Tag: rosary

Gospel for February 13, 2011 — Raising the Bar

Moses with the tablets of the Ten Commandments...
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The Gospel for Sunday, February 13, 2011 is from Matthew 5:17-37.  In this reading Jesus extends the Mosaic law on topics such as murder, adultery, divorce, and swearing oaths.  He challenges people to work even harder to have a loving relationship with God.  For example, while the Mosaic law said “thou shalt not kill,” Jesus “raises the bar” saying that you should not even have grudges and be hateful towards others.  Jesus desires that we build up a strong faith that can endure through any of life’s challenges.  He encapsulates this attitude in the Fourth Sorrowful Mystery of the rosary, The Carrying of the Cross, as He kept moving towards His crucifixion and eventual resurrection despite the pain and suffering.

Jesus extends the Mosaic law partly because the Jews had grown too complacent following the rules.  They were following each law just for the sake of following them and not so much out of a love of God or to improve themselves.  Like someone who had grown too accustomed to a particular exercise routine, the old laws no longer sufficed for building a strong relationship with God.  As Jesus said later in Matthew 19:8, the laws that Moses gave to the Israelites were necessary because they were not ready to accept the full law as God intended.  In technical terms, the original Mosaic law can be thought of as the “beta” version of the law.  It contained many of the essential features but was not completely finished.  And so Jesus’ extensions completed the law as God always intended.

Whenever we feel like God has put a huge burden on our shoulders, let us remember the Fourth Sorrowful Mystery where Jesus took up His cross.  He suffered greatly and fell repeatedly under the crushing weight of the cross.  And yet, God gave Him the strength to get up and keep moving forward.  And although Jesus prayed that God would spare Him such an ordeal, God did not remove that challenge but instead gave Jesus the strength to endure it.  This rosary mystery should show us that we too can endure and ultimately triumph even when it seems like the challenge is too much.  Moses and Jesus did not give us these moral laws with the intent that we will ultimately fail to follow them.  Quite the opposite.  God gave us these laws because He knew we could handle them and that they would ultimately make us stronger in our faith.

Is living according to God’s laws challenging at times?  You bet!  But progress is never made when the road is easy.  Our relationship with God and each other are strengthened when we take up the challenge to live according to His laws.  Only when we take up our crosses and really make the conscious decision to live for Jesus can we truly say that we have a strong relationship with Him.  This idea of challenging ourselves reminds me of JFK’s famous speech about going to the moon.  We didn’t do it because it was easy, but because it was hard.  The same can be said about forging a relationship with Jesus Christ.  View this short video and replace “go to the moon” with “build a relationship with God” to see what I mean

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Gospel for February 6, 2011 — Let It Shine!

A lamp in the night
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The Gospel for February 6, 2011 is from Matthew 5:13-16 where Jesus tells His apostles to be a light to the world and not to hide it.  In Mt 5:15 Jesus says, “Nor do they light a lamp and then put it under a bushel basket; it is set on a lamp stand, where it gives light to all in the house.”  The Fifth Luminous Mystery of the rosary, The Institution of the Eucharist, reminds us how that sacrament makes us a light of grace and goodness to the world which we must not hide.

As Catholics, we believe that Jesus is actually present in the Eucharist.  When we receive the host in the sacrament of Communion, we literally receive Jesus.  That means that we receive His grace and that is what sustains us spiritually throughout the week.  Much like how our body needs food and water to survive, our soul needs Jesus through the Eucharist.  And we use that grace and spiritual energy to be a “light to the world” as Jesus says in the Gospel.  We must remember that we not only receive a gift of grace in this sacrament but also the obligation to live our faith for all the world to see.

Often we forget our spiritual obligations of receiving the sacrament of the Eucharist.  We may receive Jesus, but we negate any of the sacrament’s benefits when we choose to sin.  Much like the light under the basket in the Gospel, the grace of Jesus Christ can be hidden by our lust, gluttony, greed, envy, or any other sinful behavior.

Our behavior can have a ripple effect.  Jesus calls us to do good deeds so that other will see them and be influenced to do good as well.  This should be easy since, much like how a lamp radiates light, someone in God’s grace should just radiate goodness and love.  For example, we probably all know some good, solid people in our lives who are just a pleasure to be around.  They don’t need to try to be good but instead goodness just comes out naturally from them.  Those people are good examples for us since they are guided by the Holy Spirit to show God’s love.  However, be careful not to mistake living your faith with showing off.  Jesus says later in Matthew’s Gospel that He does not want us to show off good works for the sake of receiving praise from others.  Instead, our good works should always be directed towards giving glory to God.

