bear fruit

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Friday, 12 July 2013 : 14th Week of Ordinary Time (Scripture Reflection)

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today Christ in the Gospel Reading we listened to, told us that He would send us like sheep among wolves, and that we must ever be ready, as this world will hate us just as it has hated the Lord first, and that even those closest to us may betray us to the enemy, because they disagree with the Lord. But it does not mean that we should be apathetic or even hostile to our families and our societies. Rather, it means that we should not put our trust in men, but in God alone. Because the Lord who loves us would take care of us and protect us with His power.

The Lord sent His Holy Spirit to the Apostles, which came down to them on the day of the Pentecost. The Spirit inflamed their hearts and gave them great and unprecedented courage and strength to preach the Good News of the Lord, first to the people of Israel, and then to the whole world. The Apostles gained much good progress in their ministries, but they also faced intense persecution and rejection, from the Jews and the pagans alike. It is often that they have to put their lives on the line, and almost all of them would die of martyrdom, but none of them lose the faith or abandon the Lord. Rather, they placed all their trust in the Lord, and remain faithful all the way to the end.

The Holy Spirit too had been given to us, through the unbroken chains of shepherds in the bishops, from the Apostles themselves. All of us have been given the Spirit of the Lord, the Spirit that brings love, hope, and faith within our hearts. This Spirit burns with a fire of love and zeal for the Lord. But ultimately, it is up to us, whether to use the gifts that the Spirit offered, or ignore them altogether, ignoring the Spirit that is within us.

Yes, brothers and sisters in Christ, we must be fruitful in the Spirit or the Spirit that has been given to all of us will be useless. We must bear the fruits of the Holy Spirit, the most important of which, that is love. If we obey the will of God and make our lives truly in reflection of the Spirit that is within us, made evident through our words, deeds, and actions, we will truly be rewarded by the Lord who is loving and faithful.

For our Lord is faithful, and He is true to His covenant. He fulfills His promise in ways that not even mankind can ever understand. He remained true to His covenant while the descendants of Abraham left Him and abandoned Him for other gods, the pagan gods of the people of Canaan. To those who are faithful He gave His grace and blessings, as we heard today from our first reading, on the reunion of Joseph and Jacob, his father.

For Joseph had been lost to his father, ever since his brothers betrayed him to the slave masters, out of their hatred and jealousy to Joseph. The slave masters sold Joseph to the Egyptians, and the brothers would have expected Joseph to disappear forever from their lives, finally rid of the favourite son of their father. But God has other plans, plans that lie beyond the understanding and knowledge of man.

Joseph was made as the instrument of salvation for thousands if not millions, throughout Egypt and the whole world, as the Lord made visible His plans to Joseph through dreams, of the coming famine and hunger that would engulf the world, and would have caused the death of millions, had preventive actions not been taken by Joseph, through the guidance of the Lord.

Eventually, the Lord brings all His people together once more, and reunited Joseph with his father, beginning with the arrival of Joseph’s brothers to purchase grains from Egypt during the years of famine, and ultimately ending with the revelation of the true identity of Joseph, then the Governor and Regent of all Egypt. All these continue to show how wonderful and magnificent the Lord is, the Lord our God.

He has His plans for the good of all mankind, and He cares for all of us without exception. That is why He sent us His only Son, Jesus Christ, one with Him in the Holy Trinity, so that we may live, and have hope instead of being doomed to death and separation from the Lord in hell. Today’s readings also told us that we must always put our complete and undivided trust and attention in the Lord our God, and not in man. For although we must indeed respect our families, and love our brothers and sisters, we must trust in the Lord more, for even brothers and sisters can turn against us, like the case that Joseph had shown all of us, that his brothers betrayed him to the slave masters out of their jealousy of him.

