Scripture Reflections

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Sunday, 12 January 2014 : Feast of the Baptism of the Lord (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate a great feast of the Church, commemorating the baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ at the Jordan river by St. John the Baptist. This baptism marked the beginning of the ministry of our Lord Jesus, after thirty years of His life in this world since He was born.

A detail on the early life of Jesus besides His birth, presentation at the Temple and the time when He was left behind in the Temple at twelve was scarce and absent, but it was likely that He lived normally as any man would, under the care of His loving family, Mary His mother and Joseph, His foster-father. He would have lived normally as any sons of a carpenter would live, learning and understanding the world from Joseph, His foster-father.

Jesus came to the Jordan to be baptised by John because it had been prophesied as such by the prophets, and it therefore the very first instance when Christ the Saviour was revealed to the world, the very first instance when many could see and hear the witness of God’s sign of salvation. The truth about God and His saving plan was made clear at that moment when Jesus was baptised.

God made His Son, Jesus Christ to be the Christ or the Messiah, or the Saviour of the world. That was because it was only in Christ that the world could be freed from the chains of sin and evil that had enslaves it since the time when sin first entered the world. And all those who believe in Him would receive the great reward of salvation.

In that event too, God made obvious His nature for the world to see. First, that He is the one and only true God as opposed to all other false gods. He is the one and only supreme Lord and King of all, as the One who created this universe and everything in it, including all of us. But in this Oneness and unity, He has three Divine persons, all coexisting with each other in perfect unity, Three distinct persona, but One in nature and in perfect and indivisible unity.

Yes, what was shown in the event of the baptism of Jesus was what we know as the doctrine of the Most Holy Trinity. God that is One and yet has Three distinct persona of Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. All of them are God, and One. The Father is the aspect of God as the Creator and the Omnipotent ruler and Lord of all things, while the Son, who was the Word of God made flesh, is the One who made things come to be, including the creation as well as the plan of salvation. The Holy Spirit is the force and power behind all things and all creation, as well as the life that God has given us.

The Father is not seen or visible to us, as He was portrayed in the Old Testament as a burning bush to Moses, or as a gentle wind to Elijah. It was often His voice that was heard, speaking His will to the prophets or directly to the people of God. Meanwhile, the Son who was the Word of God since the beginning of time and before that, was made known to us, in the person of Jesus Christ, incarnate as a Man, to become the Saviour of the world.

The Holy Spirit was also not directly seen like the Father, but is often portrayed as the flames of fire symbolising the flames of the Spirit of God, just as what happened in Pentecost, as well as a dove, which is the form that the Spirit took when Jesus was baptised at the Jordan. Thus, the Holy Trinity of Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, recalling the baptism of Jesus at the Jordan.

How is this important to us? That is because when we were baptised, we were immersed with the water of baptism much like Jesus as He was immersed in the waters of the River Jordan. And not only that, to show that our baptism is not symbolic, but instead a Sacrament, we were all sealed in the Most Holy Name of the Holy Trinity, to be the possessions of the Lord, and marked for His saving grace, which He had revealed to the world through Jesus.

Jesus Christ was unique among every beings that had ever been in creation and in this universe. That is because He is one Being with two distinct natures, one that is fully divine and the other that is fully human, the two natures of which are united much in the same way the Holy Trinity is united to each other, perfectly united in love and indivisible from one another.

The divine nature of Christ is the One who had existed before all ages with God and was God, the Logos or the Word of God, who came down into the world, and with the will of the Father and the power of the Holy Spirit, was conceived into the world in the womb of the Blessed Virgin Mary, His mother, and that was the time, when His human nature, that is Jesus Christ, becomes extant.

The two natures had always existed together in Jesus, but as He grew as a baby and then as a young child, the complete truth about His appointed mission in this world was not revealed to Jesus. Nevertheless, He grew to be great with wisdom and knowledge as He aged, and whatever had been taught to Him by His family in this world. It was however at His baptism in the Jordan, when the Trinity once again come together, in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, that the fullness of the divine mission of the Messiah, Jesus Christ, was made completely clear.

Hence, it can be said that this is the moment of new beginning in the earthly life of Christ. He began His ministry and teaching the Good News for the next three years or so, gathering His disciples and performing miracles and healing for the glory of God. It marked the beginning of the period of great graces of God, just as it does for all of us.

When we were baptised, we were marked to be the possessions of the Lord, that the mark of the Lord will remain for us for the rest of our lives. We were made completely clean once again, without any taints of sin with the water of baptism, and most important of all, we are all made children of God upon our baptism. But then we cannot just be idle or engage again in sinfulness, as we were indeed made clean upon baptism, but there also began our journey of faith towards the ultimate salvation in God, just as Jesus embarked upon His ministry.

