As we celebrate the last few days of the Christmas season and begin the New Year, Jesus turns around and asks us point blank: "What are you looking for?" What do we hope for in this Christmas season? What do we hope 2012 will bring? Some of what we are looking for is straight from the heart of God, but some of it is against the heart and will of God. We should differentiate our self-centered desires from our God-centered ones. We must repent of looking for the wrong things and believe that the Lord will fulfill those desires which are according to His will.
Many times we not only have wrong desires; we also have incomplete ones. We don't want and believe in all that God wants. As the song goes, all some people want for Christmas is their "two front teeth." All they want in life is a certain degree of comfort. These desires are too limited to be worthy of a human being and especially of a child of God. We need to be great-souled people desiring, believing in, and receiving the fullness of God's love (see Jn 10:10).
What are you looking for in the next four days and in the next year? If you look for God's will, you'll find it (see Jer 29:13-14).
| PRAYER: | Father, may I want what You want. |
| PROMISE: | "Little ones, let no one deceive you; the man who acts in holiness is holy indeed, even as the Son is holy." –1 Jn 3:7 |
| PRAISE: | St. Elizabeth lived her forty-six years of life totally abandoned to God's will as she raised her five children and opened the first American Catholic school. |
Reprinted with permission from Presentation Ministries, a lay association of the Catholic Church that focuses on evangelization and discipleship through Bible teaching, daily Mass, the charisms of the Holy Spirit, and Small Christian Community. Their ministries include:
· One Bread, One Body
· Daily Bread Radio Program
· Annual Bible Institute
· Discipleship Retreats
· Guadalupe Bible College