Team Jesus

Today in our gospel, Jesus tells a parable addressed to the people to those who were convinced of their own righteousness and despised everyone else. "Two people went up to the temple area to pray; one was a Pharisee and the other was a tax collector. The Pharisee took up his position and spoke this prayer to himself, “O God, I thank you that I am not like the rest of humanity --greedy, dishonest, adulterous -- or even like this tax collector. I fast twice a week, and I pay tithes on my whole income.” As you can see in the Pharisee’s prayer, it is an act of supplication of all the good he has done and of his faithfulness to his religious obligations. But all he did was just boasted about his good qualities before God and to show that he is much better unlike the rest, this kind of prayer is overbearing and self-righteous. On the other hand, the tax collector just stood off at a distance and would not even raise his eyes to heaven but beat his breast and prayed, 'O God,

This Sunday's gospel scripture talks about faith. Faith is a well-known gift from God. It was already involved in our lives and we are truly baptized in a church as well. Faith  grows in a different groups and situations. It also grows in church communities, in the parish, in the school, and in the family. In the gospel  scripture, it also mentioned that the Lord said, "If you had faith like a grain of mustard seed, you could say to this mulberry tree, 'Be uprooted and planted in the sea,' and it would obey you." The mustard seed, which the Lord used for giving a simile to faith, is one of the smallest seed in the world with a diameter about 1 to 2 millimetres. Now, why did the smallest seed became a huge mustard tree? Well, when people kept cultivating the mustard seed, there was a biggest chance that a seed will grow into a huge tree. Just like faith, if we keep on cultivating it even through our own little ways like praying, then there is a high chance that

In today's gospel in Luke 16: 19-31, it tells us about a rich man and a poor man named Lazarus, who both died on the same day. The rich man suffered while Lazarus was with Abraham. No matter how much the rich man cried and pleaded to make his sufferings go away or to change places with Lazarus, it did not work. Abraham said, "My son, remember that during your life you had your fill of good things, just as Lazarus his fill of bad. Now he is being comforted here while you are in agony. But that is not all: between us and you a great gulf has been fixed, to prevent those who want to cross from our side to yours or from your side to ours." The rich man did not have a choice but instead told Abraham to send Lazarus to the rich man's father and five brothers so that they may repent and to avoid the place of torment. Then Abraham said to him, "If they will not listen either to Moses or to the prophets, they will not be convinced even if someone should rise from th

No servant can serve two masters, for either he will hate the one and love the other, or he will be devoted to the one and despise the other. You cannot serve God and money. If God is our Master, then our wealth will be at His disposal. In other words, the faithful and just steward whose Master is God will employ that wealth in building up the kingdom of God. If you’re honest in small things,you’ll be honest in big things; If you’re a crook in small things,you’ll be a crook in big things. If you’re not honest in small jobs, Who will put you in charge of the store? No worker can serve two bosses: He’ll either hate the first and love the second. Or adore the first and despise the second. You can’t serve both God and the Bank.

Todays gospel talks about Gods grace for us. Despite us being sinful, it is showed that he has arms wide open for us to come back to him! The gospel also explains that God  is more pleased to find the lost not just the found. Simply because even those who are lost have big value to him. He wants us to come back to him because of who we are in the first place, knowing that “we belong to him” and “we are his beloved children”.  Nowadays sometimes we forget this, we forget to turn to God and surrender to him because we think our sins are too much that we cant go to him anymore, because we think we are not worthy anymore.  It’s quite challenging to think that it is not us who has control over our lives despite us living but God. Sometimes we think that we can rely only on our own strength to carry the weight of our sins, sometimes because of our pride or fear to be judged by others and the people around us. And these things such as pride, fear and many more aren’t easy to igno

The gospel today teaches us that we should not let fear control our lives. Anxiety, worries and the like can possibly cause us to lose sight of God and of faith. However, overcoming our fear is humility that enables us to fix our eyes upon the lord no matter how heavy our problems are. By simply focusing on God, we gain trust on him and lose sight of what bothers us. On the other hand, God calls his disciples, including us, as his “little flock”. These two words tell us about the overflowing love of God and how compassionate he is to us. These words reveal that we don’t just belong to Jesus, it also shows how deep and intimate his love is. If we can understand the depth of his love, we can more likely have an intimate relationship with him. Fear is truly inevitable, especially because every single day serves us more differently than the other. We do not have any idea on what lies beyond the end of the road, but by simply choosing to trust, and understand that we are loved by God a

"Be on your guard and avoid every kind of greed, for even though you have many possessions, it is not that which gives you life."  - Luke 12:15 Today in our gospel, it begins with an individual in the crowd asking Jesus: "Master, tell my brother to share with me the family inheritance." then Jesus replied, "My friend, who has appointed me as your judge or your attorney?" Then Jesus continued and said to the people: "Be on your guard and avoid every kind of greed, for even though you have many possessions, it is not that which gives you life." Today's gospel is very relatable in every people, a lot of us see numerous ads everyday on billboards, facebook, television, and radios. Even when we open some websites or games we are bombed with advertisments inviting us to buy this and that such as clothes, appliances, and electronics. The negative effect is that many of us especially millennials, we tend to believe that more is better or th

