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Real success

July 23, 2021 Bro. Clifford T. Sorita 726 views

SoritaIF you place a frog into a pot of cold water, the frog will happily swim around. That’s not very surprising. Frogs like cold water. But, if you place a frog into a pot of boiling water, the frog will try to jump out. That’s not too surprising either. Frogs don’t like boiling water. However, here’s what is surprising. If you place a frog into a pot of cold water, then gradually turn up the heat until the water boils, the frog will make no attempt to jump out of the pot. It slowly adapts itself to the change—adapts itself to death. This is the cost of apathy, the cost of being complacent with our Christian life. The real achievement of being a disciple of Christ is service.

As Christians, we are servants of God. When does a servant gain a reward? A servant gains a reward once he does something that is beyond his line of duty. Jesus, Son of God, became our servant, something that is definitely beyond His line of duty but because of the Father’s Love for us, He died for us. He served us. And because of this, Jesus was rewarded. He resurrected and He will come again and become ruler of the Kingdom of God as CHRIST THE KING.

What’s in it for us Christians? We, too, would be rewarded. Just by doing our duty: following the Ten Commandments and Jesus’ Teachings, we, too, can enter the Kingdom of God. We too can dine with Jesus as His friends and no less. Our Master became our Servant. He went out of His way and because of this we can be rewarded.

These privileges we have to grasp for they are above the ordinary. They are above what we can get in this world. They are special and are for eternity.

What we achieve here on earth is far from what our rewards in Heaven would be. What we achieve here on earth has nothing to do with what we can achieve in Heaven. As long as we are living for God’s Purpose, we are already mighty achievers.

Let us look on our present earthly achievements. Were they achieved for a personal goal? Were they achieved for another’s purpose? Were they achieved for God or man’s purposes? Were they achieved just to get by with life or to prepare oneself for eternity?

By the way, we do not need to go beyond what was required of us to do. God has already done that for us. There is absolutely nothing that we can do that can surpass what He has done for us. All of the unimaginable that we can do for God is still under the line of our duty. God has done the unimaginable for us. What is unimaginable for us is unimaginable only to us.

With God, everything is possible. Whatever we do according to His Will, no matter how unimaginable they may be is still our duty. We would not be using our own talents but what God has given us. Since our Master created us, everything that we do is subject to His Reason. Our talents are God’s. Therefore we have great responsibility with how we use them. Everything that we are and have is God’s.

Our duty does not impose us to be the greatest in the world. Only God is Great. Our duty is to be obedient to God. To make best of what He has given us and use them according to His Will and not to our own gain. If we gain for ourselves, that gain is perishable. The longest time it can last is until the day our bodies are buried in the ground. God’s Will is for forever. The gain we reap for ourselves does not satisfy us. The gain we reap for ourselves is useful for the time being. But Simple Obedience leads to real and big time unimaginable non-perishable gains.

In a political world such as ours, only a handful are willing to give way for the common good at the price of his/her own possessions and interests. It has always been the defense mechanism of officials to hide behind the pretension of having to bear the burden of insufficient funding for projects and expenses, which spells improvements. The charade is over… it is high time to start considering for 2016 polls exemplary leaders. Leaders who will never be hampered by a rotten political system but would converse inspire other towards a miracle of giving in meeting the needs of others.

The bottom line is that we live in the image of Jesus, our Servant Master. Thus, we should constantly live the life of Servant and not of a Master. We should constantly be reminded that our life should always be at the service of others and of the common good.

“The real heroes who come to light in these days: they are not famous, rich and successful people; rather, they are those who are giving themselves in order to serve others. Feel called yourselves to put your lives on the line. Do not be afraid to devote your life to God and to others; it pays! For life is a gift we receive only when we give ourselves away, and our deepest joy comes from saying yes to love, without ifs and buts. To truly say yes to love, without ifs and buts. As Jesus did for us” [Pope Francis].

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