Question about offering sufferings

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Teelynn

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I have a strange(?) question in regard to offering up one’s suffering to The Lord. I have gone through alot in my life and in the past have not ALWAYS offered up my suffering to Our Lord. I was wondering if (since with God there is no such thing as time) I could offer up my past sufferings and hurts to Him to be united with His sufferings for us (for whatever His intentions are, sinners, for the sick, for the souls in purgatory etc) and would that count and be a legitimate offering to Him? Why this question has been on my mind as of late, I can’t tell you:shrug: but would appreciate any opinions or knowlege of this.

Thanks!
Tee
 
I think it would be appropriate to offer to Him you entire life, good and bad, to use as He would see fit.
 
I can assure you that if you offer to Jesus all of the past sufferings of your life and those that perhaps you cannot even recall (such as an unkind word from someone that was neither here nor there) and unite them to His Most Beloved Sacred Wounds upon the Cross our Lord will receive that offering with great love and mercy to your soul and any intention you desire to offer them for.

When we live a prayer of life that at every moment is lived in faith and we endure in faith all things that happen whether they make us laugh or cause us to cry and feel pain in our hearts and we embrace them equally and give thanks to God equally and make a prayer of our lives this way from morning until night we embrace the whole of our lives in this because Living Prayer is not Living Prayer unless we offer our entire life to Jesus and become absorbed into the Living Gospel and as such become a Living Prayer of the Word even in the most smallest things of our life.

The moment you offer your life as a prayer to Jesus every moment past, present and future belongs to Him and Jesus will ever increase Himself in you and you in Him. Jesus will do great things with so poor an offering as our ‘self’ lived in this world as a prayer.

Even if you made this offering of yourself united to our Crucified Lord Jesus at your last breathe all of your life would become a prayer this is why Jesus said to the Good Thief, ‘Today you will be with me in Paradise’ because the Good Thief offered himself to Jesus saying ‘Remember me when You come into Your Kingdom’ and how would Jesus remember the Good Thief? He would remember him upon his cross next to Jesus and his faith in Jesus even as he hung upon his cross and this is why Jesus assured him of eternal life in Him. I believe the Good Thief is the second Saint of the Cross after our Blessed Virgin Mother Mary.

You must remember that Living Prayer is also a prayer of love primarily because without love this prayer is nothing and it is love primarily because it is lived out without thought of reward but given freely back to Jesus as we have been given to freely and secondly it is a prayer of forgiveness and mercy not only of sacrifice united to Jesus.

You know what comes after the Crucifixion, the Resurrection. You know the way to Jesus, it is the road less travelled, it is the Way of the Cross. Jesus has shown us the Way.

You will also find that once you offer your life like this united to the Crucified Lord Jesus in the Living Prayer of your life that Jesus will give you many opportunities to practise virtue as well as to suffer for love of Him and He will increase the graces to practise this. You will find that although the Way is hard and the Road is Narrow He will keep you on it once you open your heart to Calvary and He will keep you on this Road with His own Strength.

I am elated at your post. It is beautiful. I am proud of you and thank God for you.

Living Prayer truly is a Prayer of Thanksgiving, a Eucharistic Prayer.

I will keep you in the Living Prayer of my life.🙂
 
Thank you for answering this for me as well. I can’t remember very well my relationship with God before my conversion of heart. Its like my spiritual life started anew. But my greatest physical suffering was before this. I often wonder if it was wasted. I didn’t suffer well at all. Tim
 
TOP said:
Thank you for answering this for me as well. I can’t remember very well my relationship with God before my conversion of heart. Its like my spiritual life started anew. But my greatest physical suffering was before this. I often wonder if it was wasted. I didn’t suffer well at all. Tim
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None of us suffer well, we are all weak and we are all sinners. No sooner did I make up my mind to suffer well than I found myself complaining. No sooner did I agree to endure all things in love and as a Living Prayer then did I start to moan and lament at suffering caused by others. I am a suffering to myself, that is, my will is sound and my spirit is willing but my flesh is weak and a suffering to me. This is to remind me of humility and I thank God for that.

It is not the suffering well that matters it is the intention to suffer and suffer well that matters because suffering is the greatest expression of love.

Don’t worry about suffering well, not one of us does that. If I was you I’d be concerned to embrace my cross and offer it to Jesus.

The closer we get to Jesus the perfected the suffering and to draw closer to Jesus we are perfected in suffering. This is the Way.