May the Lord our God remind us of our holy baptism, of the time when we were made His children and welcomed into the Church, today, when we celebrate the baptism of His Son at the Jordan. May we remember always the water of baptism that made us whole again and worthy of the Lord, that we will resolve from now on to continue living in faith and devotion to God, without turning to the left or right.

Stay faithful, brethren, and as we rejoice in the baptism of our Lord Jesus Christ, let us also remember our own day of baptism! Yes, when we were made glorified as the children of God! God bless us all. Amen.

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Saturday, 11 January 2014 : Saturday after the Epiphany (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

We may be confused at first, when we listened to the first reading today, how that there are two kinds of sin, one that does not lead to death and one that leads to death. But indeed, there are indeed two kinds of sin that we know of in the Church, one being the venial sins, the lesser sins that are not very serious, and the other being the mortal sins, sins that are both heavy and serious in consequences.

But this does not mean that we should not take all sins seriously. Indeed, every kind of sins are serious and deadly, no matter how light or small they are. We cannot treat sinfulness lightly or we may end up in death. What is this death? As we all know, that the Lord is the Lord of life, and in Him, we have hope of eternal life, and liberation from the power of sin and death.

If we sin, that we are no longer worthy of the Lord, who is perfect in goodness. Yes, goodness that is not marred by sin. Sin, no matter how small, prevents us from truly reuniting ourselves with the love of God. And you all know that even if you build a building slowly, brick by brick, it will eventually become a large building. So it is the same as our sins then.

That is why as the Church had taught us, it is important for us to go to confession frequently, and not just that, but resolve to live a life without sin, as best as we can, every single day of our life. Confession should not be taken lightly, nor should we fear it. That is because the priests who hear our confession has been given with the authority from on high to forgive sins, just as with Jesus Christ, our Lord, who is Lord over all and had the authority to forgive sins, which He imparted to His disciples and from them, to our priests.

Do not fear, for the priests are also charged with the maintenance of the seal of confession, that is nothing that is shared by us to the priests should ever be made known to anyone else other than the priest. We should not fear to confess even our most secret sin. After all, the Lord is a loving and forgiving God, who will see that we are sorry for having sinned against Him and if we truly repented our sinfulness.

Sin is serious, brothers and sisters in Christ, and we should be conscious of our own sins, and understand the malice of sin above all else. Venial sins or small sins may not be a big hinder to our relationship with God, but they do make up to a big mountain of sin if we continue to do them without considering our state of sin.

We should indeed adopt the example of St. John the Baptist, who in great humility proclaimed the greatness of God, how great He was as compared to himself who is just mere servant of God. He readily said to his own disciples how he should decrease in importance while the Lord rose in importance. He did not let His human pride to get in the way, unlike many of us.

We often let fear and our human pride in the way of forgiveness. We do not let the Lord to come and absolve us from our sinfulness. We stood by our pride and let the devil to urge us to continue with our rebellion against God. No, this is not the way we should follow. Instead, cast aside our pride and fear, and instead put in a complete trust in the Lord and in His love and forgiveness.

Let us therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, from now on, follow the steps of St. John the Baptist, lowering ourselves humbly before God, and asking for His forgiveness from our sins, that we will be made righteous once again through our. Lord Jesus Christ, who sanctified and made holy all those who believe in Him. Let us be thrall of sin and evil no more, and let us from this day henceforth, be free and liberated!

Go often to confession and confess our wrongs to God, for our loving Father will surely hear us, forgive us, and embrace us with His love. God forgive our sins and be with us all always. Amen.

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Friday, 10 January 2014 : Friday after the Epiphany (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we see the power and authority of our Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God and Saviour of the world. Jesus needs no fame or human praise, because in Him lies all the glory and all praise, as the Lord of all. He sought not popularity or human praise, by doing His miracles, but He did them because of His love for us all, for all mankind.

Yes, brethren, in the past few days we have heard from the Scriptures how Jesus fed the multitudes of more than five thousand men not counting women and children, and how Jesus healed the sick, the lepers and those with illness, restoring them to full health and show the love that God has for them all. He did these to show mankind that He cared for them, and wanting them to be perfectly cured of their maladies, most important of which, is the malady of the soul.

Yes, sin, the malady of the soul. Sin tainted mankind with impurity and unworthiness, which separated us from God. Sin made us unable to comprehend God’s love for us. And it is sin that our Lord came down to us, in order to correct and address this problem, this darkness that prevented us from seeing and living in the Light of God.

The Lord had no need of advertisement to promote Himself, for the Holy Spirit testified for Him, and the people could see that He is One with authority and power. It is clear enough that no one is like Him, and He is not a mere man or a mere prophet of God, for He is the Son of God Most High endowed with power, and with the authority over all diseases and illnesses, as well as over all the forces of this world.

Yet many people continued to refuse to believe in Him or doubt in His presence. They put their trust more in human and worldly powers rather than in the Lord. The devil is hard at work everyday to convince the people that his way is better and more appealing than that of the Lord, Jesus Christ.

