42. THE CAPTAIN OF THE SHIP

The Baggage We Carry Everyday

There was a ship that was about to sail on a long journey. Everyone were so busy going about and the passengers were bringing on board all their baggage.

While the baggage were being carried into the ship the Captain of the ship had announced to all the passengers not to bring any extra baggage especially the heavy ones for they will just be additional burden to them. Even though the passengers heard the Captain no one really paid attention to the instruction nor they care to find out why. They were just simply carefree.

The Storm in our Lives

In the middle of their journey, one day the sky began to darkened and there was a heavy storm looming on the horizon. Everyone started to worry for their life except the captain of the ship. 

Some passengers began to pray and started to be scared for their own safety and the lives of all their love ones. The other passengers still remained carefree unmindful of the oncoming heavy storm that was approaching so fast that they continued enjoying their journey while drinking and exchanging vanities with each other. Just about the nightfall, waves were getting very rough and growing bigger and taller that their ships were just about being tossed around like a paper boat. 

The night came so fast as well as the storm. Water was getting on-board now that could possibly fill the boat and sink it. 

The storm was so heavy but because of the prayers of some of the passengers, miraculously the night went by without any serious incident. 

But as the daylight came, everyone on the ship just realized that they were still in the middle of the raging storm and ocean water and their ship was being tossed around left and right. The ship looked like it was about to sink with all the waters flashing all over the deck of the ship. The passengers that were praying continued to pray and this time they were praying so hard for their life and the life of everyone on board. And the others who were drinking though sea-sicked they too became worried, yet did not join others in praying but instead started to curse anyone from the Captain to the crew and everyone else. They even ridiculed and insulted those who were praying.

While all these were happening, the Captain continued to be calmed yet serious while constantly looking at the compass and he knew with the storm they were not getting anywhere but just going around and around the middle of the storm.

Everyone began to notice what was going on. They too realized the ship was just being tossed and going around and around in the middle of the storm. They were not moving away from the storm.

Jesus Knows What is in Our Heart

The Captain knew all along why it was happening. He knew why the pointer of the compass was going in circle just as fast pointing to every direction. He knew the ship will not go anywhere.

So the Captain of the ship called up a meeting with all the passengers and asked if everyone followed his advice to leave all their heavy baggage behind. Those who knew they have disobeyed the captain's instruction kept their silence and remained listening. But the ones who were drinking were getting rowdy annoyed irritated and started swearing back at the Captain and arrogantly in unison answered back "so what?" 

Yet the Captain with so much compassion, just pointed out that the extra baggage they brought on board were actually magnets that were causing the compass to read wrongly. The passengers did not understand what the master of the ship said. The magnets were just about everywhere and all around so that the ship was just moving in circle in the middle of the storm. Yet the passengers were so reluctant in doing away with their heavy baggage and are not willing to give up what they have. 

When storm comes they come in fury as if it would never end or go away. In our life, storms would come anytime sometimes without any warning. We would experience hardships, pains, failures and miseries that they would not seem to go away. When they come they seem to come in chain. Happiness too would come in chain.

As we go on with our lives, little do we think someone would always be there for us providing us with all the necessary assistance but if we don't ask for it sometimes, help don't come or even if we ask they come in different form other than the ones we are expecting. Grace of God will be received by those who are ready for it.

In the middle of the raging storm water were coming in without any let up almost sinking the ship as if its only purpose was to sink the ship. But the Captain kept steering the wheel of the ship hanging on so dearly so he can save the lives of all the passengers and his crew even if it would mean giving his life away. 

He was willing to give up his life for the sake of the passengers and his crew. 

Jesus Will Always Respect our Will

The Captain respected all his passengers that he was not forcing them to give up their extra baggage. He wants his passenger to give them up willingly and not being forced to. 

While the Captain of the ship continued to steer the steering wheel, all the passengers aware of what they have done started to realize clinging on to their pride and hanging on to their extra heavy baggage would only cost their lives, so they decided to obey what the Captain were asking them all along. One by one they threw all the extra baggage overboard and the ship started to balance and have direction. Sunlight starting to come through the dark clouds and hope were in their hearts. Everyone started feeling joy but kept praying that the storm will be over soon. And they came out of the storm unharmed with no extra heavy baggage and a few short days, the ship reach their destination. 

Finally all the passengers understood fully the effect of disobedience. Just exactly what Adam and Eve did, they disobeyed God from the beginning.

A lot of us would commit sins and hanged on to our pride and arrogance. All these will cost our salvation and the wages of sins are eternal damnation in hell

Jesus is the Captain of our lives. He died to save us from the original sin but he is still willing to die for us over and over again just so we can reach heaven. The Ship is the church he founded over 2,000 years ago that it may provide us a vessel for our journey towards heaven. The ocean is the world we live in. Sometime the whether is good and the sun shower us with energy we need to last for a day. We have the night to rest. The air to breath. The rainbow to give us joy. The birds to give us motivations. All we need is just to obey God's commandment. Live a life according to His will.

Repent and Be Saved

So when the passengers obeyed the Captain and got rid of all their extra baggage they have with them on-board, they saw their Captain smile and the compass became stable and finally pointed towards their original destination. All the passengers were so happy they finally were on their way.

