What You Freely Receive, Freely Give

One way to see how deep our relationship to God is the fruits of our lives. Only a healthy plant can produce good fruits. Only a soul filled with love and grace can be fruitful.

Our relationship with God must not get stagnant in a “Give Me” state. Even though God told us to pray for our daily bread, He also commands us to proclaim the Gospel for the salvation of souls, in short, we are all called to mission.

We cannot get stuck as receivers in our relationship with God. We cannot get stuck doing whatever we are doing for God so we can feel good, that tends to be more of a self-service than actual service, self-love than self-giving love.

Real love goes out and give. After it receives, it gives it away. Real love does not accumulate but disseminate.

So ask yourself a question. Is your relationship with God is based on making yourself feel good? Or is it out of concern for others and the desire to love of God?

Is your relationship with God just lip service?

“If we cannot love the person whom we see, who can we love God, whom we cannot see?” – Mother Teresa

If are truly love God, we want to share in His mission. It is a compulsion that comes from a heart that is in love.

“Yet when I preach the gospel, I cannot boast, for I am compelled to preach. Woe to me if I do not preach the gospel!” -  1 Corinthians 9:16

The Father asks us to pray, but He also commands us to work in the vineyard. Both are required to have a full relationship with God. And you don’t have to go far away to be missionaries. You can work on your own vineyard, your family. You can pray and offer sacrifices for those people who has no one to pray for them. You can use the internet to evangelize, that is not that hard. You can preach the Gospel in your own little way. Going to mission only means going out of yourself, your self-absorption, your own ego, to serve others.

If we have truly experienced God’s love, then we want to share it. It is that simple.

"The term 'laity' is here understood to mean all the faithful except those in Holy Orders and those who belong to a religious state approved by the Church. That is, the faithful, who by Baptism are incorporated into Christ and integrated into the People of God, are made sharers in their particular way in the priestly, prophetic, and kingly office of Christ, and have their own part to play in the mission of the whole Christian people in the Church and in the World." (#897 of the Catechism of the Catholic Church)

In What Kind of Relationship Are You In? Give and Take or Give and Give?

We often hear that to be in a good relationship there has to be a “give and take” within the partners. But I think sometimes the “give and take” mentality can get old quick because it has a tendency to be selfish. I give so I can take. Their giving becomes an indirect egotism.

St Thomas Aquinas defines love as to will the good of the other as other. There is no hidden agenda in real love. You love the person for the sake of the person and not because you can get something out of the person.

A real loving relationship practices “give and give.” There is no need for taking because the longings are being satisfied by the partner even before the other asks for it. A person who is deeply in love is focused on her beloved and not on himself. He wants to make his beloved happy. He puts her before himself every time in every thing. And she does the same.

Both are satisfied and fulfilled.

Both feel loved.

Most of us when we are considering entering into a relationship with someone ask this question, “What can I get from this person?” Another way of putting it is “What can this person give me?”

I think we should have a radical change of attitude if we want to experience real and lasting love. We must change the question “What can I get” to “What can I give to this person?”

The best example of this love is Jesus on the Cross. When Jesus let Himself get crucified, it was solely for you and me. There was no hidden agenda on Jesus’ suffering except our salvation. It was a totally selfless act. Jesus died because He loved you and me.

So if we want to have a beautiful relationship, we must learn to love like Jesus. Our love has to be totally unselfish and self-giving.

There is no greater love than to give one’s life for a friend.

By Daxx Bondoc

Has All Your Hurrying Led You Somewhere?

We live in the society who is on “the go”. We are always hurrying somewhere and rushing something. The last thing you can say about our society is lazy.

But I am saying it.

We are a lazy society!

What?

We work more than 8 hours a day, even on weekends. We have sacrificed our families for the sake of work. How could we be lazy?

We are lazy. We are lazy in the important things in life. We are busybodies on things that are fleeting and unsubstantial. We are “on the go” and going nowhere.

Our being busy is just an excuse for our laziness for the things that matter. Like loving God and our neighbor. We create an atmosphere where we can excuse ourselves not to help our needy brothers and sisters. We are even too busy that we have no time to pray.

Yet we always have time to “chill out” or “unwind”. We say we deserve it, and maybe we do. But it is amazing how much down time we can afford. Yet when it comes to visiting an orphanage or a shelter, we are simply just too busy for it. “I need that time to rest.” is our excuse. But when it comes to going out, even sleep deprivation cannot hinder us.

Our Holy Mother Mary teaches us about the right hurrying.

"In those days Mary arose and went with haste into the hill country, to a city of Judah" to help her pregnant cousin Elizabeth. Even though Mary herself was pregnant, she endured the long hours of travel and harsh landscape just to help her cousin who was in need. She set aside her own inconvenience for the sake charity.

And she went in “haste”. Mary did not procrastinate nor made excuses, which she could have since she was pregnant. But she did not. We are so unlike our Mother. We find a bit of traveling already an excuse not help. It took days for Mary to reach Elizabeth. And she was riding a donkey! And we find a bit of commuting bothersome.

Mary is the model of service. Her service does not delay. Her service goes out to the needy and does not wait for the needy to come to her.

True love hurries towards the beloved.

Love is not passive, but active.

Love does not sit lazily at home. Love goes out seeking those who are unloved and unwanted.

Let us be like our Mother Mary, who is always in “haste” in loving us.

Written by Daxx Bondoc