When you hear this Gospel or meditate on the Fifth Luminous Mystery while praying the rosary, ask yourself if you are glorifying God by living according to His will.  What type of example are you setting for those around you?  Will your behavior lead others to do good or to sin?  Do you proudly proclaim and live your faith publicly or is it something you hide from the world?  And if you do live your faith, do you do it to win the praise and glory of others or to glorify God?  Throughout the week, remember this Gospel.  Do not be afraid.  Go out and be brave by living your faith for all to see.  If you receive God’s grace during the sacrament of the Eucharist, show it off!

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Gospel for January 30, 2011 — Challenging Yourself

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The Gospel for January 30, 2011 is from Matthew 5:1-12 most famously known as The Beatitudes or The Sermon on the Mount.  Jesus gives hope to those who feel hopeless and lost in a world that does not always seem good or fair.  He talks about how He will comfort the poor, the meek, and the persecuted in Heaven.  In the Beatitudes, Jesus proclaims the greatness and majesty of His kingdom of Heaven which is the central theme of the Third Luminous Mystery.

Jesus wants everyone to know that there is more to our existence than what we see, hear, smell, and feel.  And it does not matter how successful you are in this lifetime because you worldly successes won’t amount to anything in His kingdom.  This message is hard to fully realize since many times we do not see the light at the end of the tunnel when we suffer or make sacrifices for doing what is good and righteous.  But the entire point of praying and meditating on this rosary mystery is to ask God for the faith to see the glory of His kingdom even when it seems like our good acts have little impact in this world.

Let’s break down the Beatitudes into its core message since it is sometimes lost in Matthew’s poetic language.  If you want to live for God’s kingdom, this is what Jesus asks you to do:

  • Be devout in your faith, but do not show it off for the sake of looking holy.
  • Work towards righteousness by not being afraid to call good things good and bad things bad.
  • Be merciful, especially towards those who make life the most difficult for you.
  • Be pure of heart by avoiding sin and the near occurrences of sin.
  • Work towards peace even if it is just within your own heart.
  • Endure persecution, insults, and attacks against you for doing what is good even if the world considers it bad.

This is not easy.  No one said living for God’s kingdom would be.  But that is the point of praying the rosary; to ask for the strength and guidance to live, not for the world, but for Heaven.  I know that sometimes the Beatitudes can sound a little dry when read during Sunday Mass.  I know I sometimes zone out because I’ve heard it so many times.  But it is so important to not only know the Beatitudes, but to live them.  Ask yourself this in your prayers this week, “Am I living The Beatitudes?”  Listen to them one more time from the movie, “Jesus of Nazareth.”  It is my favorite Biblical movie because scenes like this bring life and energy to Jesus’ message that is sometimes lacking during Mass.

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Gospel for January 23, 2011 — What is Holding you Back?

Annunciation, painted by Fra Angelico (1387-14...
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The Gospel for January 23, 2011 is from Matthew 4:12-23 and focuses on Jesus calling Peter, Andrew, and James to be His apostles.  This Gospel has parallels with the First Joyful Mystery of the rosary — The Annunciation.  In that mystery, Mary accepts God’s plans for Her in being the mother of Jesus.  She accepted God’s Will and a drastically altered life much like how the fishermen in the Gospel dropped everything to follow Jesus.

In Matthew’s account of Jesus calling Peter, Andrew, and James the three men drop everything and follow Jesus without question.  They did not ask Jesus if He could come back at a better time.  They did not tell Jesus that they were not up to the task of being “fishers of men.”  They did not ask what the job would entail or what sacrifices they would need to make.  They simply left their old lives behind and followed Jesus.  Now we come to Mary.  She was living a typical village life.  She had a fiance and was maybe was looking forward to being married.  And then, out of the blue, an angel tells Her that She is not only pregnant, but pregnant with the Son of God!  Mary was probably a little shocked or scared.  And although she knew this duty was change Her life forever, She fully accepted God’s Will.

