🧀The Cheese & Crackers = Quotes by John Michael Talbot, St. Francis of Assisi, and Edith Stein
🌽The Veggies = My 2💰
🍟The Potatoes = "GOD’S WAY OR MAN’S WAY?", by Al Mansfield
🍗The Meat = "Avoiding Rash Judgment", by Thomas À Kempis
🍰The Dessert = YouTube video: "Our Lady of Fatima Feast Day celebration Mass", by Fr. Lawrence Murori
🧀"Let us desire nothing else let us wish for nothing else let nothing else please us and cause us delight except our Creator and Redeemer and Saviour, the One True God, Who is the Fullness of Good, all good, every good, the true and supreme Good; Let nothing hinder us, nothing separate us or nothing come between us. May the power of your love O Lord, fiery and sweet as honey, wean my heart from all that is under heaven, so that I may die for love of your love You who were so good as to die for love of my love. Amen.” By St. Francis of Assisi
🍛 "I went out from myself. That is, I departed from my low manner of understanding, and my feeble way of loving, and my poor and limited method of finding satisfaction in God. I did this unhindered by either the flesh or the devil. This was great happiness . . . because through the annihilation and calming of my faculties, passions , appetites, and affection, by which my experience and satisfaction in God had been base . . . my intellect departed from itself, changing from human and natural to divine. . . It no longer understands by means of its natural vigor and light, but by means of the divine wisdom to which it was united. And my will departed from itself and became divine. United with the divine love, it no longer loves . . . with its natural strength, but with the strength and purity of the Holy Spirit. . . . The memory, too, was changed into presentiments of eternal glory. . . . All the strength and affections of the soul, by means of this night and purgation of the old self, are renewed with divine qualities and delight in divine harmony and joys”. By Edith Stein
Post site address: https://nealobstat.wordpress.com/2019/05/16/i-can-suffer/
On the heal of that post, another post arrived from "Catholics Striving for Holiness", that one contained a reading from St. John of Avila. There we have it, icing on the cake with a cherry on top. All of this reinforced some components of suffering, and shed new light on the subject to help solidify the right spirit in me. A catalyst in regards to moving me forward, so as not to be shrouded in darkness. For indeed it's not if, but when suffering will step into the arena of one's life, we have to take the bull by the horns. It came me that Jesus did His greatest work on the cross, a very plain example right before our eyes. Let us follow the leader. We see the results of His accomplishments and what a payday it was, so let strive to labor according to the perfect will of God.
📖Hebrews 1:3 "who is the refulgence of his glory, the very imprint of his being, and who sustains all things by his mighty word.When he had accomplished purification from sins, he took his seat at the right hand of the Majesty on high"
📖 Hebrews 12:2 "while keeping our eyes fixed on Jesus, the leader and perfecter of faith. For the sake of the joy that lay before him he endured the cross, despising its shame, and has taken his seat at the right of the throne of God"
If we labor not, what rewards will there be? For we do not know what our contributions mean in the great scheme of things, so it is to entrust ourselves to the Sacred Heart of Jesus through the Immaculate Heart of Blessed Mary in union with St. Joseph.
📖Colossians 1:24 "Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ on behalf of his body, which is the church"
📖Jeremiah 29:11 For I know well the plans I have in mind for you—oracle of the LORD—plans for your welfare and not for woe, so as to give you a future of hope.
Arriving without any gifts of suffering, appearing empty handed before the throne, there will not be anything to fill that void and what great sorry we'll experience for having wasted our pain. Sometimes it's not so much the intense suffering that weighs on one so heavily, but the daily aggravations and weariness caused by contact with the world, Lord have mercy! This is very valuable if we see with the eyes of Christ and with His mind, and most of all not lean on our own understanding.
📖2 Corinthians 4:17-18 "For this momentary light affliction is producing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison, as we look not to what is seen but to what is unseen; for what is seen is transitory, but what is unseen is eternal"
Closing with material to be pondered, here is a bit of what St. John of Avila had to say:
St. John of Avila: "The words are of Saint Paul the apostle. He was beaten with rods three times, flogged five times, stoned once and left for dead; he suffered every persecution men can inflict, his body was twisted by pain and toil. And all this was his lot not just on one or two occasions, for he writes: 'We are constantly being handed over to death for Jesus’ sake, so that his life may be revealed in us'. In all these tribulations he does not murmur or complain about God, as weaker men do. He is not saddened as those who love status and pleasure are. He does not beg God to be relieved of them, as men do who are unaware of their true value and therefore will have no part of them. He does not make light of them, as men do who set little value upon them. On the contrary, fully aware of the value of these tribulations and rising above his own weakness, Paul blesses God amid his sufferings and thanks him as though he had bestowed a fine reward. He thinks it an honor to be able to suffer for him who subjected himself to so very much shame in order to free us from the dreadful effects of sin; who exalted us by giving us his Spirit and making us adopted sons of God; and who gave us, in his own person and through his own efforts, a proof and pledge of heavenly joy.
