Sunday Wisdom

I don’t know about you, but I do not have much of a green thumb.  I love crafting and making cards is therapy for me, but a master gardener I am not. I like flowers and gardening and although I am not great at it, I do know that in order for anything to bear fruit, the branches must be pruned.

This is also true with our spiritual lives. We must be pruned to bear great fruit.  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

Pruning can be difficult and we don’t always understand suffering, but the one who created us does and works all things for our good. All we need to do is trust.  We can receive strength and life from Jesus because He blesses our efforts and makes us fruitful, but we need to stay connected to Him. We cannot do it alone. 

So let us attach ourselves firmly to Jesus through prayer, prune anything that separates us from God and let go of whatever is blocking us from connecting to Jesus, the true vine. Then we will receive life more abundantly.

Today is Good Shepherd Sunday and we are reminded that we need to take time to know His voice.  To really know the Shepherd’s voice we need to listen with our hearts.   When is the last time you took the opportunity to come aside and rest awhile so you could listen for the Shepherd’s calling?

Jesus offers all of us unconditional love and support, but He also wants us to return that gift of love by serving others, by taking the time to be a little more kind and to love one another.  In a crazy world with so much violence all around, we need not be discouraged because Jesus is our gateway to salvation. 

So go ahead and run to Him.  Do not worry about what you lack, let Him shepherd you.  Trust in His love and find peace.

Thanks for stopping by!
Until next time, be blessed, Renae

Today’s gospel reminds us that we do not always have to have all the answers. Jesus continually instructed His apostles and He was with them, so of course He will be patient with us.

Jesus wants to guide us, we just need to open our hearts and trust. So do not be troubled. Let us open our minds and allow God to fill us with His mercy and peace.

Thanks for stopping by!
Until next time, be blessed, Renae

My Lord and My God have mercy on us! Today we celebrate Divine Mercy Sunday and we see in the gospel how Jesus offers Thomas, also know as doubting Tom, love and mercy.

Thomas needs to see Jesus to believe. Blessed are those who have not seen, but believe. Notice how Jesus is so patient with Thomas and does not give up on him. Jesus never gives up on any of us. How do you give and received the mercy of our Lord?

Jesus died for all of us and when we dwell in his loving wounds we allow ourselves to be loved by Him which gives us the courage to offer mercy to others. So today, dwell in His mercy and be filled with hope, for you are loved!

Thanks for stopping by!
Until next time, be blessed, Renae

He is Risen! Praise God! 
While Lent can be a long journey, it is always an amazing opportunity to take time to re-dedicate our lives to God and adjust our priorities and in doing so we prepare our hearts for Easter.

Today on Easter Sunday Jesus once again brings hope to us all through Mary Magdalene, the one He believed in, and the one He saved from sin and despair. Mary is the first to recognize the “ordinary gardener” as her Lord and Savior and the first to experience the Resurrection!

Imagine how her sadness was turned into JOY!  Jesus entrusts her with the mission to tell the others that He has Risen!  Today we too can share in her joy and can spread the good news of the gospel!  The joy of the Gospel is to experience the Love of God in Christ. So allow the Resurrection to remove all fear and anxiety from your life and to renew and strengthen your faith!

Lots of people begin January with a list of New Year’s resolutions, but what about an Easter Season “New Life Resolution”? It does not have to be a long list, just create a list of the top three things you would like to make a priority in your new life and strive to live them out daily.

This Easter Season, let us all open our hearts and allow the love of Christ to transform us. Happy Easter!

Thanks for stopping by!
Until next time, be blessed, Renae

As we enter into Holy Week we are reminded of what the Kingdom of God looks like. Jesus our King emptied Himself for us. He is our servant King who humbly loved us enough to die for our sins and still loves us and continues to offer His love, mercy and forgiveness.

God’s way of royalty is not the world’s way and through His death and resurrection we have been saved and adopted as a beloved member of the royal family.

We can live out our royal calling in love and service for others. This week as we walk the way of the Cross with our Lord let us offer Him our struggles, sadness and anxiety and remember that He awaits us all with a crown of glory.

Thanks for stopping by!
Until next time, be blessed, Renae

This Sunday we get a glimpse of the Lord’s resurrection and we can once again be filled with Hope. We are Lazarus. The gospels often use physical metaphors to point to the spiritual.

