We All Need Forgiveness!

True humility matters!

Happy Passion Sunday!

We must be aware of our actions and those of others, but we must not judge the individual. This is difficult for me, and I assume it is difficult for others too! Jesus challenges us to look at what we think and what we do. On this Passion Sunday our Gospel Portion, St. John 8: 1-11, helps us to approach people through the Eyes of God. Our selection to meditate on is,

And they continued to ask Him, He stood up and said to them, “Let him who is without sin among you be the first to throw a stone at her.”

But when they heard it, they went away, one by one, beginning with the eldest, and Jesus was left alone with the woman standing before Him. John 8: 7, 9

Let us look at the individuals who wanted to use the woman caught in adultery to trap Jesus. We can assume that they did not care about this woman. But you can not trap Jesus unless He allows it. They received a vital lesson that day, this woman’s life is important, and these leaders have done bad things before.

Next, we have a woman who was sentenced to death because of her sin. She was powerless, but love intervened, and she was given a chance to live and change.

Finally, we have love Incarnate, Jesus. He brought Divine Wisdom to this situation.

I hope we find in this event that we are the leaders and the woman at different times of our lives. We all need Jesus, and by following Him, we may have a better world!

As we enter these special days before the Great Feast of the Resurrection of Jesus, we may enter into what Jesus did for us in living lives more like the Divine Image we were created to be.

Passiontide Blessings!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

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The Father Is Still Calling Us Home!

Regardless of what we have done, regardless of what gifts of God we wasted, God wants us home!

We are approaching the Great Feast of Easter and today we are reminded of the tremendous love of God for us. We are presented with the parable of the Prodigal Son. For our meditation today we will concentrate on the following section,

20 And he arose and came to his father. But while he was yet at a distance, his father saw him and had compassion and ran and embraced him and kissed him. Luke 15:20

The younger Son of the Father had fallen always from the Father’s love. He wasted the gifts that the Father gave him looking for pleasures that the world could provide, but the pleasures of the world do not last. When the son hit rock bottom, he remembered the Father and returned to him.

The love of the Father welcomed the son back and the celebration began!

Lent is a time to return to Father God! This Holy Season calls us back to True Love!

How are we doing?

Let us use these last few weeks of Lent so that we can embrace the Risen Lord with renewed vigor!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

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Allow Jesus to Heal Us!

Jesus wants to make us whole!

Happy Third Sunday of Lent!

I hope and pray that this holy time brings us peace and joy.

Today our Gospel Portion is St. Luke 13: 1-9. We will concentrate on the following section,

And he said to the vine dresser, “Behold, these three years I have come seeking fruit on this fig tree, and I find none. Cut it down; why should it use up the ground?”

And he answered him, “Let it alone, sir, this year also, till I dig about it and put manure. And if it bears fruit next year, well and good; but if not, you can cut it down.” Luke 13: 7-9.

God is merciful and God gives us time to bear fruit!

Each Season of Lent allows us to be fed to produce fruits of righteousness throughout the year. The things of the world oftentimes reduce the potency of God’s Word in our lives. During Lent, we do things to help us receive Divine Nourishment, Divine Fertilizer, that will allow us to produce more for God’s Kingdom.

Please use Lenten time well! Read the Sacred Scripture! Fast and pray, and let this Lent be the best ever!

The world needs our fruit of righteousness now!

Be instruments of God in the world! Make the world a better place by our fruits!

Blessings!

Pax, The Hermit of Peace.

https://gofund.me/1ad6a4aa

Jesus Puts Everything Together!

Trust in Jesus!

Lenten Blessings!

Today we meditate on the Transfiguration of Our Lord Jesus Christ. Our Gospel Portion is St. Luke 9: 28-36 and we will concentrate on,

And behold, two men talked with Him, Moses and Elijah, who appeared in glory and spoke of His Exodus which He was to accomplish in Jerusalem. Luke 9: 30-31

The Transfiguration happened a short time before the Crucifixion of Our Lord, and it was a preparation for the scandal of the Cross. In this event we see that a new Exodus must be accomplished. It would not be through the Red Sea, but through the body of Jesus. He would take the world through Himself from slavery to freedom.

