Coincidence or signal?

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Hello. Has anyone here ever had a certain biblical passage come to your mind before mass only to have that verse be part of the readings that day? Is it just a coincidence, or is God trying to tell me something? A couple of years ago the biblical character Zacchaeus came to my mind as I was walking to Sunday mass. For some reason I identified with that biblical character just then. To my surprise, the gospel reading that day was about Zacchaeus. I started to wonder if God was trying to tell me something. I researched that particular passage and tried to learn more about it. It turns out that I had a mistaken view of Zacchaeus : he was “small of stature” so he needed to climb a tree in order to see Jesus from the crowd. I had thought that he was afraid to approach Jesus and so preferred to look upon Jesus more from a distance (from the tree). It turns out that he wanted to see Jesus. Perhaps God was telling me to seek Him out like Zacchaeus did.
Today, I walked into church thinking about how stressed out and worried I have been lately and that all that stress is from a lack faith! I need to trust in God more. I literally walked in to church today thinking “God, please help me increase my faith” Well, today the first part of the gospel was the apostles asking God to do just that- increase their faith. But the answer Jesus gave has me wondering: how can I increase my faith? What can I do? Ishii
 
Isn’t that part of being in communion with the Church?😉 Aren’t little things like that nice? Don’t forget to say a prayer of thanksgiving for that boost. Tim
 
God is always doing this kind of work and today you noticed it. Now you will keep your heart on watch for His grace approaching and see His Hand working in your life and the life of others.

The Gospel is Living and lives in the prayer of our life.

In the Living prayer of my life
 
May God’s peace, love and mercy be with you all!

In this life, there is no coincidence but only Divine Providence. Our Good Lord Jesus speaks to us and manifests His most Holy Will in many different ways, through people that we meet, through events in life etc., and also through His Word, the sacred Scriptures.

Recently, I have this friend who was being obstinate about God’s commandment, about the Catholic faith and its Teachings despite my efforts of trying to help him. He invoked his free will in wanting to gravely offend Our Good Lord Jesus Christ. Now I tell you, hearing this is so painful than being physically beaten or insulted or ridiculed personally. I have been insulted and ridiculed by him and others on numerous occasions, but it just does not bother me at all but when it comes to the Person of Our Lord Jesus Christ, it just makes it so unbearable, it breaks your heart seeing that a creature of God, made in His own image and likeness, is invoking his God given gift of free will to destroy his very soul, to throw away the great goodness, love, mercy and sacrifice that Our Good Lord Jesus has done for him and defile himself and make himself a slave of satan for all eternity so as to suffer eternal punishment and pain and loss of God for all eternity.

So, the gospel reading days later was about Jesus sending out the Twelve Apostles to preach, and telling them that when they go to a place where the people will not welcome or listen to them, to shake the dust of their feet when they leave, as a testimony against these people. The priest then said in his sermon that if someone would not listen to you about the Catholic faith, then move on. Don’t be bogged down. Someone else will be the instrument of their conversion so to speak. Was that coincidence? Of course not. God was speaking through His Word and through His priest telling me it’s time to move on and to minister to others, that I have done my part and to not be bogged down. That is what I have exactly done. I decided to bring the presence of Christ to others by visiting the nursing home where I used to work and brought in some baked goods that I made and gave it to those elderly residents and some staff members. It was so moving especially feeding an Alzheimer’s resident who lost a lot of weight. Seeing him eat, as his hunger was being satisfied, made me see the presence of Our Good Lord Jesus in him. He was so happy that somebody stopped and took the time to talk to him. He and the rest of the residents and staff enjoyed the baked goods and was grateful for it and was happy with the surprise visit from me. I went to holy mass, confession and adoration afterwards to top it all. What a great grace and blessing! I am eternally grateful!

I pray for my friend, offered holy communion for him and have entrusted my friend to Our Good Lord and to our Blessed Mother so I know it is a done deal. I don’t know when that will happen, maybe not in my lifetime but I know it will. Not my will but God’s will be done. I am constantly contented and at peace…

The ways to increase our faith is through:
Daily prayer such as the rosary and chaplet of Divine Mercy
Frequent adoration of the Blessed Sacrament or just spending time with Jesus in the silence of your heart no matter what time, wherever you may be
Frequent reception of the sacraments of the eucharist and confession
Doing spiritual reading such as reading sacred Scriptures and
lives of the saints
Avoiding sins and near occasions of it. And when we fall, to sincerely repent and ask God for forgiveness immediately
Learning more about what the Catholic Church is teaching in order for us to love and serve God better, and practice the virtues that has been given to us as a free gift.
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Last but not the least, to cling ONLY to Our Good Lord Jesus no matter how difficult life may be. To have faith even if there seem to be none, to have hope against all hope, to love where there is none, and to persevere until that last breath of life.

Jesus never promised it was going to be easy but He did promise He will be with us 'till the end of time.

God bless!

Blessed be Jesus and Mary!
 
I’ve had many of these experiences… my mum too. After all it IS the Word of GOD. Many times He’s answered specific prayers that I’ve made through the daily Mass readings. A couple of times when I was leading family prayers I just took a random reading from the Bible, and it turned out to be the mass reading. He definitely speaks through His word.
 
I’ve had a few occasions where I am at Mass and the priests Homily feels like it is directed at me. Coincidence? I think not. 😉 It just proves to me that I am in the right place and that the Catholic Church is the right one.
 
Thomas Howard, I believe, is the writer who tells us that in every Mass there is a Word mean especially for each individual, if only we listen and are receptive. It can be from the readings or homily, but also from any of the other prayers of the Mass, hymns, even comments of other parishioners.
 
This happens to me all the time. I will have a conversation with someone mention the bible passage and then that’s what the reading will be. Sometimes I think that the passage was meant for me, but sometimes it appears it was meant for the other person I was talking to.
 
This is the Holy Spirit working within you.

I remember years ago, I was attending a prayer meeting on a weekly basis. A co-worker, who was Puerto Rican, attended a Spanish prayer meeting, in a different town. Both of our meetings were held on the same night. The next day after our prayer meetings, as we shared, we were amazed how both of our meetings used the same themes and scripture readings.
The prayer meetings were never pre-planned, but allowed the Holy Spirit to guide them.

Jim
 
JimR-OCDS said:
This is the Holy Spirit working within you.

I remember years ago, I was attending a prayer meeting on a weekly basis. A co-worker, who was Puerto Rican, attended a Spanish prayer meeting, in a different town. Both of our meetings were held on the same night. The next day after our prayer meetings, as we shared, we were amazed how both of our meetings used the same themes and scripture readings.
The prayer meetings were never pre-planned, but allowed the Holy Spirit to guide them.

Jim
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That is awesome, Jim.
If we pay attention to Him, we know the Holy Spirit is always at work.
 
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