warned Adam and Eve that if they were to eat from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, they would suffer the curse of death. But our first parents refused to believe God’s warning and chose rather to rely on the words of the cunning serpent. They believed that by eating its fruits, they would no longer have to depend on God. They sort self-reliance over obedience. They imagined themselves as masters of their own destiny and be forever free of God’s interference. That mistaken belief is at the heart of every sin and serves as the perennial disease that infects man till today. Little did they know that this would be their curse, a curse inherited by the whole of humanity. After taking a bite of the forbidden fruit Adam is cursed, Eve is cursed, the serpent is cursed, and the ground is cursed. The effect of the curse is catastrophic – an impassable chasm now exist between man and God; it meant the loss of communion with God, each other, and the created universe.  The curse bars us from eating of the fruit of the Tree of Life and thus man lost the gift of immortality. Death is now our lot.

But Jesus’ sacrifice on the cross has changed all that. Our wounded race could not begin to attempt such a massive task of healing the rift.  Man could never lift the curse on his own. So the Father sent His Eternal Word to become man and accomplish the task in our place, to substitute for us.  For the immortal, infinite God to empty himself and unite himself to a limited, vulnerable human nature was already a feat of unimaginable love and humility.  But for redemption to be complete, the hero would have to withstand the greatest fury that hell and fallen humanity could hurl against him – the cross. If death should come from self-reliance of man, life would come from obedience to God, even execution on the cross.

We should remember each time we see a cross that the Cross of Jesus' crucifixion was an emblem of physical anguish and personal defilement, not triumph-of debasement and humiliation, not glory-of degradation and shame, not beauty. Invented by the Assyrians, crucifixion was used as a means of subjugation and to instill fear and terror among the vanquished nations. It was the policy of the Roman Empire to adopt the best from conquered peoples. In this case, they chose the cross and found crucifixion an excellent tool of intimidation.  Incidentally, crucifixion was deemed so horrible that Roman law forbade its use on Roman citizens, even traitors.  It was reserved only for slaves and conquered peoples.

The humiliation of being stripped naked to die in a public spectacle was particularly loathsome to Jews for whom public nudity was an abomination.  More odious than the shame, the condemned was also deemed accursed. According to Deuteronomy 21:23 everyone hanged on a tree was cursed. It was punishment due for grievous crimes. The New Testament often uses “tree” rather than “cross”. Jesus thus came under this curse. Yet, Saint Peter explains more clearly what was involved: “He himself bore our sins in his body on the tree, that we might die to sin and live to righteousness.” (1 Peter 2:24) Jesus accepted the “curse” we should have received, and underwent death in our place –so that we might not die but live.

What the Son of God endured for us was the depth of ugliness and humiliation. We need to be reminded of the tremendous personal cost of love. Everyone knows the cross is about the love of God. But it is no cheap, sentimental, fuzzy kind of love. It is a costly, deep, rich, free, painful kind of love. Pope Emeritus Benedict, when he handed the WYD cross to the Australian pilgrims on Palm Sunday two years ago, said, “The Cross itself is the true Tree of Life. We do not find life by possessing it, but by giving it. Love is a gift of oneself, and for this reason it is the way of true life symbolised by the Cross."

We can say “Thank God it’s Friday” with a sigh of relief. Whew! The week is over. Done with the daily grind. Once again the end of the week came just in time before the breakdown. No struggling with the snooze button tomorrow morning. Friday night we can relax, unwind, and enjoy thoughts of a weekend without appointments and traffic jams. But today, we say “Thank God it’s Friday” because it’s God who’s on the Cross. Today, we finally experience the ultimate break – not just from the tedium of a tiring week, but a break from sin, from death, and from darkness. Only God could heal us—save us—from sin and all the darkness it brings into life. Good Friday is good because the Word of God in the flesh—Jesus Christ—could endure on our behalf all the suffering and death that is the consequence of human sin. All the pain, emptiness and despair from betrayal, injustice, illness, lost and lack of love is brought to the Cross by Jesus. He assumed the curse we had wrought through our disobedience, by offering himself as a sacrifice of perfect obedience. He himself bore our sins in his body upon the cross, so that, free from sin, we might live for righteousness. By his wounds you have been healed. (1 Peter 2:24). For this reason, we say without hesitation, without the slightest regret, without any trace of doubt, ‘Thank God it’s Friday”!