And yet, the path of the evil one is death and destruction, while the path of the Lord is life and true joy. Only in the Lord can we find the source of life, just as St. John the Evangelist told us in his letter. True life and hope for life is not in us if we do not believe in God and His Son, or put our trust in Him, the Lord of life. Jesus made it plainly enough throughout His teachings.

Jesus repeated the words eternal life very often in His ministry, and a lot of His teachings revolved on, and focused on the fact that whoever believes in Him and has Him in themselves, shall not suffer death or the consequences of death, but will gain the eternal reward of life with God. He did not make this promise lightly, for He truly imparted to all of us, as He had promised, with His own Body and Blood, sacrificed for our sake and offered freely to us.

Yes, those of us who receive the Lord in the Most Holy Eucharist and believe in Him wholeheartedly, is assured of life in God. Brethren in Christ, it is important that while we live in this world, that we do not get too engrossed with the world and forget what the Lord had asked of us. Yes, because believing in God is not merely just making promises or empty proclamation of the faith. If we believe in God, we must show it concretely through our actions, words and deeds.

Therefore brethren, let us now truly profess our faith in the Lord, that we show Him true faith and dedication, not just in words but also in action. Let the Lord see that we are truly His faithful and loving children, and that we reject the lies of the evil one. May the Lord therefore, then bless us with the abundance of blessings and graces, that in Him, we may find the joy of eternal life in true happiness. God bless us all. Amen.

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Thursday, 9 January 2014 : Thursday after the Epiphany (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Brothers and sisters in Christ, in Jesus lies the salvation of this world, just as it had been foretold by the prophets of ages past. Jesus fulfilled perfectly the prophecy of the prophet Isaiah, who foretold the coming of the Messiah, at which time, the world which had been long in darkness would see a new light, accompanied by signs of great joy and healing, which Christ fulfilled perfectly as mentioned by Isaiah.

And yet, even though the signs had been very clear that Christ was truly the Messiah, many of the people adamantly and continuously resisted the Christ and refused to acknowledge the divinity and the Lordship of Jesus Christ. Some, like the Pharisees and the Sadducees opposed Him and even hounded Him throughout His ministry because they saw Him as a rival to their own worldly authority in teaching the faith.

Some others, like His own countrymen and neighbours, the villagers of Nazareth refused to believe in Him, just because it was incomprehensible and impossible for them to believe that a mere carpenter’s son, the son of Joseph, could be the Messiah, less so to be the Lord of all creations Himself. They were formed by this prejudice, and therefore, they were not receptive to His teachings or His message.

Jesus spoke with clear authority and with the full grasp of the truth behind the Lord’s plan of salvation. Jesus made clear the true meaning behind the Lord’s ordained laws for mankind, that is the Ten Commandments He had revealed to His people through Moses. The Ten Commandments had been followed by many, but had also been forgotten at times, and their true purpose was truly not understood by the people, at the time of Jesus, when the Pharisees and the teachers of the law taught them the twisted version of the commandments of God.

The Lord had revealed to Moses many regulations and rites in addition to the commandments He gave, but these were meant to make sure that the people obey the Law of the Lord and do not instead walk astray to worship pagan gods, as these stubborn people had shown in the desert, how easily they were swayed to worship the gods and idols of the people around them.

By the time of Jesus, these rules and regulations had been codified by the Pharisees and the teachers, experts of the law, ending up becoming a great burden for the people, for there were many additions to the original rule, following the customs handed down the generations by the Jewish people. These rules numbered about six hundred and thirteen in total, and the Pharisees as well as the teachers of the law enforced them very strictly on the people.

That was why, the Lord Jesus came to us also to make clear the true meaning of the laws He had given to mankind, that they would not perversely use them for their own purposes, or corrupt them with human greed or desire. Jesus taught the people that God’s law is love, just as He is Love. The Law of God was never meant to be the burden for mankind or to punish them, but instead, it was there because the Lord loves us and He wants us to be saved.

Yes, just like the love of a father for his children. And remember how St. John the Evangelist in today’s first reading also mentioned that the law is not a burden? And because if we love God with the sincerity of our hearts, we will surely do anything in our power to devote ourselves to Him and obey Him? That is why, brethren, we must not misunderstood the Lord or misused His commandments just as the Pharisees and the teachers of the Law had done.

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, let us praise and honour our Lord and God for His great love to us. Let us not reject or cast Him away as His own countrymen and the Pharisees, the leaders of God’s people had done. Instead, let us welcome Him and His love for us, by pledging back to Him our own love dedicated to Him.

May the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ be with us all, strengthen us, and empower us to live with love, every single day of our lives. Amen.

