God's Word

I found myself really inspired by the daily readings for mass this week.  It made me happy that we make reading the daily readings a part of our morning prayer time for school and that we're starting to get back to daily mass.  What a treasure we'd be missing if we left these pieces out of our day!

Here are some of the choice nuggets from the week that really stuck with me....ideas and thoughts for me to ponder as I get ready for Lent.
 
Consider it all joy, my brothers and sisters,when you encounter various trials,for you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance.And let perseverance be perfect,so that you may be perfect and complete, lacking in nothing.But if any of you lacks wisdom,he should ask God who gives to all generously and ungrudgingly,and he will be given it.But he should ask in faith, not doubting,for the one who doubts is like a wave of the seathat is driven and tossed about by the wind.

-Jas 1: 2-6

Blessed is he who perseveres in temptation,for when he has been proven he will receive the crown of life that he promised to those who love him. No one experiencing temptation should say,"I am being tempted by God"; for God is not subject to temptation to evil,and he himself tempts no one.Rather, each person is tempted when lured and enticed by his desire.Then desire conceives and brings forth sin,and when sin reaches maturity it gives birth to death.

-Jas 1: 12-15

When I say, "My foot is slipping,"your mercy, O LORD, sustains me;When cares abound within me,your comfort gladdens my soul.

-Ps 94: 18-19

Do you not yet understand or comprehend? Are your hearts hardened? Do you have eyes and not see, ears and not hear?

-Mk 8: 17-18

Know this, my dear brothers and sisters: everyone should be quick to hear, slow to speak, slow to anger, for anger does not accomplish the righteousness of God.

-Jas 1: 19-20

Be doers of the word and not hearers only, deluding yourselves. For if anyone is a hearer of the word and not a doer, he is like a man who looks at his own face in a mirror. He sees himself, then goes off and promptly forgetswhat he looked like.But the one who peers into the perfect law of freedom and perseveres,and is not a hearer who forgets but a doer who acts;such a one shall be blessed in what he does.If anyone thinks he is religious and does not bridle his tonguebut deceives his heart, his religion is vain.Religion that is pure and undefiled before God and the Father is this:to care for orphans and widows in their afflictionand to keep oneself unstained by the world.

-Jas 1: 22-27

However, if you fulfill the royal law according to the Scripture,

You shall love your neighbor as yourself, you are doing well.

-Jas 2: 8

What good is it, my brothers and sisters, if someone says he has faith but does not have works?

-Jas 2: 14

Whoever wishes to come after me must deny himself,take up his cross, and follow me.For whoever wishes to save his life will lose it,but whoever loses his life for my sakeand that of the Gospel will save it.
-Mk 8: 34-35

Listening to what God wants of us as individuals sometimes seems so hard, but I think He leaves us enough clues between the covers of the Bible.  It's also easy to think those words were left for "those people" back then, and that they have no relevance to us today.  But "in Christ we find the fullness of revelation.  In his word and life all that God willed to say to mankind is contained."
- Francis Fernandez (In Conversation With God )