Those who live a double standard life are bringing blame to the cross of Christ.

For many live as enemies of the cross of Christ – Philippians 3:18. We need to examine ourselves that are we living as enemies of cross of Christ in our day-to-day living? Bible has cited four reasons in Phil 3:19.

First reason is that those who live as enemies of Cross, for them destiny is destruction. Second they think their God is their stomach. Third is that they give glory to their shame and lastly their mind is on earthly things.

Destiny is destruction

We see the life of Judas. He knew Jesus very closely that too in person. He ate and drank with Him. He listened to the preachings of Jesus. Even then he betrayed Jesus by a kiss. His destiny we all know. The point is that we humans who receive Jesus in mass every Sunday; can we afford to cling to sin? Sin is pleasurable. We need to examine our conscience and make a confession. We can pray that the blood of Jesus may cleanse our body , mind and soul. We can also ask Jesus to interfere in our life so that HIS will may be done and HIS kingdom comes on this earth.

God is their stomach

Today the rich are getting richer. The thirst to be wealthy is like water flowing out of the mug. Our stomach is not full. People are not content with what they have. They want more and more. We need to trust Jesus in HIS providence. Everyday we say ‘Give us today our daily bread’. We need to be content with what God gives us. We also need to make sure that we are giving one-tenth of the income to our Lord’s house. It is a challenge to fill our mind with the Word of God. Because mind controls the stomach.

Glory is their shame

Am I a hypocrite? We need to ask this question to ourselves. Are we living two lives. One is that we regularly attend Sunday mass and outside Church we live a sinful life. Whom are we pleasing? Whom are we fooling? It is time to pull our strings and say no to sin. Living a double standard life is abateful. We Christians are more answerable to Lord on our judgement day. Do not glorify yourself after committing a sin instead we need to repent so that angels can glorify over a repentant sinner.

Mind on earthly things

Many of us have cravings on earthly things. What are earthly things? Is it food, clothes, house, job? Why are we worried about earthly things? We are called to live Christ like life. The challenge is how to set our mind on heavenly things rather than on earthly things. The answer to this challenge is by constantly praising and worshiping HIM. By giving praise and worship to the Lord, the Lord will set all things right without our knowledge. We should also understand that the wavelength of thinking of God and ours is different. The wavelength is equal to the difference between the land and the sky.

Download the Enemies of the Cross of Christ PDF

Whatever happens in our life, is for good. We need to patiently wait upon the Lord for HIS glory to fall on us. St. Paul tells us to love and embrace the cross. Living as enemies of the cross is self-indulging. Take a look at these Calvary Cross Pictures of Jesus Christ.

- – - written by Merly Simon

Bible speaks little of the Mother of God but tradition gives valuable information. We know very little about Miriam of Nazareth as an actual historic person. In this she is in solidarity with the multitudes of people through the centuries especially poor women and men, whose lives are considered not worth recording. We must also be respectful of her historic difference from us in time and place.

Mary lived in Mediterranean rural village, Nazareth, whose population consisted largely of peasants working in the land and craftsmen who served their basic needs. Married to the local carpenter, she took care of the household. We do not find anything in the Gospels about the Birth of Virgin Mary. This is because the main focus has been completely centered on the person of Jesus Christ. The mystery of Christ and His two natures human and divine and His salvific mission, hence Mary was in oblivion.

Much of this knowledge of the circumstances in which we lived has resulted from the contemporary quest for the historical Jesus. But it serves us as well for the Miriam of Nazareth as a Jewish village women of faith. Mary walked by faith, not by sight. She has a relationship with God that was profound. In those days, people’s hope for the coming of the Messiah included in the hope that He would liberate the suffering poor from oppressive rule.

Unlike the birth of john the Baptist (Lk. 1:57-63) we find nothing in the Gospels concerning the birth of Mary. All the same we find in the proto Gospel of James that Ann and Joachim were her parents who were barren but in their old age gave birth to Mary. The feast “Birth of Mary” started in Jerusalem during the 5th century where according to tradition the house of Mary had been. The feast comes at a time when the fields are ready for harvest. So it is a time of rejoicing as they offer the first fruit to God. This is very significant in the light of the Word of the God “When the fullness of time came, God sent His son born of a women” (Gal. 4:4-6).