Today in our gospel, it begins with an individual in the crowd asking Jesus: "Master, tell my brother to share with me the family inheritance." then Jesus replied, "My friend, who has appointed me as your judge or your attorney?" Then Jesus continued and said to the people: "Be on your guard and avoid every kind of greed, for even though you have many possessions, it is not that which gives you life." Today's gospel is very relatable in every people, a lot of us see numerous ads everyday on billboards, facebook, television, and radios. Even when we open some websites or games we are bombed with advertisments inviting us to buy this and that such as clothes, appliances, and electronics. The negative effect is that many of us especially millennials, we tend to believe that more is better or the newest release of a phone is much better than the previous one. Jesus also tells the crowd a story about a rich man, and his land produced a good harvest. Th

The Gospel begins with the disciples and Jesus praying. When he was finished praying the disciples asked Jesus to teach them how to pray. In response, Jesus offers a 3-part teaching which was a model prayer, a parable and some sayings about the prayer. From the first part of the scripture we can learn that prayer is definitely important and that we should pray every single day. Prayer is an important value of our lives and must not forget to pray. The second part of the scripture is about the parable of a man who has an unexpected guest in the middle of the night and has not enough bread for the man and asked some bread from his neighbour. His neighbour refused but in the end he eventually fulfilled the request of his neighbour and gave him some bread. As we learned from the parable hospitality plays a big part in the parable. It shows that hospitality is important. We should learn from the parable and empathize to others and be sensitive with their needs. Jesus the

Today in our gospel, we were introduced to a story where there were two sisters namely, Martha and Mary. In this story, Jesus went to a village and Martha welcomed Him with all the formalities she could offer, for Jesus was their special guest. She was basically like a typical Filipino nakapag may bisita, they would do all the official duties of hosting a guest. On the other hand, Mary, her sister, was spending time listening to Jesus instead of helping her sister. Of course, when situations like these happen, we would always react like Martha. When we do all the work we nag, we complain and compare to others on how big you have already contributed. Kung sa tagalog pa, nagbibilangan na.Dapat tumulong din ang iba. But looking back at the gospel, Jesus said to Martha, “You are anxious and worried about many things. Mary has chosen the better part and it will not be taken from her.” To deeply understand this gospel, sino na ba ditto naka experience mag plan or organize ng events wheth

S unday Reflection:July 7,2019 “The harvest is plentiful, but the laborers are few. Therefore pray earnestly to the Lord of the harvest to send out laborers into his harvest. Go your way; behold, I am sending you out as lambs in the midst of wolves. We wipe off the very dust of your town that clings to our feet,and leave it with you. Yet be sure of this, the Kingdom of God is very near.”   - Luke 10:2-3         In this gospel, it speaks about the “seventy-two on mission” whom Jesus sent out.   The mission was the same as Jesus own ministry, to cure the sick and say to them, “the “kingdom of God has come near to you.” The Harvest field that what Our Lord says is “God’s Church” and the Laborers are “the people” of the Lord. Jesus sends the disciples “like lambs among wolves” and the Lord will be their protection.  This reminds us when we reflected on “ The Mission of the Twelve” (Luke 6:12-16).  They were sent without anything to bring, recall that the staff was important

In todays gospel, we look back on Jesus appointed Peter as the rock from which He would build His church. As we all know, Peter(Simon Peter) was on of Jesus' disciple and the one who also denied Him three times. Although, He already envisioned what Peter was about to do, still He entrust Peter the responsibility to tend His lambs and bring us closer to Him. Going back on our very own YE encounter weekend we were tasked to acknowledge and write down 5 Peter qualities which pertains to our "good traits" and 2 Simon qualities pertaining our "bad traits". I personally had a hard time thinking what to write on my Peter qualities but with Jesus' affirmation through my flock shepherd and everyone I have come to realize that my Peter qualities comoletely overshadows my Simon ones. Ofcourse, for we are made in His own image and likeness and goodness are within each one of us.  You see, God loves us even though we are sinners and we keep on sinning against H

“Love one another as I have loved you”, a quote said by God. “We love because he first loved us.”, 1 John 4:19. I admit, it is hard to love a person that destroys you the most. Especially if you need to love them for the sake of yourself or the one you love. I remember one time when my classmate since kindergarten made a mistake on me and broke my heart. Parang bang love life pero ganon siya, friends' life. She became one of my closest friend and I treated her as my sister, given the fact that I am an only child. Yet, hindi talaga natin masasabi na kung kaibigan kayo ngayon, kaibigan kayo hanggang sa huli. Yung tinuring mong kapatid at closest friend siya pa ang sisira ng pagmumukha mo sa lahat. Ang mga magaganda mong ginagawa ay binabaliktad sa lahat ng bagay sa mga kaklase at kaibigan mo. Pero eto ako, tao lang, kailangan magpatawad at magmahal, pinatawad ko siya. Kaso masasabi rin nating tao rin naman siya, ginawa niya ulit. So, dahil alam ko ang tama at ang tamang gawin upang

              In the Gospel, “The Wedding at Cana”, is a very powerful statement to Jesus’ Divinity. In that time, wine is very significant in weddings. If the wine were to run out during the wedding, it would be an insult to the guests. And as what the Gospel says, the wine did run out. Mary, the mother of Jesus, told Him and replied that, it is not the right time yet. Of course, Mary told the servers to follow Jesus’ orders. The time has come and Jesus had ordered the servers to fill the 6 stone water jars. After that, the water has turned into wine and was served to the guests.           The Gospel was like a showcase of Jesus’ Divinity. No one can turn water into wine in just a matter of seconds. Only someone with great power and divinity can make a miracle just like that. Of course, it was not truly a showcase of power, but it was of good will that Jesus performed a miracle. The turning of water into wine was the first miracle He has ever done.           Another view of the G