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Wednesday, 8 January 2014 : Wednesday after the Epiphany (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

God is with us, and He never leaves us, because He is in us and He remains with us, so long as we remain faithful ourselves towards Him. He steadies those who have faith in Him and keep them steady in the storm of the ocean that is this world. Like the disciples, if they keep their faith in God strong, their ship would not sink, because the Lord is with them.

God sent us His Son, Jesus Christ, to liberate us from the tyranny of sin and evil. No longer will evil have any power or sovereignty over us, as they once had since the days of the first mankind until the sacrifice of Jesus on the cross. This is the proof of Divine love, manifested in the suffering and death of Jesus.

And He did not just stop at that, because He promised and then sent the Advocate, that is the Holy Spirit, to come down upon His disciples on Pentecost, who then, through the disciples, passed on to all the faithful ones, all of us today. The Lord Himself dwells within us through His Most Holy Presence in the Eucharist, which we partake every time we participate in the Holy Mass.

We must always them keep all of our actions, our deeds and words within the bounds of the laws and the precepts of the Lord, because only then He will remain with us and stay within us, marking us as the ones worthy of His kingdom when He comes again at His second coming. We cannot just profess our faith in Christ without action, that is concrete action, based in love, the love of God.

Faith without love and good graces through our actions, again based on love, is dead. A dead faith is no good, and is no better than having no faith in the Lord. Our faith must be a vibrant and living faith, which is a faith made concrete by our own loving actions, both towards our neighbours, our fellow men and women, as well as of course, towards God Himself, who had first loved us.

God rewards those who have faith, and rewards those who love. This is because He treasures those who believe in Him and worship Him as the Lord their God, and those who follow His will, as revealed through the prophets and through the Lord Jesus Himself who revealed to us the true meaning of the commandments of God that is love.

And God will protect those who belong to Him and provide for them. They will be blessed and glorified. Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, let us put our complete trust in the Lord and love Him more and more day after day. Fear not the devil or any forces that threaten us, because the Lord is with us, on our side. Those who have any ill will against us will be destroyed before God.

Instead, brothers and sisters, we should love one another and care for each other, and give of ourselves to others in need, in the same way as Jesus Himself had given Himself to us, to be our help, our Saviour, and our hope. Be a beacon of light for the people of God, those who still live in darkness. Share with them, the love of God, that we have in us, because we have received the Holy Spirit and the Lord Himself dwells within us.

Let us profess love in all of our actions, words, and deeds, and spread the same love that God has given us through Jesus. Let us always remember that our faith is dead without action, and particularly without love. Let us from now on, if we have not done so, love one another, and love each other sincerely, forgiving each other of the mistakes we have done, and remove any grudge that existed between us. And finally, let us love Jesus our Lord with all our hearts, all of our strength and abilities!

Lord Jesus, love us ever more and continue to watch over us, and make us to realise how great the love You have for us, that we may love You ever more too! Amen.

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Tuesday, 7 January 2014 : Tuesday after the Epiphany, Memorial of St. Raymond of Penyafort, Priest (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

God is Love, and He is the embodiment of Love, and in Him is the purest form of love as ever existed in this universe. That is what today’s readings try to bring to us, as we continue to learn more and more about the Lord and what His plans are for us.

God loved us so much that He was willing to come down, in the form of man like us, His own Word, the divine becoming a humble and mortal man, so that through Him, the world may know love, understand love, and most importantly, be saved in the love of God.

Jesus brought the love of God into reality and complete in concreteness. The love of God was made real through Jesus, whose very presence was the ultimate proof of God’s undying love for us, even though we often reject and spurn His love for us. Despite of that, He still came offering His love to all mankind, even to those who rejected Him and persecuted Him and those who followed Him.

God showed His love even by feeding His people, when they followed Him to hear His teachings even for days. He miraculously multiplied loaves of bread and fishes, to feed them until there were even great excess and leftovers. In His love for us, He showed it through concrete action, and in the end, He gave none other than Himself, offering Himself to all of us, in the form of His own Body and Blood.

We who receive these Body and Blood of our Lord, that is in the Eucharist, receive the Lord, and indeed, the fullness of His love. We can indeed say that as the Lord loves us, His love is now inside each one of us. That is the message that St. John the Evangelist in his letter tried to convey to us, that because we belong to the Lord and the Lord is in us, we have love and we know what is love. And therefore, with that love, we ought to love one another.

Love cannot just remain within us or it will be dormant, wither and die. This is because love is meant to be shared with one another. There is no love or real love if we selfishly keep it to ourselves. Certainly our Lord who is love did not keep the love He has for us, from us. He was moved with compassion and love every time He saw His children, that is us, in pain, sorrow or difficulties. The proof of which could be found throughout the Scriptures, including what Jesus had done in the multiplication of the bread and fish to feed His beloved ones.