Therefore, dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we are called again by the Lord to be the ministers of His Gospel and Good News, and also the ministers of His people, to serve the people of God, that is one another, with love, compassion, and kindness. To show mercy to our enemies, to pray for them and bless them with the Lord’ blessings, that they too may come to see the light and repent. We are also called to bring the light and love of God to our own families, to our own societies, to those who are nearest to all of us. Remember that mission does not just happen in some far away countries, but it must also happen even in our country, in our own homes, because even there, there are still many lost souls awaiting for the Lord to help them, through us.

May God empower us and give us a new hope and strength, to carry out the mission that He had entrusted to all of us, with faith, devotion, and love, that we will never give up despite the challenges that await us, or the oppositions that will face all of us, even from within our own families, from those closest and dearest to us. God bless us all, and may He strengthen us all with His Spirit, that we can be more like Him, and bear the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Amen.

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Thursday, 9 May 2013 : Solemnity of the Ascension of the Lord (Scripture Reflection)

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today is Ascension day, a very important day in our faith, because today we celebrate a central tenet of our faith. That is the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of God, is resurrected on the third day after dying on the cross for the salvation of all  mankind, but that today, most importantly, we celebrate the glorification of God, in which Christ, who had descended to this world as a humble man, returns to His glory in heaven as the divine God.

For Christ, our Messiah and our Lord, is both fully man and fully divine at the same time, with both of His human and divine nature united indivisibly in a mysterious and holy link that is beyond our best understanding. In Christ, who had been made incarnate to be a lowly human like us through His birth in Mary, His mother, lies our salvation, and our only hope.

Because, Christ, who is the Lamb of God, gave up Himself to be the sacrifice for the sake of our sins, just as God instructed the people of Israel to sacrifice unblemished lambs to erase their sins and their unworthiness before God. Jesus Christ as the Lamb of God is not merely unblemished, but also perfect, and as the only perfect and worthy sacrifice to take away all the sins of the world, once and for all, through the sacrifice He made on Calvary.

We celebrate this every time we celebrate the Mass, in which the bread and the wine that we offer are truly turned into the Precious Body and the Precious Blood of the Lamb, which He Himself had offered to His disciples at His last supper, so that He will continue to live in them, and therefore remain within us, that He will be within us, and therefore belong to Him and the Father. We have all been mark as His own, and we will not be lost, as long as we keep Him ever in our hearts, and invoke Him in all our actions.

He may be no longer with us in physical form, because He was indeed taken up to heaven with His glorious Ascension, when He parted ways from His disciples and left physically this world, but He actually remains with us, within all of us, that we are empowered with His presence. He granted us the Holy Spirit, the Helper, which came to the Apostles at Pentecost, and from them, the Holy Spirit is passed down to us, with the Sacrament of Baptism and strengthened at Confirmation, the fire of the spirit is burning with us, the living symbol of Christ’s presence within each one of us.

This Spirit that we have within each of us will stay dormant if we do not do anything to make use of the gifts that the Spirit had granted within each of us. Yes, all of us have the power and ability to make the difference, in our own lives, and in the lives of many of those who are around us. The Spirit has planted within us the seeds of faith and love, and these seeds will not sprout unless we provide them with ever greater faith and love, that can only be provided through solid and true actions made in the name of the Lord, and reflecting that we truly are God’s children.

If we allow the Holy Spirit to grow within us and use our beings to bring about love and peace in both ourselves and those around us, it will allow us to grow and bear much fruit, fruits of love and blessings, the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Christ who was taken up on Ascension will come again as He promised all of us, in His Second Coming, which is coming soon. When He comes again, He will see if we, the plants that He, the seed spreader, had grown to the results that He wants.

If we do not bear any fruit, like that of the barren tree, He would destroy us and curse us, because we have not bear any fruit, despite having been planted with seeds of faith. Just like those who had been given money by the master to be invested, but wasted the money in idleness, and did not invest it to let the value of the money to grow for profits. In this, the love that God had given us had become useless, because love cannot just remain within ourselves, because love is between us and another party, and remember that the Lord Himself had commanded us to love both Himself, and our fellow brethren.

