I have made my life’s purpose to make Jesus smile.  I encourage you to make this your life’s purpose too.  Jesus, Our LORD and Saviour gave everything to open the gates of Paradise to us, to redeem us and to give us new life.  The question is what will we give to Him, how can we give Him glory, how can we prove that we truly, truly love Him.

I don’t think the answer to this question needs to be really complicated.  Let’s reflect together on what God truly wants from us.

FAITH, SURRENDER AND TRUST

Our spiritual journey must begin with faith in God.

“And it is impossible to please God without faith. Anyone who wants to come to him must believe that God exists and that he rewards those who sincerely seek him.”  Hebrews 11:6

If you are struggling to believe, don’t be afraid.  God will reveal Himself to you.  Pray for faith. It is a gift He wants to give you.

To truly surrender to God’s will and His way, we must acknowledge the truth that we are all sinners and we are all in need of God’s grace, His blessing and His guidance.

“For everyone has sinned; we all fall short of God’s glorious standard.” Romans 3:23

“If we confess our sins, he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness.  If we say we have not sinned, we make him a liar, and his word is not in us.” 1 John 1:9-10

As we begin a new year, let us examine our lives and ask God to reveal to us how we can improve and truly make Him smile.  Let’s tell God we are sorry for our sins and ask for His forgiveness and protection from all that is evil and contrary to His holy will.

Surrender is not an easy thing for human beings because most of us like to control things, but the truth is we can’t really control anything.  This very day something could happen that could change our priorities; let’s surrender our lives to God knowing that He will always be there to help us.

Surrender requires trust in God, great trust in fact.

“Trust in the LORD with all your heart; do not depend on your own understanding.  Seek his will in all you do, and he will show you which path to take.” Proverbs 3:5-6

I’ll tell you a true story about something that happened to me a number of years ago.  I was going to a church that I had never been to before.  I was going there to pray and to be with Our Lord.  I wanted to spend some quiet, sacred time with Him and I was excited that this chapel inside the Church was open 24 hours a day.

A problem arose getting there.  At one point I realized I was lost.  I have a poor sense of direction and I overestimated my ability to drive to the Church without getting lost.  I didn’t have a phone with me to check google maps and I didn’t have a GPS, so I prayed:  “God I am lost!”  Suddenly I tell you the truth, my hands started moving the steering wheel with such confidence.  I turned the steering wheel multiple times.  I was turning this way and that way and after a few turns, behold I saw the Church.  It was a little miracle, God took over driving the car, with my hands.  God did what I could not do.  He brought me to my destination and He will bring you to where He needs you to be if you surrender to Him and trust Him and give Him control over your life and your plans and priorities.

SPIRITUAL INTIMACY

Do you remember when Jesus said, “I am the vine; you are the branches. If you remain in me and I in you, you will bear much fruit; apart from me you can do nothing.”  John 15:5

If a branch breaks off the vine it cannot survive because it needs the vine to sustain it.  It’s life and it’s vitality depend on the vine.

Jesus used this image of Himself as the vine to help us to understand that He desires intimacy.  Jesus wants us to know that He is always with us and we can rely on Him being with us in every moment.  We are His chapel, the place where He will perpetually live, if we will invite Him in and make Him the center of our lives.

Intimacy thrives on persistent communication.  Prayer and reading and understanding God’s Word are not just important, they are critical to enabling us to remain connected with God’s grace and holiness.  We cannot be holy in and of ourselves, but if we remain close to Jesus and keep praying for His love to work through us, we will find ourselves capable of doing things we might have thought impossible.

LOVE AND SACRIFICE

I was privileged at the age of forty, to hear God’s voice speaking in my heart, asking me a question.  I was at a turning point in my life.  It was not a happy time.  I was lost.  I was not going to church.  I had never read the Bible.  I was very unhappy and I wasn’t even sure I wanted to live and God made a house call that changed my life.

God asked me this question: “What is love?”  His voice within me was gentle and powerful.

I answered, “I know what love is.  Love is a feeling.”

To this the gentle voice within me said one word, “Wrong”

So I said, “What is it then?”

And the voice within my heart said, “Love is a choice”

I realized that God was not happy with some of the choices I was contemplating, e.g., should I get a divorce, should I end my life.

I realized love is born in choices that please God, that honour Him.