Today, we celebrate the feast of St. Raymond of Penyafort, a religious who lived during the time of the Medieval era Europe. St. Raymond was a major figure in the faith in that era, having numerous contributions to the cause of the Church, by his numerous writings and works, in particular related to the Church laws and regulations, meant to regulate and maintain purity in the faith of the people of God.

But besides this, St. Raymond was also very renowned for his missionary zeal, that is to spread the word of God and the truth about God to those who lacked faith in Him. St. Raymond was particularly aiming at the conversion of the Jews and the Muslims. The first group of people was the people first chosen by God to be His people, but many rejected Him when He came to His people in Jesus. They rejected the One who had fed them with food, as well as with His own Body and Blood.

And the second one was a group of people who were misled by heresy instigated by the false prophets in what is now modern day Arabia. They were misled by falsehood spread by the evil one in purpose to confuse the people of God, that they would reject the very One who is the true and complete manifestation of God’s love in this world, that is Jesus Christ. They rejected Him and His divinity, rejecting that their Lord came into this world to save them, being led into the lies that it was unimaginable for their Lord to lower Himself to be a humble man.

These are the people whom St. Raymond wanted to convert to the cause of the Lord, to show them the truth of the love our God has for everyone, including these misled and rebellious children of His. We too should take part in delivering the truth to everyone and have the same aspiration as St. Raymond of Penyafort. We have to show the love of God to them, just as we should also show the same love to one another. We do this through our own actions, deeds, and words, that they too may believe.

May the Lord our God who loves us with all of His heart, also enkindle in our hearts His love, that we may love one another just as He asked of us, as well loving Him as our God and our Father. Amen.

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Monday, 6 January 2014 : Monday after the Epiphany (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Only those spirits who acknowledge that Jesus is Lord and God, that truly belong to the Lord. Not all spirits and apparitions belong to the Lord, for some does belong to the devil and the falsehoods that he brings to us. Yes, brothers and sisters in Christ, it is important for us to take note of this fact, so that we will not fall into deception and disobey the Lord and His will, even without us knowing it.

Prophets, seers, and visionaries appeared throughout the ages, even up to today, my brethren. We have those who received visions and apparitions of various origins, some of which are truly genuine and have been approved by the Church, but some others of more dubious origins and may even be an attention-seeking or popularity movement, if not immediately devil-inspired.

My dear friends, indeed we have much to gain from good visions and apparitions, through which the Lord continues to speak to us, either directly or through the intermediary of His saints, particularly that of His mother Mary. Through these the Lord had made His will known, and that particularly and often includes the call for mankind to return to Him and repent from their sins.

Remember brethren, that we ought to adhere strongly to the teachings of the faith through the Church, what the Church had taught us in our faith, which is the result of millennia of refinement and richness of God’s revelations made through the ages via His innumerable saints. Quite a few of the saints recognised by the Church were known to be mystics and visionaries, who often received messages from the divine. And our faith can only get richer because of them.

But we have to be careful lest we fall into the lies and falsehoods of Satan. Remember that our first ancestors, Adam and Eve, was deceived by Satan wearing the then noble form of the animal snake, posing to them as the good and benevolent being with good intent, but in fact having malice and evil deep inside. The devil, the prince and father of lies, deceit, and trickery certainly have no problem to deceive us by posing as a holy angel of God or the apparition of saints.

Hence, brothers and sisters in Christ, it is absolutely important for all of us to be properly educated on the faith we have in Christ, that we all will all have a solid foundation of faith, that not even the devil will be able to disturb. And the catechesis of our faith must be complete, that we leave no loophole which the evil one will be able to exploit to his advantage.

Thus, it is important for all of us to seek to always understand more about our faith, by putting our trust in reliable sources especially in the teaching authority of the Church, and trusting only in visions and apparitions approved and proven to be true by the authority of the Church. For the Church had been the great deposit of faith, defending the true and orthodox faith ever since the days of the Apostles until today.

Popular apparition or vision, or popular and influential individuals do not make up our faith brothers and sisters in Christ. If what they revealed to us is not in line or even contrary to our faith and the teachings of the faith in the Church, we can be almost certain that those visions, apparitions, and individuals did not come from God, but rather from men, or worse still, from the evil one.

The popular alleged apparition of the Blessed Virgin Mary at Medjugorje in Serbia for example, had not been approved as a legitimate apparition of the faith and yet it remained very popular, drawing many pilgrims and believers. In the Medjugorje ‘apparition’, the Blessed Virgin apparently appeared daily and gave her messages in daily manner, almost as if she is responding to the prayers of the pilgrims, and as a result, drawing even more people to come and believe in the alleged apparition.

This is what we have to exactly be on guard for, to avoid putting too much emphasis on unverified visions of the spirits, so that we will not easily fall prey to the attempts of the evil one to deceive us, just as he had once deceived Eve, and many other people who had passed away before us. Be always on guard, and strengthen our faith. Read the Scriptures with understanding and deepen our knowledge of the faith through understanding the teachings of the Church.