I thank God for your beautiful conversion in faith.🙂
 
Embracing it is far harder then the suffering itself. I’ve learn to offer minor things, but letting go of past pain is tough. Its what made me who I am. Something to work on. Thanks, Tim
 
TOP said:
Embracing it is far harder then the suffering itself. I’ve learn to offer minor things, but letting go of past pain is tough. Its what made me who I am. Something to work on. Thanks, Tim
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Embracing the cross is accepting it as God’s will for you and for all men. You are right it is not easy. Jesus did not find it easy either, He agonised in the Garden of Gethsemane.

I am the opposite to you, I find the greater cross easier to embrace as I clearly know it as the cross, but the smaller sufferings I have found harder to embrace. I have wondered how thoughtlessly unkind people can be in such small ways and they forget the smallness of life and how a small kindness can make a great difference and when these are omitted or when a small unkindness is committed I feel more injustice for these than for the greater because the greater I find easier to forgive because I cannot imagine the greater sin would be as easily committed. I think it is because I love the smallness of life and I can’t understand how people cannot see all of the small things and decide to practise a small kindness, such as a card in the post or a smile. Infact the smallness of life is simple politeness and I think how can a soul do a great kindness if they cannot be trusted with a small kindness.

I have learnt from the Good Shepherd to love the small crosses as much as the large ones because there is merit in every cross.

Letting go of pain is not what the cross is. If there were no pain either physical, mental or spiritually then it would not be a cross and if it is a great and heavy cross then some of that pain will always remain and the memory reminds the body and spirit of that pain from time to time. This is what makes it a great cross because it is one to be carried all of the life and reshapes our life. But that does not mean that the cross crushes our life because when it is united to Jesus this greater cross lifts us up even within our pain and instead of crushing us it elevates us to the Divine.

Your knowledge that your cross has made you who you are is a deep self awareness. It is by the cross that we are perfected in the likeness of Christ Jesus. I believe we are to be happy to be who we are. I would not be who I am without my cross and many other blessings and joys. This is who I am glad to be and I thank God for that and so should you thank God for who you are because I thank God for you because there is no-one like you, you are wonderful and fearfully made, how glorious is that!

You know and you see that a mountain of small crosses make a mountain of love and a great cross builds that mountain all the more quickly. So it is that we are not to overcome the cross but we are to accept it and carry it and it is Jesus Who does great things with it and overcomes it for us, all we have to do is carry it in our weak humanity and His Strength will shatter and pierce the darkness with His Light.

That is Victory and that Truly is Beautiful!🙂
 
The agony in the garden has deep meaning for me. I was told I was going to die from cancer, but I survived it almost four years ago. I feel I could sweat blood at times , fearing having to go through it again. My offering is my life and I’m scared. Tim
 
TOP said:
The agony in the garden has deep meaning for me. I was told I was going to die from cancer, but I survived it almost four years ago. I feel I could sweat blood at times , fearing having to go through it again. My offering is my life and I’m scared. Tim
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You will probably tell me off but I am going to say this anyway.

I firmly believe that souls who suffer from cancer as you have are Saints.

Tim, I can give great discourses on the Cross; I am familiar with it. I know the cross well and I can say all manner of things about the cross and I know beautiful things about it but it is a totally different matter to carry the cross.

But what Jesus says to us and it always gives me strength is ‘Do not be afraid’ and He can say this because He has gone before us and knows there is nothing to fear because He has risen the other side of the Cross.

When I carry the cross I too am scared even though I desire it and my heart is ready for it. I flounder, I fall. My heart races, I have cold sweats, I have a dry mouth, I am afraid. Jesus was no different, He too suffered fear and agony but when I go to my Crucified Lord all of my worry disappears even though the fear remains I have found peace in Him. I can face it in His Peace.

Go to Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane in your meditation. I have been to Him there and He will give you His Strength. Don’t look at your fear, look at His Strength and ask Him to give it to you, He will give it to you because it will bring you His Peace and His Peace He freely gives.

You are a living saint, I can see that and you will not like me saying that but I am saying it for your strength and because it is true.

You are always in my Living Prayer and today my life I offer for you as my prayer for you and those you love and worry about so much. Don’t worry about them, Jesus will take care of them they are His and we are only entrusted to each other.

The love and kindness of Jesus to you.

Tim, ‘Do not be afraid’
 
Thank you, the first lesson I learned from the Lord was to trust my family with Him because they are His. My current life depends on this discipline. They are His and treat them as such. Thats all I can say. Thank you so much for your insight and advice. Tim
 
Thank you all for your beautiful words of encouragement and spiritual insight.🙂 I am with Tim as I guess it bothered me that when I have suffered in the past, I didn’t do a very good job of it sometimes.😦 But looking at it in a different light, I am sure non of us suffer well at times and can offer it bravely to Our Lord. (the human condition;) ) Maybe He just expects us to keep praying for the grace to carry our cross well. And if we fall, offer that to Him as well.

Blessings to all,
Tee
 
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