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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 1, 2019 17:37:50 GMT
AUGUST 1 The Healing Physician
Be assured that all your diseases will be healed. Have no fear. You may say that your diseases are powerful; but this physician is more powerful. There is no disease that the Almighty Physician cannot cure. Just allow yourself to be healed and do not reject His healing hands. He know what He is doing.
- Commentary Psalm 72, 32
Prayer. Bring relief to a serious wound with Thy great medicine. Mine is serious, but I take refuge in the Almighty. I would despair of such a grave injury unless I had recourse to a great physician. - Commentary of Psalm 50, 6
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 3, 2019 1:57:38 GMT
AUGUST 2 Lift Up Your Hearts
Put the things of creation in the second place. You have to leave this world some day, for you are not going to remain here forever. Each day you hear, "Lift up your hearts." But you sink your heart into this world as though you heard the very opposite. Listen to me, you who are poor: what is lacking to you if you have God? Listen to me, you who are rich: what do you possess if you do not have God? - Sermon 311, 14-15
Prayer. Lord, help us, so that a change may be achieved in us, and we may find Thee ready to offer Thyself for the enjoyment of those who love Thee. - Commentary on Psalm 6, 5
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 4, 2019 2:32:49 GMT
AUGUST 3 Temperance
All who love the world dwell in it by their love, just as all whose hearts are lifted upward dwell by their love in heaven. When we are commanded not to love the world, it does not mean we should refrain from eating, drinking, or begetting children. But temperance is ordered because of the Creator, so that such things will not enslave you by your love of them.
- Sermon on 1 John 2, 12
Prayer. Command, Lord, and requisition whatever Thou wish. But heal and open my ears to that I may hear Thy voice. Heal and open my eyes, so that I see Thee commanding. Drive the madness out of me, so that I may recognize myself.
- Soliloquies 1, 5
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 4, 2019 17:47:42 GMT
AUGUST 4 Not Every Sin Is Sinful
Many sins are committed through pride, but not all happen proudly. They happen so often out of ignorance and out of human weakness. Many sins are even committed by people weeping and groaning in their distress. - Nature and Grace 29, 33
Prayer. Lord, I have done much wrong. I cannot hope for a speedy rest for myself. May my torments be enough till Thy coming. Let me be tortured now. Then, when Thou come, spare me. - Sermon 327, 2
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 5, 2019 20:18:04 GMT
AUGUST 5 A Redeemer Fashioned for Us
God the Father said: "I sent you One Who would seek you out, walk with you, and forgive you. So He had feet to walk with and hands to forgive with. Thus, when He ascended after His Resurrection, He showed hands, side, and feet: hands with which He gave pardon to sinners; and side from which flowed the ransom of the redeemed." - Sermon 16A, 10
Prayer. Come, Lord, and act. Rouse and renew us, kindle us and carry us away, shine before us and be gentle with us, let us love and run toward Thee. - Confessions 8, 4
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 6, 2019 16:00:03 GMT
AUGUST 6 You Are a Beggar of God
Even though you possess plenty, you are still indigent. You abound in temporal possessions, but you need things eternal. You listen to the needs of a human beggar, yet you yourself are a beggar of God. What you do with those who beg from you is what God will do with His beggar. You are filled and you are empty. Fill your empty neighbor from your fullness, so that your emptiness may be filled from God's fullness. - Sermon 56, 9
Prayer. Lord, I have waited for Thee to come and deliver me from every need. For in my need Thou have not forsaken Thy law of mercy. - Commentary on Psalm 129, 3
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 8, 2019 2:47:15 GMT
AUGUST 7 You Must Be Drawn
Our Lord said: "No one can come to Me unless the Father Who sent me draws that person." This is a great commendation of grace! Do not make judgments about whom God draws and whom He does not draw, unless you wish to fall into error. Accept this once and for all, and understand it: you are not yet drawn to God? Pray that you may be drawn! - Sermon on John 26, 2
Prayer. Lord, heal and open my eyes that I may recognize Thy will. Put to flight my foolishness that I may know Thee. Show me the road I must travel that I may see Thee. Thus aided, I hope to do all Thou have commanded me.