May our Lord Jesus Christ strengthen our faith, and grant us the strength and courage to say no to the deceptions of evil, and that we may seek the Lord and. Him only, following what He truly desires of us. God be with us all. Amen.

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Sunday, 5 January 2014 : Solemnity of the Epiphany of the Lord (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Dear brothers and sisters in Christ, today we celebrate the feast of the Epiphany, a great feast commemorating the divinity and Lordship of our Lord and God Jesus Christ. On this feast we remember the faith of the great men from the east, the three wise men, or often known as the three ‘kings’, who come from a far-off land to honour and glorify the Saviour who was born in Bethlehem.

They came to praise the Lord, whose birth was foretold by the prophets, and whose birth was marked by the appearance of the great star in the heavens. The Light of the world had indeed come into this world, and no more appropriately marked by a sign of great light. That was why the wise men came to Him who is Lord, bearing with them great gifts worthy of our Lord Jesus.

The wise men brought with them the gifts of gold, frankincense, and myrrh. These were great and precious gifts, each of which had a deep, symbolic meaning, each of which also highlighted the truth about Jesus, who is both King and Lord God of all, who came into this world, so that through Him all may be saved.

Gold is the offering fit for a king. Ever since ages past, due to its appearance and its rarity, gold had been used for many important purposes, especially as money or decorations, or as works of art. They were so precious that they fetched a great price, and this is true even until today. So why is gold given as a gift to our Lord? That is because He is indeed a King, the One and True King of all, the King of kings, whose authority encompasses all of creations.

In giving the Lord Jesus the gift of gold, the wise men honoured the Lordship and kingship of Jesus, of the authority and power which He wields over all things, in all of creations. They honoured the Lord as King of glory, the One from whom ultimately all power and authority originate from. The Lord’s power and rule is absolute, and this is what this gift of gold is meant to teach us.

Then frankincense, just as the incense we use at our celebration of the Mass, is meant to be used for worship. Frankincense is in particular the best and the greatest among incense, the best quality of all. And indeed, the gift of frankincense highlighted the divinity of our Lord Jesus Christ, the divine Lord and Almighty God, who alone is worthy of worship.

The Lord Jesus is divine, and this fact cannot be refuted or denied, despite the attempts of many to do so. Jesus is not just merely a holy man or a prophet, because He is truly far greater than all of that. He is the Logos, the Word of God made personal in Jesus, as the Divine incarnate. As such, He is one with God and is God, and through Him the world was created. He was present before the beginning of time and before all things came into being.

We should not have any other gods except God, and we should worship Him and Him alone. And Jesus is divine, and as such is worthy of worship, and indeed we are actually obliged to give Him the proper honour and worship. That is the message and understanding behind the gift of the frankincense to the baby Jesus, man but also fully divine at the same time.

But it is not all about majesty and glory that Jesus came into the world. The last gift of the three, that is myrrh, highlighted this reality. The myrrh is a precious material used to help preserve the dead bodies, and to prepare them for burial. It is indeed a weird gift, is it not? Who would give a baby a gift that is used to preserve and prepare a man’s burial?

But that is how wonderful the feast of Epiphany is, because just as the meaning of the word Epiphany, this feast marks the opening of our understanding to the true nature of our Lord Jesus Christ, that first He is King, as represented by the gift of gold; and that He is Lord and God, as represented by the offering of frankincense; and last but not least, the gift of myrrh, which symbolises the singular important event, for which Jesus Christ came into the world.

That event was the Passion of our Lord, when He suffered, persecuted, punished, and eventually died on the cross, all for the sake of the reparation of our sins. He died and was buried, and it is this burial which was highlighted by the gift of the myrrh. For it is important that the Lord Jesus die, that in His death, we too will join Him in dying to our old, sinful selves, and then risen in glory together with the resurrection of Jesus.

The gift of myrrh signified this great event, when our Lord made Himself the Lamb of sacrifice, to bear the sins of the world. He who is Divine was willing to come down into this world, and to suffer human rejection and condemnation, and to suffer a most humiliating death, that is death on the cross. All these so that we, the most beloved among those He had created, can be once again reunited with Him.

Therefore, brothers and sisters in Christ, as the Epiphany and the gift and offerings of the three wise men highlighted the true nature of God and the centre important issues of our faith, let us all use this opportunity, to reflect on our own relationship with God. Have we realised the great love that God has for all of us? Do we then choose to obey and follow Him? Or do we instead prefer to reject Him and continue to walk in the darkness?

Christ is the Light of the world and He has come to liberate us from darkness. Just as the three wise men had followed Jesus from afar and came to worship and pay their obeisance to Him, we too should follow their examples. Offer God our love, obedience, and devotion, and offer Him the gifts from our hearts. Be faithful to God, and follow His ways, for in His love, He had given much love for us and show us how to lead a faithful life to Him, that we may be saved. God be with us all. Amen.