The description although in the manner of an apocryphal document obviously presents an important historical event about the Birth of the Mother of the Lord. The birth of Mary is ordained in particular toward her mission as Mother of the Saviour. Tradition, grounded on very old testimonies, informs us that Saints Joachim and Ann in their old age came from Galilee to settle in Jerusalem, and there Mary the Mother of God was Born. A Church was built during the 4th century, possibly by Saint Helena, on the sight of the house of saints Joachim and Ann in Jerusalem.

The origin of this Feast sought in Palestine. It goes back to the consecration of a Church in Jerusalem, which tradition identifies as that of the present basilica of St. Ann. At Rome, the Feast began to be celebrated towards the end of the 7th century, brought there by Eastern monks, Gradually and varied ways it spread to the other parts of the west in the centuries that followed. From the 13th century on the feast drew notable importance and celebrated with solemnity on different dates from place to place.

For some centuries now, the Birth of Mary has been assigned to September 8 both in the East and West. However, when the feast of the Immaculate Conception (which has a later origin than that of the birth) was extended to the whole Church the Birth of Mary slowly and steadily assigned everywhere to September 8 – nine months after the solemnity of the Immaculate Conception.

Read the following 2 articles that tells more about the birth of Mother Mary:

Birth of the Blessed Virgin Mary – September 08

Nativity of The Blessed Virgin Mary

If many “will rejoice” at the Birth of the precursor (Lk. 1:14) a much greater joy is stirred up by the BIRTH of the MOTHER of the savior. Hence, this is a Feast that serves as a prelude to the “joy to all people” brought about by the Birth of the son of God at Christmas and expressed by the singing of hymns and carols. Added to this joy on this MARIAN FEAST is that of light because with MARY’S BIRTH the darkness is dispersed and there raises in the world a dawn that announces the sun of justice, Jesus Christ the Lord.

Mary – Queen – as the daughter of the Father, Mother of the son, and bride of the Holy Spirit, Mary was crowned Queen of Heaven and earth by the Triune God. As we celebrate the Birthday of our Heavenly Mother, let’s pray that she may continue interceding for us.

- – - written by Bro. Mathew Perunilam

Faith is trust in a person that He will not leave us alone. Faith in God is the strong assurance one has at the bottom of his or her heart that all those things that are impossible for human being are possible for God.

Once I had an opportunity to interact with a couple and our discussion is still fresh in my mind. The Husband is around 48 years old and the wife is 46. They have no children yet. They prayed a lot but no answer was favored to them. With great enthusiasm I asked them a question, “Do you still pray for a child even today in this situation? Do you believe that God can work miracles even in this crisis?”

Their response was just a hum which was so interesting and thought-provoking. I believe that the answer cannot be Yes, as I noticed their grieving face, desperate eyes and in their eyes I could read the answer to my question “How can a child be conceived at this age? Even the uterus was also removed due to the illness” there is no scope for a different answer than this.

This made me to think more about the man’s faith in God. Most of our faith is not much different from those couple I interacted with. Since there is always a logic involved in our faith like that of the couple, our trust is more relying on our abilities than God’s power to do greater things in our lives.

1. Child who is brilliant and has the capabilities to study better will win in the Exams
2. Since the uterus is capable and the age is suitable, a child may be conceived..
3. Since the body is responding to medicine, healing may happen.

Our logical thought goes like this; If that is the case, the God who formed the heaven and earth even before you were formed in your mother’s womb and given you name is an omnipotent God and for Him everything which is impossible for man is possible.

Abraham and Sarai

Nothing different is the experience of Abraham the father of all believers and his beloved wife Sarai. Genesis 13:14-16 says that “The Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him; Raise your eyes now and look from the place where you are, northward and southward and eastward and westward” For all the land that you see I will give to you and your ‘offspring’ forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if one can count the dust of the earth, your offspring also can be counted. Rise up, walk through the length and breadth of the land for I will give it to you. What a strange promise when one looks at this with his logic because Abram is Childless when God promised this and they must have longed for a child after Abram and Sarai become one.

Still Abram was sure that God will favor his prayers and God is faithful to his promises and that is the reason that Abram went towards the Promised land which is offered to his own descendents even when he was childless. Abraham experiences a delay to reach in to God’s promises and probably which could have caused his heart to go dim and to doubt than trusting in God’s promises.