Now we come to you.  Would you be able to radically change you life if Jesus asked you to?  Luckily, the chances of us being called like Mary and the Apostles is very small.  We typically don’t need to make a snap decision to drop everything and follow Jesus.  Even those who accept the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience don’t make that decision quickly but only after years of study and meditation.  Chances are Jesus isn’t asking you to sell your home, car, and possessions and leave everything you know behind and become a missionary.   But this Gospel and rosary mystery raises the question, “Are there things in your life that prevent you from committing to God’s plans for you?”  Meditate on this question this week and take a deep look at what holds you back.  Money?  Your job?  Your social life? Drugs?  Lust?  The things that hold us back from Jesus may not be outright sinful but might be a distraction.  For example, there is nothing wrong with working hard and making a good living.  But you must be careful to strike the right balance and not have your job consume you and become more important than your relationship with God.  Pray and meditate for the knowledge to find those things in life that prevent you from fully following Jesus and for the strength to not let them have so much control over you.

I will leave you with a quotation from a little green friend of mine.  In “Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith” young Anakin tells Yoda that he is having dreams about the death of someone close to him. Yoda responds saying that the fear of loss leads to the Dark Side.  When Anakin asks what he is to do, Yoda advises, “Train yourself to let go of everything you fear to lose.”  While George Lucas probably didn’t have Matthew’s Gospel in mind when he wrote that, I think Yoda’s words relate well to this Gospel and rosary mystery.

Gospel for Janurary 16, 2011 — God’s Plans

St John the Baptist
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The Gospel for January 16, 2011 is from John 1:24-34 and, like the previous week’s Gospel, focuses on Jesus’ baptism.  In John’s Gospel, Jesus’ baptism takes the role of the Fourth Joyful Mystery — The Presentation in the Temple.  John does not write about Jesus’ birth or childhood but starts with His baptism as an adult.  This Gospel shows John the Baptist as the one who presents Jesus to the world through baptism.  John understands and accepts God’s special role for him and this Gospel and rosary mystery calls us to also reflect on how God calls us to live.

A few verses earlier in John’s Gospel, the pharisees ask John the Baptist if he is the Messiah, Elijah, or another prophet.  Each time John responds, “no.”  When pressed on why he baptizes people, John responds, “the reason why I came baptizing with water was that He might be made known to Israel” (John 1:31).  John’s mission, or vocation, is to prepare people for Jesus’ coming.  God’s plan for John wasn’t an easy one as it called for a life of constant prayer, penance, and fasting.  John’s life eventually ended in his arrest and execution.  I’m sure many people saw John the Baptist as some crazy person who wondered the desert.  After all, how many of us would probably roll our eyes if someone came into town yelling, “repent, repent!”  But John knew that preparing people for Jesus’ coming was so important that he dedicated his life to it.  I sometimes wonder if John, and many of the saints, had other plans for themselves earlier in their lives that they abandoned because it was not what God asked of them.  Maybe John wanted to be a banker, a carpenter, or own a vineyard.  But he knew that his passions wouldn’t amount to anything if they did not line up with God’s plans.

Simeon in the Fourth Joyful Mystery is very similar to John the Baptist.  Simeon spent his entire life in the temple in Jerusalem waiting and praying for the Messiah to appear.  Like John, Simeon was probably ridiculed and dismissed as a fool.  And I’m sure Simeon, as a boy, didn’t think that his entire life would be spent in the temple waiting for God to reveal Himself to him.  He probably imagined a “normal” life of living in a small village and working in the fields.  But that was not God’s plan for him.  And like John the Baptist, upon seeing Jesus, Simeon announced how Jesus was “a light for revelation to the Gentiles, and glory for your people Israel.” (Luke 2:32).  Both John and Simeon served to announce that God was made man and came into this world to lead us into His kingdom of Heaven.

When you read or hear this Gospel or meditate on the Fourth Joyful Mystery of the rosary, ask yourself:

  • Are you living according to God’s plans or your own?
  • Are you looking for how Jesus presents himself to you in your life?  Do you search for Him in routine prayer, fasting, and meditation?
  • Are you patient with God’s plans for you or are you looking for God to give you a “quick fix?”
  • Are you open to God’s plans even if they are difficult or run contrary to how you would like to live?
  • Do you have the strength to live up to God’s plans for you even if they are at odds with accepted societal practices?
  • Are there parts of your life where you live contrary to God’s plan for you?
  • What will you do to align your life more with God’s Will?
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Gospel for Janurary 9, 2011 — God’s Booming Voice

John the Baptist baptizing Christ
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The Gospel for January 9, 2011 is from Matthew 3:13-17 — the Baptism of Jesus which is also the First Luminous Mystery of the holy rosary.  When you pray this mystery, remember verse 3:17 where God tells John the Baptist and others gathered, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased.”