- Soliloquies 1, 5
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 8, 2019 21:09:54 GMT
AUGUST 8 Prayer and Temptation
Without a doubt, we must pray lest we enter into temptation. This is denied by those who claim that God's aid is not necessary for humankind to keep free from sin and that the human will that merely knows the law is sufficient. Such persons should certainly be kept out of the hearing of everyone and should be rejected by the unanimous voice of all. - Human Justice, 44
Prayer. Lord Jesus, Thou suffered for us not for Thyself. Thou bore the punishment for no fault of Thy own, to abolish both the fault and the punishment. - Sermon 136, 6
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 10, 2019 3:22:43 GMT
AUGUST 9 Christ's Members Follow the Head
You must realize that when the Father shows His works to Christ's members, it is to Christ that He shows them. He shows them to the members through the Head. Suppose you wish to take hold of some object with your eyes closed. Your hand does not know where to go, yet your hand is your member. Open your eyes and your hand will now see where it must go. The member follows the way indicated by its head. - Sermon on John 21, 9
Prayer. Lord, only this do I ask of Thy great kindness: that Thou convert me totally to Thee and allow no obstacle to hinder me as I wend my way to Thee. - Soliloquies 1, 6
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 11, 2019 2:26:17 GMT
AUGUST 10 Let Friends Help Us
For when we are harassed by poverty, saddened by bereavement, ill, or in pain, let good friends visit us. Let them be persons who not only can rejoice with those who rejoice but can weep with those who weep. Let them be persons who know how to give useful advice and how to win us to express our own feelings in conversation.
- Letter 130, 2
Prayer. O Lord, my God, pay heed to my prayer. Look with mercy on my desire, which is not concerned with myself alone but with my neighbor's good as well. - Confessions 11, 2
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 11, 2019 17:26:25 GMT
AUGUST 11 Two Types of Fear
Shall I say something about the two types of fear? There is a servile fear and there is a chaste fear. The first fears that it may suffer punishment; the other fears that it may lose justice. The chaste fear endures forever. Love does not destroy it or drive it out of us, but rather embraces it and holds on to it as its companion. We come to the Lord in order to see Him face to face. Then a chaste fear preserves us.
- Sermon on John 43, 7
Prayer. I implore Thee, God, Thee to Whom faith calls us, hope leads us, and love unites us. Come to me in Thy mercy.
- Soliloquies 1, 3
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 12, 2019 15:27:57 GMT
AUGUST 12 Thou Loved Me First
Look down upon me and have mercy on me according to the judgment of those who love Thy Name. For Thou first loved me, so that I might love Thee. By loving Thee, I love myself, and thus I am wisely able also to love my neighbor as myself. Lord, teach me how to act; teach me how to do Thy will. For though I hear, and bear in mind what I hear, I am by no means supposed to have learned if I do not act. - Commentary on Psalm 118 (27), 5-8
Prayer. Lord, Thou first loved me, so that I might love Thee.
- Commentary on Psalm 118 (27), 15
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 13, 2019 15:15:49 GMT
AUGUST 13 Rich and Poor - Equal Births
Carefully examine yourself and see how you stand in relation to the poor. Look at yourself, not at what you possess. Why do you scorn your brother or sister? In your mother's wombs both of you were naked. In truth, even when you have departed this life, and your bodies have rotted, when your souls have been sent forth, can the bones of the rich and poor people be told apart? I am speaking of the condition of humankind in which all are born. For both things are true: a person becomes rich here and a poor person will not be here forever. - Commentary on Psalm 103, 7
Prayer. God examines rich and poor, not according to their lands and houses, but according to the riches of their hearts.
- Commentary on Psalm 48, 3
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 15, 2019 3:50:51 GMT
AUGUST 14 Death Starts With Life
Rest assured that the possibility of death starts with the beginning of life. In this world of ours, only those who are not yet born can claim not to be as yet due to die. That is why the uncertain day of death becomes a daily contingence for you and me alike. - Sermon 9, 2
Prayer. Eternal Truth, true Love, beloved Trinity - all this, my God, Thou are, and it is to Thee that I sigh by night and by day. - Confessions 7, 10
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Post by Elizabeth on Aug 15, 2019 20:42:21 GMT
AUGUST 15 Mary and the Church
Mary gave birth to your Head, and the Church gave birth to you. For the Church also is both mother and virgin. She is mother by her entrails of charity, and virgin by the integrity of faith and piety. She gives birth to many, but they are all members of One who Body and spouse she herself is. In this she is like Mary, because in many she is the mother of unity. - Sermon 192, 2
Prayer. Come, let us adore Him Whom the Virgin conceived without concupiscence, to Whom she gave birth as a virgin and remained thereafter a virgin. - Sermon 231, 2
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