I realized God was coming to me to help me make some choices that would change my life and allow me to become the woman He wanted me to be.

So I returned to church after a very long absence.  I confessed my sins, rebuilt my marriage and broke free from depression.

I kept hearing God say in my heart, “Trust Me”.  It wasn’t an order, just a quiet gentle, yet powerful summons to put my faith in Him and so I did and here we are.

Do you need to reflect on your choices?

Spiritual discernment is to have the ability to keep distinguishing am I on the right path, am I pleasing God, are my choices ‘love in action’ or are they selfish and greedy?  Let’s keep reflecting on our lives.  Are we making Jesus smile or are we focused on pleasing ourselves?

True love requires sacrifice.  Love must be more than just giving Jesus the scraps that are left over from a life of self-indulgence.  Are we giving God our lives, our hopes, our dreams?  God has a plan for us and it may or may not be consistent with what we imagined or dreamed.

Let us stay close to Jesus and ask Him to help us make choices that prove our love.  Let us ask Jesus to help us to become more and more like Him, selfless, charitable, patient, willing to sacrifice for the wellbeing of others.

DIVINE NOURISHMENT

God gave us such an amazing gift, The Bible.  The Bible is God’s story, the story of His people, His plan of salvation, His Holy Will and His Holy Way.  Let us be fed with His Word as we strive to learn how we can keep making Him smile with lives devoted to pleasing Him.

The Bible was not written as a ‘profitable venture’.  The chosen people, the first disciples of Christ sacrificed themselves and endured great hardship to share the Word of God with us.

“Unlike so many, we do not peddle the word of God for profit. On the contrary, in Christ we speak before God with sincerity, as those sent from God.” 2 Corinthians 2:17

The first disciples of Jesus “… devoted themselves to the apostles’ teaching, and to fellowship, and to sharing in meals (including the Lord’s Supper), and to prayer.” Acts 2:42

Jesus invites us to His Supper to receive His Body and Blood in the Sacrament of the Eucharist.

Remember on the night before Jesus died, “He took some bread and gave thanks to God for it. Then he broke it in pieces and gave it to the disciples, saying, “This is my body, which is given for you. Do this in remembrance of me.”  Luke 22:19

The Eucharist is such a mystery.  That Jesus Himself can transform ordinary bread and wine into His Body and Blood is a miracle that we experience in every Mass.  Remember St. Paul cautioned people, “For if you eat the bread or drink the cup without honoring the body of Christ, you are eating and drinking God’s judgment upon yourself.” 1 Corinthians 11:29

Let us ask Jesus to help us to receive Him in the Blessed Sacrament with reverence and awe for He is Holy and He wills to feed us and nourish us, His little branches, in need of His life and love with His Body and His Blood.

PRAYER AND THANKSGIVING

“Be thankful in all circumstances, for this is God’s will for you who belong to Christ Jesus.  Do not stifle the Holy Spirit.  Do not scoff at prophecies, but test everything that is said. Hold on to what is good. Stay away from every kind of evil.  Now may the God of peace make you holy in every way, and may your whole spirit and soul and body be kept blameless until our Lord Jesus Christ comes again.” 1 Thessalonians 5: 18-23

“And pray in the Spirit on all occasions with all kinds of prayers and requests. With this in mind, be alert and always keep on praying for all the Lord’s people.”  Ephesians 6:18

Friends of Jesus, in my spiritual journey something happened that truly transformed me and that something was I went to Calvary to witness in my heart The Passion of Christ.  I continue to go to Calvary every day @ The Time Jesus died for us, 3pm, and at that time I pray for forgiveness, I pray for the whole world, for God’s mercy and saving grace, for God’s Holy Spirit to be poured out upon all souls for our salvation and sanctification.  As I continue to reflect on how much Jesus suffered to save us, I am called to forgive those that have hurt me.

I invite you to join The Mercy Movement that is calling all believers of Christ to stop and pray and remember how much Jesus suffered to save us.  We unite daily at 3 o’clock each of us in our local time zones or in any time zone convenient for prayer.  Our world needs the mercy of Our Saviour Jesus Christ and Jesus is so worthy of us stopping every day to say thank you Lord for dying for us, for your willingness to give everything to prepare a place in Paradise for us.

Let’s keep striving to make Jesus smile.  Let’s stay close to Him asking Jesus to perfect us one day at a time into the people He wants us to be.