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Saturday, 4 January 2014 : Weekday of Christmas Time (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Brothers and sisters in Christ, today we hear about the call that Jesus made to His first disciples, when St. John the Baptist announced to the people, the truth about Jesus, that is the Lamb of God. One may ask, why Lamb of God? To answer this, we have to look at the role of the lamb in the society of Israel and the faith that they had, that is following the laws of God as given through Moses.

The lamb is one of the few animals mentioned at the Book of Leviticus, used in the offerings to God, which in this book, were used for various purposes. The most important of these sacrifices were the sin and burnt offerings to God, in which the animals were slaughtered and their blood on the Altar of God represent the cleansing of the sins of God’s people, and the purification of their souls.

But these offering of lambs and other animals as sin offerings, were only temporary. They did not completely erase the sins of the people, nor did they justify the people in God. The people were only given a breather in their sinful daily lives, and they have to offer the sacrifices again and again to keep themselves worthy of the Lord.

That is because, even though unblemished lamb supposed to be used, they are not perfect, not in the way that the Lamb of God is perfect in all aspects. Then, to add to the point of the truth about the Lamb of God, we have to also remember about what happened when God saved His people Israel from their slavery in Egypt. God asked the people through Moses, to find unblemished lamb, and slaughter it so that its blood could be used to mark the houses of God’s people.

The blood let it known to the angels of death sent by God to kill the firstborn of the Egyptians, that the houses marked by the blood belong to God. Yes, death passed the houses of the faithful who obeyed the Lord, and the people of Israel were saved and liberated by the Lord who loved them. In this light therefore, we too, should see the Lord Jesus, the Lamb of God.

For indeed we can define the role of Lord Jesus Christ in these two characteristics. First that Jesus is the Lamb of sacrifice, the most worthy of all, to be the offering for all of our sins. As Jesus is Himself God incarnate, He is perfect and indeed the only One perfect to redeem us from our sinfulness, and to make worthy again all the people of God.

Then secondly, Jesus is the Lamb whose Blood becomes the mark of all the faithful ones in God, that when the Day of Judgment comes, God will know those who belong to Him, and those who had remained faithful and true to His ways. Remember that Jesus in the Last Supper gave His own Body and Blood in the transformed bread and wine for His disciples to eat and drink.

This is very much in the same way as the lamb of the Passover, where the lamb was slaughtered, and it was eaten by the family of the people who slaughtered it, and the blood used to mark the houses of the faithful. Jesus is our Passover Lamb, or more precisely the Paschal Lamb of sacrifice, who brought with Him the joy and hope of Easter. In this perfect sacrifice of Christ, which He made on the cross, He reunited mankind to the Lord, and made the whole creation to be filled once again with hope.

Jesus did not come into this world for leisure or without a clear purpose. He had a clear aim, that is to liberate mankind from their slavery to sin and evil, ever since mankind were sundered from God after they had sinned. Jesus laid Himself freely for us, as a lamb led to the place of slaughter, just as He went through grievous scourging and suffering during His Passion and way towards the cross. All these, He did for our sake, that we may be free forever from the dominion of sin and evil.

Yet, as we all know, brethren, many of us still live in darkness and prefer to be in the darkness rather than to be in the light. We turn ourselves away from the Lamb. He offered us freely the graces He had poured onto us with His sacrifice, and yet we still prefer to rebel against Him and reject His offer of salvation and eternal life.

We prefer to live in our sinfulness and our current way of life, instead of seeking the Lord in the way that the disciples had done. Remember what happened when John the Baptist proclaimed to the disciples, that Jesus is the Lamb of God. The disciples straight away went and follow Him, without questioning and without doubting!

Can we too, brothers and sisters, profess our faith in Jesus in the same way? Jesus offered Himself to us, for our sake, and died for us on the cross, that we will be saved and received new life in Him. He went quietly and obediently to the slaughtering table, so that we ourselves will not have to endure death and its punishment for eternity. We are sinners yes, but we do have the capacity and ability to change ourselves for the better.

Therefore, let us today seek first to know more about our Lord, the Lamb of God, and then learn to love Him and seek Him more and more, that we will be more intimate in our relationship with Him. Let us not be ignorant of His love but instead seek to increase even more the love we have for Him. May the Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, free us from the hands of Satan, and bring us into new life eternal. Amen.

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Friday, 3 January 2014 : Weekday of Christmas Time, Memorial of the Most Holy Name of Jesus (Scripture Reflections)

Liturgical Colour : White

Today we glory in Jesus Christ, and we praise Him with the greatest exaltation we can give. Indeed, we ought to do that every single day of our lives without ceasing, with every single breath that we take. For it is through Christ that we have life, and it is also through Christ that we have hope for a new and everlasting life in joy and happiness.

