A Different Kind of Birthday This Year

It was a different kind of birthday experience I had this year.

You see, this past weekend, just a day before my birthday, I admitted myself last Sunday in the wee hours (2am/3am 1st day of DST that day, too) of the morning to the ER because of stomach pain since Friday night. The ER were jam-packed. Spent all Sunday morning and better part of the afternoon in the ER hallway waiting (my own version of "no rooms in the inn" misfortune).

It was diagnosed that I have an acute appendicitis. And to think this all happened during Lent—somehow, and fittingly, an opportunity opened up to deepen both me and my wife's Lenten practices of prayer, fasting, and almsgiving during my ordeal in the hospital.

I got to offer up my pain and suffering, and an opportunity to pray quietly for the healing of all the sick I saw in the ER, as well as all the current patients at that hospital while waiting almost 15 hours before to getting a room; I also got to fast for more than 24-36 hours without food and water. I'm also especially grateful to my wife, who has been by my side through it all, offering her own form of almsgiving—driving, washing, and dressing me, even assisting an adjacent patient and their family while waiting for a room—despite her exhaustion and lack of sleep. At the culmination, when surgery was about to perform that evening, funny enough, I found myself positioned in a crucified pose during my surgery, just before being put to sleep.

They kept me in the hospital overnight and was finally able to go home on my birthday. Indeed my special day this year was different, it was different because the gift of life our heavenly Father has continue to blessed me feel even more profound, literal and real especially after coming so close to the cusp of mortality on the eve of my birthday and and this season of lent. I got to sense and experience all in one, God's love, healing mercy and saving grace on my birthday.

All blessings, honor, praise, and thanksgiving unto Him for allowing me to see another year with cherished family and friends.

031025

Got an Evangelization Moment?

𝙀𝙫𝙖𝙣𝙜𝙚𝙡𝙞𝙯𝙖𝙩𝙞𝙤𝙣 𝙎𝙩𝙖𝙧𝙩𝙚𝙧

Through the years at work, I've learned that wearing a Jesus (or Mary or a saint) medallion or crucifix seemed to capture my clients' attention, and without me even trying, it elicits them to open up, ask and talk about faith, prayer or church conversations. I find many people are living in quiet desperation, longing for something transcendent.

As an introvert, this is one simple way of evangelizing and sanctifying my workplace especially working on a setting or system that is imperfect.

Excited to hear your #holymoments story, too. Who knows, "you may be the only Jesus some people see."  

CHECK OUT SAINTLY CATHOLIC CHRISTIANS GIFTS & MERCH: 

Amazon.com/author/domchu

Artjuniverse.redbubble.com

Teepublic.com/user/artjuniverse

Praising God habituates the virtue of Humility

One of the noblest aspects of praising the Lord, such as in a prayer meeting, is that it fosters the virtue of humility within us. It cultivates a "sacrificial heart."

We basically pray in four ways: to adore or praise God, to thank Him, to ask for pardon for our sins, and to ask Him for something.

In those last three, it involves ourselves in the picture when we pray. We pray because we hope to benefit from something in our prayer. But in the first type of prayer, when we praise God, it's all about Him. We devote our minds and hearts to forget ourselves and think of God alone.

If I give thanks, it is because I have received something. If I ask for forgiveness, it is because I have sinned. If I ask for something, it's because I need something. But in the prayer of adoration or praising God, the only person we consider is God alone. There is no element of "me, myself, and I" in this type of prayer.

That is why when we sing praises to the Lord, it is the most perfect form of prayer, the kind that gives the greatest glory to God.

As St. Paul exhorts us in his letter to the Romans 12:1: "Therefore, I urge you, brothers and sisters... to offer your bodies as a living sacrifice, holy and pleasing to God—this is your true and proper worship."

May the sacrifice of our praise be pleasing to you, O Lord. Come, Holy Spirit, enkindle our hearts and minds, and lead us where you want us to go according to your Holy will. Amen.