Very few people in the history of the human kind have ever directly heard the voice of God.  Imagine how great and at the same time terrifying that experience must have been for those present at Jesus’ baptism.  I know many times we may wish that God would talk to us in a more direct way such as through a booming voice from the sky.  But would you be truly prepared for such an event?  Would you be willing to change your entire life since you could no longer be ignorant of God’s existence, His laws, and the divine nature of Jesus Christ?

And yet I wonder how many people present at Jesus’ baptism were also there at Pontius Pilot’s palace yelling, “crucify Him!”  That shows just how stubborn (and stupid) we can act at times.  Even when we hear God’s Word and know what God expects of us, we turn around and either abandon Him or outright attack Him or His Church.  We do this all the time.  We know what is right and wrong in most common cases.  We know what the Church teaches about various moral, ethical, and social issues.  And yet so often we flagrantly act contrary to God’s Will.  It makes me wonder if we would even convert our sinful ways if God did speak to us as a voice in the sky.  After all, God would be competing with Oprah, television, and the media to whom we usually give more attention.

None of us have heard God as a booming voice in the sky.  But that doesn’t mean God doesn’t speak to us.  He speaks through the Magisterium of the Catholic Church.  He spoke through the saints.  And God speaks to us through prayer.  When it really comes down to it, we really don’t have much of an excuse to not keep God’s laws because He constantly communicates them to us.

When we pray the First Luminous Mystery of the rosary and recall Jesus’ baptism, let us also recall our own baptism.  Remember that through our baptism God calls us to live in His grace and one day be with Him in Heaven.  At our baptism, we were about as close to God as we ever can be in this life because our souls are wiped clean of all sin and we did not face any time in Purgatory.  That is the state God desires for our souls.  Trying to live in that state should be our ultimate goal in life.  That is what this Gospel and rosary mystery remind us.  In your prayers, really listen to what God says to you.  When you silence all those distractions and open your heart to God then you may actually realize that God does speak to you with a booming voice.

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Our Lady’s Messages: December 2010

Our Lady’s December 2nd,  2010 Message to Mirjana:

Dear children; Today I am praying here with you that you may gather the strength to open your hearts and thus to become aware of the mighty love of the suffering God. Through this His love, goodness and meekness, I am also with you. I invite you for this special time of preparation to be a time of prayer, penance and conversion. My children, you need God. You cannot go forward without my Son. When you comprehend and accept this, what was promised to you will be realized. Through the Holy Spirit the Kingdom of Heaven will be born in your hearts. I am leading you to this. Thank you.

Mary talks about gathering strength and becoming aware of the love of a suffering God.  Any of the Sorrowful Mysteries of the holy rosary fit this theme.  Jesus suffered in the garden, was scourged, crowned with thorns, carried the cross, and eventually crucified.  He is the greatest model of showing strength in the midst of difficulty and suffering.  Mary asks all of us to think about Jesus’ suffering when we encounter difficult times in our lives.

The Holy Spirit depicted as a dove above the H...
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When faced with difficult challenges it might seem so easy to “run away” and hide whether that be physically, mentally, or spiritually.  Maybe we hide from our troubles with drugs, alcohol, or deviant behavior.  Maybe we avoid attending Mass, praying, and receiving the sacraments in order to avoid taking a deep look at ourselves and realizing where we fail to live as Jesus calls us.

Mary wants us to take a deep look on how we live and notice areas where we do not live as Jesus desires.  She says that we need to realize our deficiencies if we are to convert and start living for Jesus’ Kingdom of Heaven.  There is an obvious reference to the Third Luminous Mystery in Mary’s message.  But much like many people in Jesus’ time we have a tendency to back away from this challenge of conversion.  When Jesus stopped healing people and giving out free bread and fish people quickly abandoned Him.  Even His apostles fled and hid when the Romans arrested Jesus.  Mary asks us to resist that temptation to run and hide from the path Jesus lays before us.  Even when the entire world seems against you for following Jesus’ Will remember that Mary, the saints, and the Holy Spirit are in your corner to support you.  With their help, you will have enough energy to conquer whatever the world throws at you.  All you need to do is supply the will to face those challenges instead of running and hiding.