Carrying your cross

Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows

Yesterday we celebrated the Exaltation of the Holy Cross. We see beauty in the Cross, because the Passion of our Lord gives a human face to the love of God for a fallen humanity. But paradoxically, the cross is also a symbol and an instrument of powerlessness. There are few things that can match the depravity of this instrument of torture and death. For a brief moment, where hours seem like eternity, the Son of God gave up His access to the powers of the universe so that He could die at our hands. On the wood of the cross, the most powerful being in the universe chose to be powerless. The Lutheran theologian and martyr, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, describes the profound significance of this moment, “God allows himself to be edged out of the world and onto the cross. God is weak and powerless in the world, and that is exactly the way, the only way, in which he can be with us and help us.” So what God has done is that He took an instrument of evil, an instrument that brings death and transformed it so that it gives life, brings goodness and healing, and that’s what we hear Jesus saying about himself, “When I am lifted up, as Moses lifted up the serpent in the desert, then I will give life.” The instrument of death becomes an instrument of healing, life and salvation.

The power and the powerlessness of the cross provide us with the necessary lens to view our own suffering, our daily crosses. And this is the way we experience God’s power here on earth, sometimes to our great frustration, and this is the way that Jesus was deemed powerful during his lifetime. The Gospels make this clear. Jesus was born powerless, and he died helpless on a cross. Yet both his birth and his death show the kind of power on which we can ultimately build our lives. The cross of Christ, therefore, teaches us that we can find power in weakness, in that which makes us vulnerable and even seemingly powerless. This path is a "road less traveled," a path that, unexpectedly, enables us to achieve genuine control in the face of suffering and even death. The hallmark of this path is the personal decision to accept our sufferings, actively laying down our life on behalf of others by embracing the particular kind of death God has ordained for us, patterning our choice on the choice consciously made by Jesus Christ. As no one had ever done before, Jesus charted the path of love-driven sacrifice, choosing to lay down his life for his friends. He was no mere victim in the sense of being a passive and unwilling participant in his own suffering and death. He was in control. No one could possibly take his life from him, unless he chose to lay it down.

As Christians, we are called to share in the passion, death, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus. Like the Mother of Jesus and the Beloved Disciple who faithfully stood by the cross whilst others fled, we too are privileged to perceive the beauty and the glory of the Lord; a beauty and a glory however that is veiled in the ugliness of a tortured body, the degradation of poverty, humility, and vulnerability of the Crucifix that hangs before us. Today, as we commemorate the Feast of Our Lady of Sorrows, let us draw strength and courage from our Blessed Mother, to embrace our daily crosses with hope and to witness our true love of God and our neighbors in bringing God’s kingdom of love, peace, joy, justice, and fellowship amidst hatred, conflicts, violence, depression, sadness, injustice, and self-centeredness.

The hidden power of the cross

Feast of Exaltation of the cross 

Today the church celebrates the Feast of Exaltation of the Cross. The Cross of Christ, the centre and pinnacle of God’s saving work, is also the centerpiece of our faith. The cross reveals the most profound depths of God’s love: “God loved the world so much that he gave his only Son” (John 3:16). Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI tells us that “the cross … is the definitive sign par excellence given to us so that we might understand the truth about man and the truth about God; we have all been created and redeemed by a God who sacrificed his only Son out of love. This is why the Crucifixion … is the culmination of that turning of God against himself in which he give himself in order to raise man up and save him. This is love in its most radical form.” (Deus Caritas Est, 12)

The symbolism of power hidden in the cross is often lost on us, and is only revealed as a mystery of revelation. The Cross represents the Sovereign authority of God and his providence. This is certainly difficult to comprehend. Yet, what seems to us to be failure is, in God’s eyes, the victory of sacrificial love. It is on the cross, that Christ receives the highest exaltation from God, ironically, at the moment he suffered the greatest humiliation at the hands of men. As Christ was lifted up on the Cross, now by means of the Cross, he lifts up humanity, and indeed all creation. As today’s gospel reminds us, “for God sent his Son into the world not to condemn the world, but so that through him the world might be saved”. The Cross possesses the power to forgive sins which are hidden, the power to heal consciences and human hearts. It is there that we have been set free of the debt of sin and liberated from the clutches of death.

