Count It All Joy

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Monday of the Sixth Week of Ordinary Time

Consider It All Joy

Many times you were close to falling beneath the cross of difficult trials, and you still experience many sorrows over your children. Bearing such ordeals is meritorious for you and for any mother. By Divine Will, these experiences that affected your life have not been in vain. I have taken them all into consideration. (Mary) (November 19, 1962)

Today’s Readings: Consider it all joy, my brothers and sisters, when you encounter various trials, for you know that the testing of your faith produces perseverance. (James 1)

Prayer Meditation- Lord it can be so hard to count it all joy when we are so distracted by the noise of this world- the problems,  sorrows, anxieties, fears- we come so close to falling daily under the cross of difficult trials! But Lord, You know what is good for us- You know that the testing of our faith produces the perseverance we need to stand firm until the end (Matthew 24:13). Lord, all the strands that have gone into the making of the fabric of our lives have not been in vain- nothing is wasted  (John 6) of the scraps that we bring to You but united to Your Cross are restored into a beautiful tapestry of Grace!

Short Fuse

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Sixth Sunday in Ordinary Time

Short Fuse

“Your bad temper will go on, but from this evil nature, I will accomplish a masterpiece if you agree to submit to My Divine Hand.  Simply surrender to Me like the grapes that are pressed and transformed into wine, which will become My Precious Blood.” (Jesus) (September 24, 1963)

Today’s Readings: But I say to you, whoever is angry with his brother will be liable to judgment; and whoever says to his brother, ‘Raqa,’ will be answerable to the Sanhedrin; and whoever says, ‘You fool,’ will be liable to fiery Gehenna. (Matthew 5)

Prayer Meditation- Lord, how often we fall into anger with our words, actions, and deeds. We are so easily offended- we have a short fuse and a long memory filled with unforgiveness. But the fruits of the Spirit are gentleness and self- control yet so often we do not see it in our lives. So many of us struggle with anger and the need for control- we want to walk on the water in faith but we drown in our own humans will stuck in self -reliance. Lord help us to surrender with humble trust in Your Mercy and bring to You all that is hurting us because we are all hurting people- only You can make a masterpiece of Grace out of our souls but we need to surrender and let you break us so You can heal us! Transform us with the wine of Your Spirit!

Committing All To The Lord

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Wednesday of the Fifth Week of Ordinary Time

Committing All To The Lord

Ask often and ask for much with respect to intentions and needs and you will receive accordingly. Even more, if I perceive your trust, I will fulfill your request repeatedly. “ (Jesus) (Compendium Page 115)

Today’s Readings: Commit to the LORD your way; trust in him, and he will act. He will make justice dawn for you like the light; bright as the noonday shall be your vindication.(Psalm 37)

Prayer Meditation- Lord, how often do we try to do it all in our own strength rather than rely on You. Why do we not trust You when we know that if we do, You will act? Lord, You know what our hearts are full of- it is in today’s Gospel (Mark 7:14-23) yet we think we can do it all on our own. Yet You ask us to give everything to You- our work, our families, our anxieties, our hurts and disappointments, everything! Lord help our feet to truly journey together with You- help us to hear Your Voice saying, this is the way, walk in it when we would turn to the right or to the left (Isaiah 30:21).

Better is One Day In Your Courts

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Memorial of Saint Scholastica
Better is One Day in Your Courts

There is always a great and continual longing for God in my heart. I accepted life, death and suffering according to His Holy Will. This filled me with such felicity that words cannot express it. My heart throbbed with happiness. (Elizabeth) (June 5, 1965)

Today’s Readings: My soul yearns and pines for the courts of the LORD. My heart and my flesh cry out for the living God.  (Psalm 84)

Prayer Meditation- How lovely is Your Dwelling Place, Lord God Almighty! Lord, it is indeed better to spend one day in Your Courts than one thousand elsewhere! Lord, today, even if we cannot get to Mass, let us offer ourselves completely to You, fully present in The Tabernacle so that all that we do today will be for Your Glory! Let us encounter You in Your Word, in prayer, and in the Sacraments!