Message, 25. December 2010:

Dear children! Today, I and my Son desire to give you an abundance of joy and peace so that each of you may be a joyful carrier and witness of peace and joy in the places where you live. Little children, be a blessing and be peace. Thank you for having responded to my call.

Mary’s message if short and sweet.  She asks us to rejoice in the Third Joyful Mystery — Jesus’ birth.  And while She delivers this message on Christmas, we should remember Jesus’ birth throughout the year.  God did not take on human form so that we may remember Him and live according to His Will for just one day.  Jesus didn’t teach us about His Heavenly Kingdom, suffer, die, and rise again only so we would have a reason to decorate our houses with light displays and hit the malls to buy gifts for people.  Jesus came into this world so that we may follow His message of joy and peace every day of our lives.  Mary asks us to spread that peace and joy by first embracing it in ourselves.  So as we start a new year ask yourself, “are you a living blessing and sign of peace?”  If not, how can you convert your heart to live as Mary asks us to live?

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Two Years of RosaryMeds

Birthday Cake Cupcake
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I found this article about the benefits of Catholic radio very inspirational.  It discusses a survey taken by listeners of Immaculate Heart Radio with these results:

According to the survey, 581 respondents said the radio channel helped them teach their children the truths of the faith. Additionally, 265 said Immaculate Heart Radio helped them return to the Catholic faith while 58 said the radio network helped them convert from another religion and 28 said they were helped to convert from agnosticism or atheism. Just over 100 respondents said the radio network helped them save their marriage, 23 said they were helped when contemplating suicide, and seven were helped to “choose life for my baby.”

This was not the most scientific survey since it sounds like the sample group was probably mostly made up of people from their main listening audience.  However, I find it amazing that this radio station saved at least 100 marriages and 30 lives.  And that is just from people who responded to the survey.  Who knows how many others were helped?  The saving of even just one life validates the importance and the impact of Catholic radio.  This means there are at least 30 people who are alive today who might not have been if it wasn’t for Immaculate Heart Radio, EWTN, and other outlets spreading the Catholic faith.

The accomplishment of Catholic radio fills me with a little hope as RosaryMeds turned two years old this week.  Granted, I don’t have the resources or collective wisdom of EWTN.  I probably haven’t transformed lives as dramatically as Immaculate Heart Radio.  But hopefully I inspired someone to pray the rosary who otherwise wouldn’t have.  Hopefully, I injected a small little pearl of wisdom in a posting that made someone feel better or helped them achieve a deeper state of prayer.  If you have found this website interesting or inspirational, please leave a comment or a suggestion.

I’m super excited about RosaryMeds’ third year.  I have some great ideas in mind that I hope will come to fruition in 2011.  And a big thank you to the  1,905 new visitors and the 423 returning visitors from 77 countries speaking 34 languages who visited in 2010!

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Our Lady’s Messages: November 2010

A Statue of the Virgin Mary in the Mouintain P...
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November 02 2010 Message to Mirjana at Medjugorje:

Dear children; With motherly perseverance and love I am bringing you the light of life to destroy the darkness of death in you. Do not reject me, my children. Stop and look within yourselves and see how sinful you are. Be aware of your sins and pray for forgiveness. My children, you do not desire to accept that you are weak and little, but you can be strong and great by doing God’s will. Give me your cleansed hearts that I may illuminate them with the light of life, my Son. Thank you.

Here’s a little news flash for all of us — we are not perfect.  We make mistakes.  We fall in and out of sin and hence we fall in and out of God’s grace.  Many of us would rather ignore this simple reality and believe that everything we do is just fine.  Or we think that because we do not suffer any consequences for certain actions in this world that we can continue to do them with impunity.  We make excuses like, “it’s legal so it’s moral.”  Or, “that’s an old rule that no one follows anymore.”  Mary points out that the longer we fool ourselves into thinking we are perfect the weaker we become.  And that becomes a vicious cycle because when we are spiritually weak we are more susceptible to Satan’s lies and  temptations which only puts us further away from God’s grace.