Follow Him with Joy

I'm happy that I was able to partake the Eucharistic celebration with the students in one of those university that located in Kuala Lumpur. It is a great honour and pleasure that I'm invited to pray and to shared some of stories with them. At the same time,to get some input from the students. I still remember there a few non-catholic students joined in and celebrated this wonderful mass with us and praising our Lord. I was amazed that these non-catholic shared with me their interest in the catholic faith, importantly, they found peace! They love the prayer that we pray, they love the hymns that we sung, they love everything! Most importantly, I can see their love for Christ, the anointed one, which is our Savior and Messiah.

As a president of the Catholic student society, to play a role as a leader, we need to face different types of problems. We need to deal with some unexpected situation. Even, we need to take criticism. When something goes wrong, you are the first who will be shot by the people, members or lecturer. Well, in any organization for that matter, leaders are facing problems with all kinds. they need to face critics often! I guess this is the heaviest burden that a leader got to bear on their shoulder.

In today's gospel reading, what does Jesus mean when he says his disciples, the follower of Christ, or leader for that matter, must be sheep in the midst of wolves? The prophet Isaiah foretold a time when wolves and lambs will dwell in peace (Isaiah 11:6 and 65:25) This certainly refers to the second coming of Christ when all will be united under the Lordship of Jesus after he has put down his enemies and established the reign of God over the heavens and the earth. In the meantime, the disciples must expect OPPOSITION and PERSECUTION from those who oppose the gospel. Jesus never hesitated to tell his disciples what they might expect if they followed him. Here Jesus says to his disciples: This is my task for you at its grimmest and worst, do you accept it? This is not the world's way of offering a job. After the defeat at Dunkirk. Churchill offered his country blood, toil, sweat, and tears. Often, this is not the message that we prefer to hear when the Lord Jesus commissions us in his service. Nonetheless, our privilege is to follow in the footsteps of the Master who laid down his life for us.

Now, are you willing to to accept hardship and suffering in following after the Lord?

Back to the topic as a leader. In many times, we might face difficulties in dealing with our members or some authority! Now, the question is can we bear our cross with joy?  As a young leader like me, sometimes I face hardship! sometimes I might discourage with things and matter that just suddenly pop-ups. But,  I know that our Lord Jesus is cheering for us in heaven, so that we may accomplish our task at the finish line. He is the one who always support us and give us the grace to accomplish our task in life.

Don't be surprised if "You will be hated by all on account of Me. But whoever holds out till the end will escape death." (Matthew 10:22) Jesus commanded His disciples to be on "guard with respect to others."( Mt10:17) because He would send His disciples out "like sheep among wolves"( Mt. 10:16). He said that they may be handed over to the police by their own families (see Mt10:21) because we are Jesus' disciples, we may be handed over to be beaten, tried, and executed, after having witnessed for Jesus by the power of the Spirit (see Mt 10:17-21) That is why throughout centuries, many Christian who died for their faith which known as Martyr. We must arm ourselves with the mentality that we will suffer in flesh (1 Pt 4:1). Expect the privilege of persecution (see Acts 5:41) as a Christian. However, the great consolation for us as a Christian is that Jesus will be our refuge, and He will be there always to love us and protect us. He will give us strength.  Importantly, we will be enjoying with Him in His everlasting Kingdom that He prepare for each one of us in heaven.

The Risen Hope

Alleluia! Jesus is risen! Yes, Christ rise from the death to show that He is God, to show that He is the one that send from the father to redeemed our sins. No tomb in the world could contain the Lord Jesus for long. His death on the cross purchased our redemption and his triumph over the grave on Easter morning defeated death. So, what preserved the Lord Jesus from corruption? He was kept from decay and he rose from the dead by divine power. ''My flesh will dwell in hope. For you will not let your Holy One see corruption. (Psalm 16:9-10)

The mystery of Christ's lying in the tomb on the Sabbath reveals the great Sabbath rest of God after the fulfillment of our salvation which brings PEACE to the whole world (Colossians 1:18-20).  Is your hope in this life only? Or is it well founded in the resurrection of Christ and his promise that those who believe in him will live forever?

From my passed two passage, I was sharing on the topic of Holy Thursday and Good Friday. Let rewind ourselves back a bit and see. On Holy Thursday, we celebrated Jesus' gift Himself to us in the Holy Communion. Then comes to Good Friday, is just merely a service in the church, but had no mass. We (Catholics) still receive Holy Communion on Good Friday because it does not break our fast on that day. Holy Saturday, we have neither mass or Holy Communion. During the day, we can't even go to church and visit Jesus in the Blessed Sacrament. The Blessed Sacrament does not reside in the sanctuary of the church. The Church deprives us of Jesus' Eucharistic presence on Holy Saturday to help us experience the day Jesus was buried, when Jesus' physical presence was no longer on earth. After experiencing deprivation from the burial of Jesus' Eucharistic presence, we almost scream with joy when we receive Jesus in Holy Communion at the Easter Vigil.