Why is Jesus so special? And why is He so important to all of us? That is because as we all know, He is God Himself, and yet He is not a distant and unloving God who lords Himself over us as gods typically do, in our understanding of the term divine. Instead, Jesus is the Word, who is God and who is with God since the very beginning of all, begotten of the Father not created, and who emptied Himself of His glorious divinity, so that He might be born into this world, as one of us, a lowly human.

His coming had been prophesied by the prophets and the messengers of God for many millennia, and His coming had been expected and awaited by the people of God. God was known as the God named I am who I am, or YHVH in short. His Name is holy, and as one of the Ten Commandments stated, that the people of God must treat this Holy Name with the greatest respect.

We who are the most beloved ones of the Lord’s entire creation, had sinned against Him and rebelled against His will and commands, preferring to trust in Satan rather than in the power of the One and only True God. Yet, God is Love, and in us, He saw that there were good in us, just as all of creation was once perfect in goodness.

Everything was good then, until rebellion, pride and jealousy entered into the heart of Satan, who rebelled against Him and boasted that he would sit at the throne of God, only to be cast down, away from heaven. From there, Satan tricked and lied to our ancestors, that they were deceived and sin entered into the hearts of mankind. Ever since then we had been made dirty by the presence of sin in us, and yet in each one of us good is still present.

That is why God decided to come down upon this world in order to save us all from our fate that is death. He came to us, through the intermediary of the Blessed Virgin Mary, His mother, who bore Him as He remained in her womb for nine months after He, by the power of His own Spirit, entered into the world of mankind

And just like all of us, He has a Name, and a Name was given Him, that is Jesus, which in the original Aramaic is Yehosuah in approximation, containing the Name of YHVH, that is the Lord. Yes, that is in conjunction with the other name that Jesus is known, that is Emmanuel, or God-is-with-us. Yes, the very Name of Jesus is Holy and great, for it is the Name of God Himself, and not just any gods, but the One and only True God who dwells with us, by being born into the world, in order to be our Saviour.

He came into this world and began His ministry, of healing, of teaching, of feeding the people of God. He gave a great revelation on the nature of God and His love. Indeed, as we all know, that God so loved the world, that He gave His one and only Son, Jesus Christ, so that all who believe in Him will not perish in death, but gain eternal life, which was promised to us by the Lord Himself.

Jesus came into this world with power and authority, and not just any kind of authority or power, but the true authority, out of whom all authorities came about. There can be no power or authority that does not have its source in Jesus. Even the devil, Satan, who had reigned mercilessly upon us as our jailor in the slavery by sin, and who had exercised power and control over us, was powerless and is powerless, and will ever be powerless before Jesus.

The evil spirits feared Him, and said His Holy Name aloud to the people to hear, that is Jesus, the Holy One of God, the Christ Himself. They trembled with fear upon hearing His Name, knowing the fate that they will suffer at the hand of God’s justice. They were once beautiful angels in heaven, but they followed the devil, once Lucifer, the brightest and greatest angel into his rebellion as I mentioned earlier. Ever since then, they were doomed, and destined to suffer for eternity by God’s justice.

The Lord’s authority is over everything, every single matter that exists in our universe and beyond. He is the Lord of all things visible and invisible. That is why even at the utterance of His Name, every knee and every beings shall bow down, genuflect, even flat to the floor! Yes, every beings, everything created by God, be it angels, mankind, animals, plants, or even the demons, the evil spirits, and Satan the great enemy of all himself.

Yet, brethren, sadly, many of us these days seem to take lightly upon this Most holy Name of all names. They made fun of His Name and disrespected His glorious Name. They did not respect the Name of the Lord, through whose sacrifice on the cross, we have been made whole once again, and gained the hop e of life eternal in Him. We instead prefer to deal with the devil, just as our ancestors had done, and glorify him instead of glorifying the Lord in Jesus.

This must not be the way we live our lives, brethren in Christ! We have to seek a total and complete change of our wayward ways, and seek to rectify the impropriety we had done upon the Lord. Keep the Lord’s Name sacred and glorified, just as He had commanded us in the Ten Commandments He gave to Moses. We cannot mock or disdain the Holy Name of Jesus.

Remember, brethren, the power of the Holy Name is powerful. If we are faced with a great power of evil, and we recite this great Name with faith, that is with true faith, and if we are upright in our lives, then no power, no matter how great or how evil it may be, can assail us. God Himself will come to protect us, and those who are against us will flee in fear, because they know that God is with us, Emmanuel! Jesus indeed! The One whose Name is exalted above every other names!

Yes, let us all give glory to our Lord Jesus, and glorify His Name from now on if we have not done so. Come Lord Jesus, be with Your people, and with Your children, and deliver us from the evil one, with the might of Your hands and with the glory of Your Name!