Moses and Elijah bring together the Law (Moses) and the Prophets (Elijah), that is all of Judaism and they are fulfilled in Jesus.

Jesus brings everything together!

Everything includes our lives. As Moses and Elijah had to come to Jesus, we are called to do the same.

Freedom is found passing through Jesus! No matter what we are going through, if we bring it to the Lord, He will bring us to freedom and peace of mind.

May our lives be glorified through Him!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

https://gofund.me/033e2079

Being Tempted is a Reality!

Jesus reveals how we respond!

Welcome to the First Sunday of Lent 2025!

We begin this sacred time always in celebration of the holy time of Jesus’ 40 days in the wilderness as He prepared for His mission to humanity. Here we renew our mission to ourselves and the world!

Our Gospel Portion is taken from St. Luke 4: 1-13 and we will concentrate on the following,

And Jesus answered, “It is written, ‘You shall worship the Lord your God, and Him only shall you serve.’ ” Luke 4:8

Jesus had to go through three temptations from the evil one after His 40-day fast. He was in a weakened state, but He relied on Father God and was victorious over these temptations. In doing so, Jesus modeled for us how to deal with the temptations to do the wrong thing in our lives.

Temptations are a reality, it is how we deal with them that matters!

The Son of God, Jesus, came to teach us how to live out our true selves in a world that is not comfortable with the truth! There are so many easy answers to our problems and many of these answers are contrary to our true selves as images of God in the world. In our selection today we see our focus. If any action takes us from the true worship of God, then it is not appropriate for us!

During this sacred time of Lent, may we work on ourselves so that our lives mirror Jesus in all that we say and do, now and ages unending! Amen!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

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Heart Work Matters!

A better world begins with us!

Today in some parts of the globe is known as Carnival Sunday. It is the last Sunday before the Season of Lent. We are in the last days before many of us will enter into a time of introspection, Heart Work! Our Gospel portion is, St. Luke 6: 39-45, and our selection for meditation is,

“The good person out of good treasure of his/ her heart produces good, and the evil person out of his/ her evil treasure produces evil; for out of the abundance of the heart their mouths speak.” Luke 6: 45

I know that I have always heart work to do because judging others is so easy to do. But if we judge someone, how can we truly be loving to them?

Jesus calls us to look at ourselves first, then from self knowledge of ourselves we can determine if we live out the life and message of Jesus, we can help others to do the same.

Jesus reminds us of the need to work on ourselves when He tells us,

“Can a blind person lead a blind person? Will they not both fall into a pit?” Luke 6:39

Our hearts must see and acknowledge what is going on in them, and compare them with the Heart of Jesus. The old yet important question still needs to be asked of ourselves, “What would Jesus do?” The answer to this question requires us know Jesus and have Him as the center of the totality of our lives!

As we close this last Sunday before Ash Wednesday, may we take Jesus seriously and make our world a better place through our lives!

Blessings!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

https://gofund.me/1ad6a4aa

Be A Child Of The Most High!

Love Matters!

Being a Child of the Most High is challenging. However, it is a sure way to find true peace in one’s life. Jesus models this way of life.

Our Gospel Portion today is St. Luke 6:27-38 and our section to use today follows,

“But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be children of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.” Luke 6: 35

How does one truly become a Child of the Most High, simply it is to do what the Son of God Did! Jesus’ words and example are the way of life that brings peace on Earth and good will to all. This way of life goes against the way people normally live and treat one another, but it is the way of peace.

Be little Jesus and transform our lives.

The life, Passion, and Death of Jesus is His modeling of the good life for us. It is the life of a true child of the Most High.

Be like Jesus and change the world one person at a time!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

https://gofund.me/033e2079

Rejoice and Be Glad in Jesus!

Jesus will make a way!

The message of Jesus is so profound yet it it is so contrary to the way humans approach life. However, if we aim to fulfill the Way of Jesus, Heaven would be in our hearts and that Heaven would radiate from us through our world!