Now, what did the disciples of Jesus discover on the third day of Jesus' death? On Sunday morning the women who had stood with Jesus when he died upon the cross on Good Friday went to the tomb to pay their last tribute to a dead body.  The disciples thought that everything had finished in tragedy. None of the Jesus' follower expecting to see an empty tomb and hear the angel's message that saying 'Why do you seek the living among the dead? Remember how he told you, while he was still in Galilee, that the Son of man must be delivered into the hands of sinful men, and be crucified, and on the third day rise. (Luke 24: 5-7). The angel urged them to believe that Jesus had indeed risen just as he had promise.

Are you prepared to meet the Risen Lord? The disciples of Jesus were as unprepared for his resurrection as they were for his death. The empty tomb made them fearful and joyful at the same time. 'Where did they put the body or did he really rise just as he predicted?' Even though Jesus had spoken to them before of his death and rising, they could not believe until they saw the empty tomb and met the risen Lord. Aren't we are the same? We want to see with out own eyes before we believe! The guards brought their testimony to the chief priests and elders who met the news with denial. They were resolved to not believe that Jesus had risen and they bribed the guards in the hope of keeping others from believing it.

What is the basic of our faith in the resurrection? The scriptures tell us that ''Faith is the assurance of things hoped for, the conviction of things not seen' (Hebrews 11:1). Faith is an entirely free gift that God makes to us. Our faith is a free assent to the whole truth which God reveals to us through his word. Faith is certain because it is based on the very word of God who cannot lie. Faith also seeks understanding. That is why God enlightens the 'eyes of our hearts' that we may know what is the hope to which he has called us (Ephesians 1:18)

Through the gift of faith, the Lord reveals himself to those who believe in his word and he fills them with 'new life in his Holy Spirit''. Do you live in the joy and hope of the resurrection? And do you recognize the presence of the Risen Lord in his word, in the 'breaking of the bread', and in his church, the body of Christ?

In Matthew's Gospel, the first commands Jesus gives to the first people who saw Him after His resurrection are: 'Do not be afraid! Go and carry the news' of my resurrection. (Mt.28:10). Now, Jesus speaks to the world through the witnesses He has chosen (Acts 10:41). The risen Lord backs up His witnesses with power and authority (Lk 10:16). When people don't believe us, His witnesses, Jesus gets upset (Mk 16:14).

The duty of a witness is simple. A witness simply testified to what they have 'heard and seen' (Acts 4:20). The only issue for a witness is whether or not they will speak. Organized crime gets a lot of mileage out of silencing witnesses through fear of death, and so do enemies of Jesus. But, Jesus tells us: Do not be afraid!' (Mt 28:10). Jesus has the ultimate 'witness protection' program. He will be our refuge. He has triumphed over death! Fear and death have 'no more power over' Jesus and His witnesses. (Rm 6:9)

Jesus tells us: 'You are to be My witnesses' (Acts 1:8). 'Do not be afraid. Go on speaking and do not be silenced'. (Acts 18:9). 'Go and carry the news' (Mt 28:10) that Jesus is risen from the dead and all who believe in Him have eternal life (Jn 3:16).

Power of Your Love

Today, Friday! This is not an ordinary Friday that use to be throughout the year. Today is a very special day where Christ willingly enter into his passion, and die on the cross for us. The reason of Christ doing this is simple, because He loves us so much that he die for our sins so the way to heaven can be open to all of us.

The word 'LOVE' with four simple alphabet, sound so simple in life. In reality, that will not be easy for people to act upon it. In a relationship, often we hear the couple saying"How much do you love me?'' One of them might answer' My love for you is just like the height of a mountain'. But in the real sense, how many of us, for the sake of our beloved one, willing to die for them?

Now, Jesus willing to do that for us, because of His Love for us. Despite our sinfulness and wickedness, His love for us will never cease. He wants to bring Salvation for us so they we may reunited with Him in His Heavenly kingdom. The cross brings us face to face with Jesus suffering. And his death was agonizing and and humiliating.