The Third Luminous Mystery calls us to acknowledge God’s kingdom of Heaven and convert.  This rosary mystery echos Mary’s message asking us to take a critical look at our lives and improve in areas where we are spiritually weak.  Jesus calls us to constantly examine our thoughts, words, and actions and ask ourself, “Am I living for God’s glory or my own?”  We all have a choice.  We can choose to live in ignorance of God’s laws and hope that we will never have to answer for our sins.  That is an incredibly risky and foolish gamble because the consequence of being wrong is eternal damnation.  Or, we can acknowledge our sins through the Sacrament of Reconciliation.  In doing so we “accept that we are weak and little” as Mary says but at the same time striving to be “strong and great by doing God’s will.”

November 25, 2010 Message at Medjugorje:

Dear children! I look at you and I see in your heart death without hope, restlessness and hunger. There is no prayer or trust in God, that is why the Most High permits me to bring you hope and joy. Open yourselves. Open your hearts to God’s mercy and He will give you everything you need and will fill your hearts with peace, because He is peace and your hope. Thank you for having responded to my call.

Like many of Her earlier messages, Mary asks us to just slow down and take some time to pray.  I find Mary’s observation that our hearts are full of “death without hope, restlessness, and hunger” interesting.  I echoed something similar in my post about Jesus’s teachings on the End Times and our final judgment.  I observed that without God in our lives we are destined to just stumble pointlessly through life, die, and turn into nothingness.  But Mary says that there is so much more to us than what we can experience in this world if we only open ourselves up to God.  She promises us peace, joy, and hope.

Let’s look at our options.  On one hand we can choose a life of pointlessness, misery, and despair.  On the other hand we can choose peace, hope, and joy.  We make that choice by deciding that we will consciously acknowledge God’s kingdom of Heaven, pray to Him, and put our trust in Him.  What do you choose?

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Scary Times

Waaah!.
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We are going into that “scary” period in the liturgical calendar right before Advent where many of the readings and Gospels focus on the end times, persecution, and final judgment.  There are many people who take these apocalyptic verses to extremes.  There is the one camp that just ignores these readings or see them as a lot of hyperbole and not events that will eventually occur.  The other camp thinks the end of the world will occur every day and finds every shred of circumstantial and coincidental evidence to support their claim.  I want to take a more balanced look at these readings and how we can approach them without being hysterical.

The Gospel reading from Luke on November 14, 2010 presents some very grim imagery.  Jesus describes wars and insurrections, earthquakes, famines, plagues, and persecution (Lk, 21:5-19).  I do not think anyone would disagree that these are all pretty terrible things and we would be fortunate to avoid them.  In many people’s world view this is how it all ends; people dying in misery and despair.  However, many people do not see that there is light at the end of this dark tunnel we call human existence.  There is the glory, comfort, and joy of eternal life in Heaven.  Last Sunday’s Gospel ends with Jesus saying,  “not a hair on your head will be destroyed.  By your perseverance you will secure your lives” (Lk, 21:19).  And that is the central message we should take away from these apocalyptic readings — the joy of Heaven is infinitely greater than any suffering here on Earth.

Think back to your childhood.  Do you remember the first time you cut yourself?  Perhaps you fell when you were playing.  Maybe you poked yourself with a sharp object.  I’m sure many of us cried and wailed over that pain as it seemed like the worst torment we would ever encounter.  Now as adults we probably don’t have the slightest recollection of that ordeal.  This is similar to how Heaven will compare to all our Earthly suffering.  The worst wars and tragedies won’t even be a faint memory compared to the joys of Heaven.  This is what Jesus teaches us in the Gospel.  In the end, our faith and perseverance will bring us more happiness than we can possibly imagine and make all our earthly suffering seem like nothing more than a scraped knee.

We can pick any Sorrowful Mystery as an example of  perseverance through hard times.  In this period before Advent, when we pray the rosary, we should ask God for the strength to endure any difficulties in our lives.  Perhaps you are having a hard time at work or at home.  Maybe you are having relationship problems or there are people in your life that bring you nothing but misery.  Take all those challenges and present them to God when you pray.  Try to look past the misery and difficulties of this world by reminding yourself that it is all temporary.  When you put it all in perspective you will realize that life’s biggest obstacles are so small compared to the joy of Heaven and you will wonder why you even worried about them in the first place.

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