Our Gospel Portion today is the Sermon of the Plains, this is found in the Gospel of St. Luke 6: 17-26. Our selection is as follows:

“Blessed are you when men hate you, and when they exclude you and revile you, and cast out your name as evil, on the account of the Son of Man!

Rejoice in that day, and leap for joy, for behold, your reward is great in Heaven; for so their fathers did to the prophets.”

Luke 6:22-23

If we would take Jesus seriously, there is nothing that people would say and/or do to us that would destroy us! The real relationship that matters is our relationship with Jesus! We are built on the shoulders of those who took Jesus seriously! For the first 300 years of Christianity, being faithful could lead to be to being executed. Yet they were faithful unto death!

An example only 10 years ago, 21 people were beheaded, and the execution was filmed by their executioners. The executioner were members of ISIS. These Coptic Christians refused to renounce Jesus! These Christians truly lived the words of Jesus and they speak to us today that Jesus Is All! It has encouraged me to be more faithful and thousands of others.

Hopefully we will not have to experience execution physically for Jesus, but in little ways we may experience the hate of others because Jesus Is All for us!

May we never let anyone take Jesus away from us!

Jesus is our Heaven and we will experience Heaven here and now in Him!

Have an awesome Sunday!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

https://gofund.me/033e2079

Give Jesus Total Trust!

Jesus will make something beautiful out of us!

In our Gospel Portion today (St. Luke 5: 1-11) we have a very important conversation between Jesus and Simon Peter. We read,

And when He ceased speaking, He said to Simon, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”

And Simon answered, “Master, we toiled all night! But at Your word I will let down the nets.”

And when they had done this, they enclosed a great shoal of fish; and as their nets were breaking. They beckoned to their partners in the other boat to come and help them. And they came and filled both boat, so that they began to sink.

But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees saying, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.” Luke 5: 4-8

We must think like Jesus, not like Simon Peter. Jesus knows us better than we know ourselves. Simon Peter had a limited understanding of himself. And that makes perfect sense. He knows how holy Jesus is, he knows how powerful Jesus is, and he knows how sinful he is. But Jesus saw through the shortcomings of Simon Peter and He knew He could do marvelous things through him.

Simon Peter did follow Jesus and Jesus could build His Church using him! Simon Peter surrendered to Jesus and this gives us an example for us to follow!

Do not let our opinions of ourselves become a barrier to God’s plan for us!

Let Jesus have His way with us and He will do marvelous things through us too!

Be blest!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace.

https://gofund.me/033e2079

Let Us Be Light!

May we be light to the darkness that surrounds us!

Happy Feast of the Presentation of Our Lord Jesus to the Temple!

We have another aspect of the Christmas Mystery today, the Presentation of the Lord in the Temple. Our Gospel Portion for today is St. Luke 2:22-40. This event follows the Jewish Law referred to as follows,

And when the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, they brought Him up to Jerusalem to press Him to the Lord

(as it is written in the Law of the Lord, “Every male that opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord”) and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the Law of the Lord, “a pair of turtledoves or two young pigeons.” Luke 2:22-24

This celebration was done 40 days after the birth of Our Lord! What a blessing to celebrate this event of Our Lord’s life! Jesus did everything that people would do, yet the significance was magnificent! At the Presentation, God entered the Temple in bodily form. His presence blessed the Temple and two individuals received Him as Lord in His Temple. We read of one of these individuals as follows,

Now there was a man in Jerusalem, whose name was Simeon… And it was revealed to him that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord’s Christ. And inspired by the Holy Spirit he came into the Temple; and when the parents brought the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the Law, he took Him in his arms and blessed God and said, “Lord, now let your servant go in peace, according to your word; for my eyes have seen your salvation which you have prepared in the presence of all peoples, a light for revelation to the Gentiles and the glory to Your people Israel”

Luke 2:25-32

Today it is customary to bless candles and walk into our temples, our church buildings. We have received Jesus, we carry our lights into the church, but do not leave them there!

Can we carry our lights out in the world? There is so much darkness and pain around us!

May we bring the Light of Christ everywhere we go!

Be light and break up the darkness!

Happy Feast Day!

Pax. The Hermit of Peace

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