Water is a metaphor for the quenching of our spiritual thirst and we can do that just by being in the presence of Jesus, who is the living water. Bread is a metaphor for satisfaction and we see that when Jesus breaks bread to feed a crowd of followers. Jesus is the Bread from Heaven and He feeds or spiritual hunger. Jesus gives sight to the blind and Jesus is the light of the worlds, so He works through us to bring clarity to our spiritual vision.

In today’s gospel Jesus restores physical life to Lazarus as a sign of breaking the bonds of death and in doing so offers all of us the gift of eternal life. “I am the resurrection and the life. Those who believe in me, even though they die, will live, and everyone who lives and believes in me will never die.” ~Jn. 11:25-6

We are Lazarus and we can begin each day anew in our relationship with Jesus. He is always waiting and always offers us His grace and His mercy By His death, He washed away our sins and through His glorious resurrection, He called us all to be saved. So rejoice, for we too can experience the joy of salvation.

This is a pretty famous Scripture saying, “For God so loved the world that He gave his only Son” and these simple words can bring us so much hope.

God did not send his Son to condemn us, but to help us see the light! We are all created in God’s image, yes, but we were also created with freedom of choice and sometimes that means we make bad choices. Of’ course we are not measured by our past mistakes or bad choices and God wanted to make that very clear, so He sent his only Son to enlighten us.

We have to allow ourselves to be enlightened. So, how do we keep that Divine light in our lives? How do we stay connected to our inner goodness? Quite simply put, through daily prayer. Prayer is the spark that ignites the light of the presence of God within all of us. God’s light fills all of us with love, forgiveness and healing. The light of God is so powerful that it spreads to others and shines most brightly when we are being true to our most inner selves.

Prayer is our continual awareness that God loves us and will never abandon us. So go ahead, flip the switch! Turn on that light of prayer and shine brightly for all to see.

In today’s gospel we experience the sincere frustration and anger Jesus portrays as he drives out the money changers from the temple.  Yes, Jesus gets mad.  Being anger is an emotion and it is never wrong to have emotions, but what we do with our emotions determines who we are.

Jesus shows us it is okay to get mad, but remember He did not hurt anyone with his anger. He just overturned a few tables to get everyone’s attention.  So why was Jesus so mad?  After all selling oxen, sheep and doves had been a traditional part of history, so what made this day so different.

Jesus was angry over the disrespect many of the merchants were showing in the temple area. He was not angry at the merchants for selling animals, He was angry at the injustice of some of those merchants exploited the poor by selling animals for a far higher price in the Temple than would be made outside. They were profiting from the good intentions of others.

I am sure we have all experienced a time when money creeps in to a situation who it tends to take over.  I am not saying that money is bad, it is certainly needed and we can use our money to make the world a better place, feed the poor, house the homeless etc.  However, when money becomes the focus, it takes over. 

Jesus is gently reminding us to keep our focus on him and to keep our priorities in check. This Lent, let us continue to put Jesus first in our lives.  Spend a few quite moments each day this week thanking God for the many blessings in your lives.  It might just change your life.

Wow time sure does seem to be flying by. It seems as though it was just Christmas and now we are preparing for Easter. Our Heavenly Father gave us the gift of peace through the birth of His beloved Son and this week we receive the gift of His wisdom and glory in the Transfiguration. “This is my beloved Son, listen to Him.”

That really is the key, to be still and listen. It is always a challenge to “be perfect as our heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48), but if we turn to prayer and really listen, it gets easier. The key to loving others, especially those who seem to always try our patience is to try to see them as Jesus does. This takes prayer, practice and grace.

Jesus wandered throughout many villages teaching and preaching, filling those who would listen with His wisdom. But do we listen or do we just go about our day where nothing changes. At Easter God will give us Jesus again, not as a gift of peace, but as a gift of forgiveness and redemption.

He, Jesus, came to die for everyone and His Mercy is for all who will take time to listen and be moved with compassion for others. It may not seem like much, but a little kindness and compassion really can change the world. So don’t give in to fear and doubt, put your trust in the one who sacrificed His life for you and trust in His everlasting grace and mercy.

“Jesus I need your grace. Help me to seek you with all of my heart and to be caring, kind and compassionate to others.”