Daily Bible Reflections
for May 23, 2017
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Dear Friend,

God has a great plan for your life including this Tuesday.

Praying for you,

Bo Sanchez



23
May
Tuesday
TODAY'S READINGS:

DIDACHE | COMPANION | SABBATH
DIDACHE

 

FIRE STARTER
 

“Believe in the Lord Jesus and you and your household will be saved.” – Acts 16:31

 

       My nephew was a reluctant Christian when my husband and I started mentoring him in his career. We shared how God demonstrated His blessings upon us and invited him to join us every Sunday at The Feast, our community gathering at the Philippine International Convention Center, to discover for himself how he will also be blessed.

       He came every Sunday and even brought friends. When he resigned as an employee and ventured into business, he brought his employees with him. He then started to organize marathons and he would begin the events with a full band leading the worship. He would donate the proceeds to ministries for the poor.

       Being on fire with the Spirit, he convinced his parents — old as they were — to get married in church because he firmly believed in God’s blessings. He witnessed to his brothers and sister about the blessings from his personal encounters with Jesus. The Lord put a fire in his heart and he spread it to his household, friends and business. And the Lord honored his heart by prospering him. Donna España (donna.espana@yahoo.com)

 

Reflection:“A true disciple is constantly ready to share the love of Jesus with others and this can happen unexpectedly and in any place.” (Pope Francis)

 

Lord, let your Holy Spirit work through me so I can reach out to those around me.

 

St. Gregory VII, pray for us.

 

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Didache | Companion | Sabbath | Top

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COMPANION

 

1ST READING

The miraculous freeing of Paul and Silas from prison is parallel to the freeing of the Apostles related earlier in the Book of Acts. Luke, the author, identified Paul’s ministry with that of the Apostles and made it legitimate in the eyes of his readers. Paul’s ministry must have caused some controversy. The Acts of the Apostles spoke a number of times about the authenticity of their conversion.

 
Acts 16:22-34

22 The crowd in Philippi joined in the attack on Paul and Silas, and the magistrates had them stripped and ordered them to be beaten with rods. 23 After inflicting many blows on them, they threw them into prison and instructed the jailer to guard them securely. 24 When he received these instructions, he put them in the innermost cell and secured their feet to a stake. 25 About midnight, while Paul and Silas were praying and singing hymns to God as the prisoners listened, 26 there was suddenly such a severe earthquake that the foundations of the jail shook; all the doors flew open, and the chains of all were pulled loose. 27 When the jailer woke up and saw the prison doors wide open, he drew his sword and was about to kill himself, thinking that the prisoners had escaped. 28 But Paul shouted out in a loud voice, “Do no harm to yourself; we are all here.” 29 He asked for a light and rushed in and, trembling with fear, he fell down before Paul and Silas. 30 Then he brought them out and said, “Sirs, what must I do to be saved?” 31 And they said, “Believe in the Lord Jesus and you and your household will be saved.” 32 So they spoke the word of the Lord to him and to everyone in his house. 33 He took them in at that hour of the night and bathed their wounds; then he and all his family were baptized at once. 34 He brought them up into his house and provided a meal and with his household rejoiced at having come to faith in God.

 
P S A L M
 
Psalm 138:1-2, 2-3, 7-8

R: Your right hand saves me, O Lord.

1 I will give thanks to you, O Lord, with all my heart, for you have heard the words of my mouth; in the presence of the angels I will sing your praise; 2 I will worship at your holy temple and give thanks to your name. (R) Because of your kindness and your truth; you have  made great above all things your name and your promise. 3 When I called, you answered me; you built up strength within me. (R) 7 Your right hand saves me. 8 The Lord will complete what he has done for me; your kindness, O Lord, endures forever; forsake not the work of your hands. (R)

GOSPEL 

Jesus explained to His disciples that He will soon leave them. However, His absence will make way for the coming of the Holy Spirit. When Jesus returned to His rightful place with the Father, He sent us the Holy Spirit, the guarantee of salvation and the gift of a full life.

 
GOSPEL ACCLAMATION

I will send to you the Spirit of truth, says the Lord; he will guide you to all truth.

 
John 16:5-11

5 Jesus said to his disciples: “Now I am going to the one who sent me, and not one of you asks me, ‘Where are you going?’ 6 But because I told you this, grief has filled your hearts. 7 But I tell you the truth, it is better for you that I go. For if I do not go, the Advocate will not come to you. But if I go, I will send him to you. 8 And when he comes he will convict the world in regard to sin and righteousness and condemnation: 9 sin, because they do not believe in me; 10 righteousness, because I am going to the Father and you will no longer see me; 11 condemnation, because the ruler of this world has been condemned.”

 

think: What is harder for you – to be the one to leave home or the one to be left behind? Why?

 
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Read the Bible in one year Ruth 1-4

 

T O D A Y’S BLESSING LIST

 

thank You, Lord, for: ______________________________________________________

 
 

The all-new Feast mobile app is finally here! All the content you love from here may also be found in our new app and so much more! Please make sure to download the new Feast App, as we will eventually stop updating this version soon.

Let's continue to grow together with our all-new Feast app! Download and upgrade today: Feast App for Android | Feast App for iOS.


Didache | Companion | Sabbath | Top

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SABBATH

 

WHAT MUST I DO?

 

Openness of heart that we talked about yesterday gets a sequel today. In contrast, though, to Lydia the dealer in royal clothing materials, the man who was actually the jailer was not named. What is common between the two was their openness.

       Lydia was open to listening to the teachings of Paul and company. The jailer, whose eyes were opened to a theophany, a divine manifestation through an earthquake that flung open all doors and loosened all the chains, “fell down before Paul and Silas.”

        The end result for both, though, was the same. “He and all his family were baptized at once.” And presumably in both stories, the interior joy felt by all shone out externally at a meal shared together in celebration.

      We all are over-stimulated nowadays. The info flood, the never-ending tweets, the insistent posts that keep us glued to our Facebook walls at any given time of day (and night!) make us see much more than we really need. Miracles could happen every day, and we end up missing them, for our attention is much too caught up in the welter of so much stimuli from all fronts.

       The jailer must have “seen it all” before — criminals and law breakers, political misfits and rebels, revolutionaries and recalcitrant offenders of all types. But all he had seen did not prepare him for what he saw that night in jail. Faced with a theophany, he was ready to give it all up and kill himself. But what prevailed was not fear, but awe at the goodness of whoever it was that Paul and Silas represented. He was not just in awe. He was nonplussed.

          But the good jailer had the openness of mind, heart and will to ask the right question: “What must I do to be saved?” He signaled a welcoming attitude to truth. He opened more than just doors. He opened his heart to salvation. Fr. Chito Dimaranan, SDB

 

---------- REFLECTION QUESTION ----------

Are you open to the miracles that happen to you every day?

 

Dearest Lord, let me focus on You and Your goodness instead of all the distractions in the world. Amen.

 

The all-new Feast mobile app is finally here! All the content you love from here may also be found in our new app and so much more! Please make sure to download the new Feast App, as we will eventually stop updating this version soon.

Let's continue to grow together with our all-new Feast app! Download and upgrade today: Feast App for Android | Feast App for iOS.


Didache | Companion | Sabbath | Top

Get your daily readings and more for free inside the Feast App!
Google PlayStore     iOS AppStore

 

 

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