His Real and Everlasting Presence

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Monday of the Fifth Week in Ordinary Time

His Real and Everlasting Presence

Such great silence reigned in my soul. The Lord had not yet overwhelmed me with His kind words, but He had filled my soul with His Divine Presence in a marvelous way. I experienced this in my veins and in my bones. (Elizabeth) (August 20, 1962)

Today’s Readings: Then Solomon said, “The LORD intends to dwell in the dark cloud; I have truly built you a princely house, a dwelling where you may abide forever.” (1 Kings 8)

Prayer Meditation- Lord in today’s Gospel the crowd sought only to touch the tassel of Your garment but we who are Catholic Christians get to encounter You whole and entire, Body, Blood, Soul, and Divinity, in The Blessed Sacrament. Do we come to You with the longing of those in Gospel who brought the sick out to the marketplace with expectant hope and faith? Do we not realize the Glory and Majesty of the King of the Universe who intends to live among us in the dark cloud- in the dark cloud of our anxieties, fears, loneliness, sickness, and despair. Lord, dwell in us and abide with us forever- in Your Word, in prayer, and most especially in Your Real Presence- may You be praised loved and glorified in every tabernacle of the world until the end of time!

Praise We All Our God!

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Memorial of Saint Paul Miki and Companions

Praise We All Our God

I will show you My satisfaction, so you can receive strength for your soul to be filled with the abundance of My Divine Grace that you must pass onto others. In this way they can praise and glorify God for His Infinite Goodness (Jesus) (December 5, 1964)

Today’s Readings:

With his every deed he offered thanks 
to God Most High, in words of praise.
With his whole being he loved his Maker
and daily had his praises sung. (Sirach 47)

Prayer Meditation: O Lord You inhabit the praises of Your people! Give us strength Lord so that we can praise You always and pass on this Grace to others so that Your name will be praised daily throughout the Earth! Like King David let us sing to You daily! Let the praises rise and the blessings fall so that we can truly be a blessing to others through the Flame of Love Grace!

Two By Two

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Two by Two

“Watch and pray. When two or three gather, they take up the battle against the Prince of Darkness and his devastating power. Do not be idle!” (Jesus) (August 7, 1962)

Today’s Readings: Jesus summoned the Twelve and began to send them out two by two and gave them authority over unclean spirits. He instructed them to take nothing for the journey but a walking stick –no food, no sack, no money in their belts. (Mark 6)

Prayer Meditation- Lord, You sent Your disciples out two by two. We are not meant to be lone wolves in our walk with You! As the Holy Spirit informs us in the book of Ecclesiastes- “And if one can overpower him who is alone, two can resist him. A cord of three strands is not quickly torn apart.”(Eccl 4:12), We are stronger in prayer when we gather together! Let us not be idle in praying, particularly the Rosary, together and take up the battle against evil in our world!

Tough Crowd

Today’s Consuming Fire Meditation- – A Daily Dose of the Flame of Love Diary Served Up with Today’s Scriptures

Wednesday of the Fourth Week of Ordinary Time

Tough Crowd

Many people in your neighborhood have known you for years. You have fought your great battles before their eyes. (Mary) (November 19, 1962)

Today’s Readings: Jesus said to them,

“A prophet is not without honor except in his native place and among his own kin and in his own house.” So he was not able to perform any mighty deed there, apart from curing a few sick people by laying his hands on them. He was amazed at their lack of faith. (Mark 6)

Prayer Meditation- Lord, I think so many of us can relate to today’s Gospel. We all come from families and hometowns, people who have known us for years. They have watched us rise and fall and have formed opinions about us- they are familiar with who we are and where we have been. And then someday something changes- for many of us reading this that “something” may well be You in our lives! And as You change us our loved ones may not know what to make of us. Lord You know well the pain of being rejected by Your own family members and neighbors. Our Lady knows well what it is like to suffer these pains as well as She watched You almost run off a cliff (Luke 4:29) in the Gospel of Luke version of this story. Lord, today we pray for all of our families- that our family members would be open to Your Grace despite the fact that we hold Your Treasures in earthen vessels (2 Corinthians 4:7).