Again the merciful and compassionate God speak to Abraham in a vision that we read in Genesis 15:1-6, “After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, ‘Do not be afraid Abram, I am your shield, your reward shall be very great. But Abram said, ‘O Lord God what will you give me, for I continue childless and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Demascus?’ And Abram said, you have given me no offspring, and so a slave born in my house is to be my heir.’

But the word of the Lord came to him, “This man shall not be your heir no one but your very own child shall be your heir.” He brought him outside and said “look towards heaven and count the star, if you are able to count them”. Then he said to him “so shall your descendents be and he believed the Lord and the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness.

However, after long-awaited interval Abraham still experience the withdrawing faith and he listened to Sarah’s words and obeyed Sarah’s advice to go to her slave girl and obtain children by her. It clearly tells us that even Abraham or Sarah could not believe what God promising many a times in their lives before.

However, we see the merciful and compassionate God again and again intervening in his life and promising the same thing even at his age of 99 in Genesis 17: 1-6 God tells him “I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless. And I will make my covenant between me and you, and make you exceedingly numerous.” Then Abram fell on his face, God said to him, as for me this is my covenant with you: You shall be the ancestor of a multitude of Nations. No longer shall your name be Abram but your name shall be Abraham; for I have made you the multitude of nations; and I will make you exceedingly fruitful. “

Now it is Sarai’s turn because the logic is that a woman cannot conceive after certain age, and see in Genesis that God even making Abrams heart strong to believe that everything is possible for God we see in Genesis 17:15-19, God said to Abram, “As for Sarai your wife, you shall not call her Sarai but Sarah shall be her name. I will bless her and moreover I will give you a son by her. I will bless her and she shall give rise to nations; King of people shall come from her. At this time when God spoke to him Abram fell on his face and laughed as his logic questioned him if a child can be born to such an old lady like Sarah who was 99 years old and Abraham who was 100 years old.

However, even the merciful and compassionate God comes down to meet Abraham again and again whose faith had grown down and could not believe in God’s providence and promises as he being completely a human being crammed with logics.

In Genesis 18:9-15, God appears to him and ask where is your wife Sarah, “There in the tent, then one said, I will surely return to you in due season and your wife Sarah shall have a son.” Sarah was also listening to this conversation at the tent entrance behind him, could not believe as to how can an old woman like her and her old husband have pleasure was her argument.

Still what had happened in their lives? Abraham and Sarah’s life is not different from those couples whom I had introduced you before. Genesis 21 ;1-2 gives us an answer to that question” The Lord dealt with Sarah as he had said, and the Lord did for Sarah as he had promised. Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age at the time of which God had spoken to him.Here we clearly understand that one who waits for God’s own time will experience God’s greater miracle. The wonder here is that the Bible says that the 99-year-old lady nursed her son Issac with her own milk till he grew up instead of substituting it with any other food.

All these incidents in Abraham and Sarah’s life gives us ample evidence and proof that nothing is impossible for God Almighty and God works in one’s life in his own time. Therefore, it is good to believe in God’s power and ability than trusting in one’s own abilities and capabilities. God can work in your life in a mighty way even when there is no hope in your life and you feel you are left out with no scope for things according to your logic and ‘reasons. If you are willing to believe strongly inside your heart that God will do great things in your life, certainly it will be done for you.

The wax melts at a certain degree Celsius is a scientific proof and hence we believe it. However, faith means believing that God can work even where science has no scope. Each and every Christian has a call to grow in faith which goes above ones logic. If Christian life is not growing beyond rituals and if the rituals are not becoming an outward expression of an intimate and unbreakable relationship with Christ, One cannot experience the depth of the deep-rooted faith in God’s ability. It is difficult for a human being to have such strong faith in God when his logic rules him.

When we question about the place of God in Man’s life, the answer is correct that the place of God in Man’s life is extremely high. However, man’s reasoning limits him to think about God as a powerful person who is extremely high and above from man’s reach and slow in answering his prayers. However when we realize that our Lord is the God who is powerful, compassionate and merciful and that He came down from the heavens to the earth to live with us humans, we will flee from our sins and come out from the lack of faith in his abilities and will have a passionate desire to live with him and this will enable us to acquire a strong faith to believe that nothing is impossible for God.

Read Nothing is impossible for The Lord

When God becomes an intimate and loving family member who always stays with us, we stop wandering for materialistic pleasures and seeking reasons in everything else than God’s ability. May the Holy Spirit help us to experience him more closely so as to have a strong faith in his ability.

- – - written by Thomas Philip