Normally a crucified man could last for several days on a cross. Jesus' had already been scourged, beaten with rods, and a crown of thorns pressed into his skull. It is no wonder that he died mid-afternoon. Jesus was crucified for his claim to be king. The Jews had understood that the Messiah would come as king to establish God's reign for them. They wanted a king who would free them from tyranny and foreign domination. Many had high hopes that Jesus would be the Messianic King. Little did they understand what kind of kingship Jesus claimed to have. Jesus came to conquer hearts and souls for an imperishable kingdom, rather than to conquer perishable lands and entitlements.

We can find no greater proof of God's love for us that the willing sacrifice of his son on the cross. Jesus' parting words, "It is finished " express triumph rather than defeat. Jesus bowed his head and gave up his spirit knowing that the strife was now over and the battle was won. Even on the cross, Jesus knew the joy of victory. What the Father sent him into the world to do has now been accomplished. Christ offered himself and without blemish to God and he put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. (See Hebrews 9:24-26)

St.Augustine comments on those who stood at the cross of Jesus: 'As they were looking on, so we too gaze on his wounds as he hangs. We see his blood as he dies. We see the price offered by the redeemer, touch the scars of his resurrection. He bows his head, as if to kiss you. His heart is made bare open, as it were, in love to you. His arms are extended that he may embrace you. His whole body is displayed for your redemption. Ponder how great these things are. Let all this be rightly weighed in your mind: as He was once fixed on the cross in every part of his body for you, so he may now be fixed in every part of your soul.

In the cross of Christ, we see the triumph of Jesus over his enemies, sin, Satan, and death. The cross of Christ is the safe guard of our faith, the assurance of our hope, and the throne of love. It is also the sign of God's mercy and the proof of forgiveness. By his cross, Jesus Christ has pardoned us and set us free from the tyranny of sin. He paid the price for us when he made atonement for our sins.

The way to peace, joy, and righteousness in the kingdom of God and the way to victory over sin and corruption, fear and defeat, despair and death is through the cross of Jesus Christ. Now, do you follow the Lord Jesus in his way of the cross with joy, hope and confidence? 

Saint Stephen

When you first saw this picture? You might be wondering that what I'm going to share today. Perhaps, you might try to figure it out by observing the picture below and find out the answer.

Yes. He is Saint Stephen. (St.Stephen), the first martyr of the church.

Today, just before I started to pray. Out of sudden, I'm curious about Saint's feast day that is going to celebrate at mass today. So, I just click on the Catholic application that I have downloaded on my phone to find out. Saint of the day is St. Stephen. To be frank, I don't really know much about him. After reading his life stories, it really make me feel impress about  the way that he live for his faith.

The church has celebrated the feast day of St.Stephen on the 26th of December,right after the day of Christmas. His name Stephen means 'Crown' , and he was the first disciple of Jesus to receive the martyr's crown. A martyr is someone who is killed or made to suffer greatly because of their religious beliefs.

St.Stephen was a deacon in the early Christian Church.  The apostles had found that they needed helpers to look after the care of the widows and the poor.  So they ordained seven deacons, and Stephen is the most famous of these.

God worked many miracles through St Stephen and he spoke with such wisdom and grace that many of his hearers became followers of Jesus.  The enemies of the Church of Jesus were furious to see how successful Stephen's preaching was.  At last, they laid a plot for him.  They could not answer his wise argument, so they got men to lie about him, saying that he had spoken sinfully against God.  

St. Stephen faced that great assembly of enemies without fear.  In fact, the Holy Bible says that his face looked like the face of an angel. The saint spoke about Jesus, showing that He is the Saviour, God had promised to send.  He scolded his enemies for not having believed in Jesus.  At that, they rose up in great anger and shouted at him.  But St.Stephen looked up to Heaven and said that he saw the heavens opening and Jesus standing at the right hand of God.

His hearers plugged their ears and refused to listen to another word.  They dragged St .Stephen outside the city of Jerusalem and stoned him to death.  The saint prayed, "Lord Jesus, receive my spirit!"  Then he fell to his knees and begged God not to punish his enemies for killing him.

After reading his story,I'm touched by his story. He teaches us to forgive our enemies, be strong in our faith and the truth of life. 

Pope Benedict XVI said that He is the role model of new Evangelization. He said: we are called to fix on our gaze on the Son of God, and like St.Stephen, deacon of the first martyr of the church, ''open up our lives to the light that directs us '' on the life's path. (Source: www.news.va)

From now on, St.Stephen will be one of my patron saint in life.