The Lord Himself has told us that to love the least and weakest of our brethren, we have loved Him. That is why to just love the Lord alone, is in fact not sufficient, because this love that we have is not perfect, and can only be made perfect by us also loving our fellow brethren, particularly those who lacks, and those who are weakest and persecuted. Therefore, only in living our faith, and using the gifts that the Holy Spirit has placed in us that we can truly bear fruit and be found worthy when Christ once again comes into this world to judge it.

He will welcome and congratulate us, if we had done what we can to fulfill His wishes and His commandments. He will say to us, “Well done, My faithful servants. Come and take your rightful place at My Kingdom.” But if we do not make use of the chance we have now, and waste it on idleness, or worse, that is to spurn God’s love and Spirit, and indulge instead in the worldly temptations and pleasures and the world of hatred, we would be banished by the Lord from His presence, because we will be found unworthy of Him.

The Ascension of our Lord Jesus Christ therefore, serves also as a reminder. Indeed, we rejoice in His glorification and ascension in heaven, to take up His rightful place at the right hand of the Father, but as the angels had said to the disciples on that day, that Christ will come again and that time when He comes again, He will judge the world and gather His faithful ones to Himself while banishing those who strayed from His way, together with Satan and his fallen angels, into the eternal damnation that awaits them.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, today, let us not be complacent, and let us strive to be always ready for the return of our Lord Jesus Christ, which indeed will come soon, and will come at a time when many are at their most unprepared moments. Do not be caught unprepared, and let us make sure that all of us, from now on, put Christ at the very centre of our lives, and reflect Christ in all our thoughts, our words, and our actions, that we show that we belong to Christ and to Him alone.

Love one another and love God with all our hearts, our minds, and our beings. Put our trust completely in Him, and let Him transform us with His Holy Spirit, and bear much fruit in us, the fruits of the Holy Spirit. Remember that Christ ascended to heaven, is always within all of us, with all of us serving as the Holy Temples of His Divine Presence. May God be with all of us, always, till the end of time. Amen.

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(Special) Mass for the Election of the Roman Pontiff / Missa pro Eligendo Pontifice (Gospel Reading)

John 15 : 9-17

As the Father has loved Me, so I have loved you. Remain in My love! You will remain in My love if you keep My commandments, just as I have kept My Father’s commandments and remain in His love. I have told you all this, that My own joy may be in you, and your joy may be complete.

This is My commandment : Love one another as I have loved you! There is no greater love than this, to give one’s life for one’s friends; you are My friends, if you do what I commanded you. I shall not call you servants any more, because servants do not know what their master is about. Instead I have called you friends, since I have made known to you everything I learnt from My Father.

You did not choose Me; it was I who chose you and sent you to go and bear fruit, fruit that will last. And everything you ask the Father in My Name, He will give you. This is My command, that you love one another.

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Friday, 1 March 2013 : 2nd Week of Lent (Gospel Reading)

Matthew 21 : 33-43, 45-46

“Listen to another example : There was a landowner who planted a vineyard. He put a fence around it, dug a hole for the winepress, built a watchtower, leased the vineyard to tenants, and then went to a distant country. When harvest time came, the landowner sent his servants to the tenants to collect his share of the harvest. But the tenants seized his servants, beat one, killed another, and stoned a third.”

“Again the owner sent more servants, but they were treated in the same way. Finally, he sent his son, thinking, ‘They will respect my son.’ But when the tenants saw the son, they thought, “This is the one who is to inherit the vineyard. Let us kill him, and his inheritance will be ours.” So they seized him, threw him out of the vineyard and killed him.”

“Now, what will the owner of the vineyard do with the tenants when he comes?” They said to Him, “He will bring those evil men to an evil end, and lease the vineyard to others, who will pay him in due time.”

And Jesus replied, “Have you never read what the Scriptures say? The stone which the builders rejected has become the cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing, and we marvel at it. Therefore I say to you : the kingdom of heaven will be taken from you, and given to a people who will yield a harvest.”

When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard these parables, they realised that Jesus was referring to them. They would have arrested Him, but they were afraid of the crowd, who regarded Him as a prophet.