Dear brothers and sisters, I pray God may open your eyes and let you see what hidden treasures he bestows on us in the trials from which the world thinks only to flee. Shame turns into honor when we seek God’s glory. Present affliction becomes the source of heavenly glory. To those who suffer wounds in fighting his battles God opens his arms in loving, tender friendship, which is more delightful by far than anything our earthly efforts might produce. If we have any sense, we shall yearn for these open arms of God. Can anyone but a man in whom all desire is dead fail to desire him who is wholly lovable, wholly desirable?
If you long for these festivals of heavenly joy, if you want to behold them and take part in them, be assured that there is no better way to reach them than the way of suffering. This is the way Christ and his disciples have always travelled. He calls it a narrow way, but it leads straight to life. That is why he tells us that if we want to join him, we shall travel the way he took. It is surely not right that the Son of God should go his way on the path of shame while the sons of men walk the way of worldly honor: The disciple is not above his teacher, nor the servant greater than his master. God grant that our hearts may find no rest and seek no other food in this world, save in hardship and suffering beside the Lord’s cross"
"Imagine that you have come to a fork in the road. (I’m reminded of Yogi Berra’s famous saying, “When you come to a fork in the road – take it!”) Anyway, we do come to many forks in the road – matters to decide, choices to be made, changes to consider, etc. Now imagine two signs: one saying God’s Way and the other Man’s Way. You would be tempted to think, that’s a simple choice, right? Wrong! God’s Way or Man’s Way?
Look at the first pages of the Bible. Adam and Eve, the first man and woman, the first married couple, had a choice to make. They knew what God’s way was. They chose not to take it. They decided on their own way, man’s way. And all mankind has suffered ever since. Abraham, though childless, had God’s promise that he would have an heir and would be “the father of many nations.” But at Sarah’s insistence, he fathered a son by her maidservant, Hagar (Genesis 16). To this day we still witness the conflict that ensued from that act of impatience…man’s way, not God’s way.
King Saul got tired of waiting on Samuel to offer sacrifice and took it upon himself to offer the holocaust instead, in impatience and disobedience to the Lord (1 Samuel 13). He did it his way, man’s way, and lost his kingdom because of it. God’s Way or Man’s Way? Jesus was tempted as we are, yet without sin (Heb. 4:15). Jesus faced temptation before His public ministry. He resisted by constantly referring back to God, God’s word, and God’s way: “Man does not live by bread alone, but by every word that comes from the mouth of God…You shall not tempt the Lord your God…You shall worship the Lord your God and Him alone shall you serve” (Matt. 4). When Peter tried to dissuade Jesus from suffering and death, Jesus turned on Peter: “Get behind me , Satan! You are a stumbling block to me. For your thoughts are not of the things of God, but of the things of men” (Matt. 16:23). In other words, you are thinking man’s way, not God’s way. And here is the trap – we too often think that because we want something or think something is best, God necessarily does also. But obviously, that is not the case at all.
In the Garden of Gethsemane, Jesus prayed that the cup would pass Him by, but ended by saying, “Not my will but your will be done” (Mark 14:36). Not man’s way but God’s way. God’s Way or Man’s Way?
“There is a way which seems right to a man, but its end is the way to death” (Proverbs 14:12). So how do we distinguish God’s way from man’s way? Well, in all really important and crucial matters, God has made His way abundantly clear. God’s word is extremely plain, simple and understandable on topics like marriage, sexuality, the life of the unborn, etc. But it is also clear that the world has definitively turned from God’s way to man’s way, especially in those very areas. Secular society has its own “dogma” and is quick to condemn and punish all who deviate from it. It is, as Pope Saint John Paul II said when still a cardinal, the “anti-gospel.”
Some in the Church, in a misguided effort to be “tolerant and inclusive,” seem to follow the world’s example by soft-pedaling, watering-down, or trying to change God’s word, especially regarding marriage, sexuality, and unborn human life. We need to pray and work fervently against this.
God’s Way or Man’s Way? There is another famous saying: “Those who refuse to learn from history are doomed to repeat it.” It’s safe to say that men and women, in general, have refused to learn and therefore do repeat the same mistakes over and over again. Let us pray, however, that we may all learn from the sad history of going man’s way so that we not repeat it. So, when we come to a fork in the road, let’s be sure to take it – so long as the sign says God’s way!"
"Turn your attention upon yourself and beware of judging the deeds of other men, for in judging others a man labors vainly, often makes mistakes, and easily sins; whereas, in judging and taking stock of himself he does something that is always profitable. We frequently judge that things are as we wish them to be, for through personal feeling true perspective is easily lost. If God were the sole object of our desire, we should not be disturbed so easily by opposition to our opinions. But often something lurks within or happens from without to draw us along with it.
Many, unawares, seek themselves in the things they do. They seem even to enjoy peace of mind when things happen according to their wish and liking, but if otherwise than they desire, they are soon disturbed and saddened. Differences of feeling and opinion often divide friends and acquaintances, even those who are religious and devout. An old habit is hard to break, and no one is willing to be led farther than he can see. If you rely more upon your intelligence or industry than upon the virtue of submission to Jesus Christ, you will hardly, and in any case slowly, become an enlightened man. God wants us to be completely subject to Him and, through ardent love, to rise above all human wisdom"
Video link:
https://youtu.be/DkopD4u9Hs4