Miracle happened the storm was gone and the ocean became so calmed they have reached the port of their destination with so such an ease.  

The moral of the story is when you disobey God, you will bring forth all sorrows, pains and miseries in your life sometimes they are unbearable you just want to give up your struggle and at times commit suicide. 

But if you live a pious life in obedience to God's commandments and will, your journey through life will be just as easy and calm. There maybe some difficulties along the way but they all will be overcome.   

During our journey in life the Captain of our heart is our Lord Jesus. He will calm the sea, he will show us the way, he will give us directions throughout our lives. We are the passengers. The ship is his church he founded 2000 years ago. There will be many who will attempt to destroy it but even Satan will not prevails against it. 

Satan will put up tens of thousands of churches, use communism and freemasonry, the illuminati, politicians, celebrities and many others just to bring the down the church whom Jesus Christ founded through St. Peter, the Rock. In spite of all these attacks from within and outside the church in the end Jesus will win.

The devil will send hordes of false messengers and teachers to sow false teachings. He will have advocates to translate the words of God, pervert and corrupt the Holy Bible. These evil teachers will spread errors all over the land to all four corners of the world, confused people and make them blind from the truth giving them the devil's version of the bible but as Jesus promised they all will not prevail. 

Jesus is the Way, the Truth and the Life

Jesus will calm down everything around us, give us hope, show us the way and makes us all holy. The crew are all his appointed vicars that began from St. Peter the Rock whom he gave the keys to the kingdom of God. Jesus also called many workers for his church but only few are chosen to continue the sacred duty of leading many to salvation but the other worker who were also called will apostatize, will be corrupted by the devil, will become the enemies of the church, will create havoc and will lead the other sheep to eternal death.  

The origin port was our present life here on earth and the port of destination is heaven. The journey is the way we will conduct our daily lives. Storms are the trials in our lives.

The extra baggage we carry are all the burdens in our heart – our sins, our shortcomings and failures that are offensive to our Lord our God. 

What is in our heart and in our minds are like the clothes we wear everyday. It will be the showcase of who we are and how we live.

How we conduct our lives will always be visible and seen by everyone. Our magnets in life will always cloud our mind and closed our hearts to God. And what we keep in our hearts will be known to God always and can never be hidden. 

We will always be known by the works we do. Even though God give us graces and show us the way but if our works are dirty, God will not accept us for nothing impure can enter the kingdom of God.

Judge Others and You Already Earned Your Reward

People will judge us especially when they see how stormy our life is. And you will be so arrogant and proud that you will not be able to practice humility.

In any house, group, company or community if there is no humility there will be no unity.

Leaders and masters must be the servants of the servants if they want to love and serve God.

If you live a life with vanity, you will be idolizing your ego - your self-centeredness - the 'me, I and myself'. And you will never be able to see your own fault but you will see the fault of others so quickly and you will be judging them as if you are not a sinner yourself.

You will always throw stone at anyone because you will always be so blinded with sins that you can no longer distinguish which one is right or wrong. You will foster hatred in your heart. You will carry grudges and plot evil and deceit among your brothers. For as long as you live you will have no peace.

Your soul will always be liken to a rotting ship all your life that you will be in constant conflict with the truth. You will never believe anyone but yourself and only those whom you chose to believe and follow. In your blindness you will be following a blind teacher. And therefore both of you will never see the light of day for all your days shall be in darkness and your ears will hear no music but only the growling and rantings of the dead for how can one be alive again if he is already dead. How can a false teacher teach the truth. How can a blind lead another blind or how can a blind follow another blind.

Birds of the same feather will always flock together.

Yet God will send a rescue ship even if you are drowning for you are still his children...soon the prodigal son will come home. But it will be your choice. 

So now ask yourself deeply in your heart, do you really know Jesus? 

In our quest for purification we have to understand that we cannot continue to commit sin, offend our brothers and offend our dear Lord. Jesus has taught us the way, the truth and the life and we have to obey his commandment always for us to live a pious life so we can be saved.

We also have to let others know what we know about God and show them the way to Him as well. If we choose to disobey, we will be carrying those heavy magnets that could cause us to go down to hell when we die.

Don't give bad apple to your brother to eat for they will suffer pain in their belly rather share with him your best apple that he too may live a good life.

Take heed my brothers and sisters for when the night comes we would never know if we will ever see the daylight again.

Remember our purpose in life is to know Jesus, love Him and serve Him.

Silent Crusader

41. CONFESSIONS OF A CATHOLIC CONVERT

The Value of Simple Devotion

Intellectual knowledge is valuable and knowing about one’s faith is crucial. Almost always we elevate intellectual knowledge above everything else. but really in doing so we miss to grasp what true holiness meant and we don’t understand the beauty and value of simple devotion.

I came across this beautiful story of a Baptist conversion to catholicism which I want to share here with you. 

Confessions of a Catholic Convert

HALEY STEWART

“Screech….screech….screech.” The old woman’s walker gave an ear-splitting shriek as it dragged across the floor. She slowly made her way into Mass 10 minutes after it began. My husband raised his eyebrows at me and I grinned at him. We were new converts and had just moved back to our hometown and a new parish. The old woman in the house dress and slippers made an appearance at every Mass we’d attended. It didn’t matter which Mass we went to…the Vigil, 8am, 12:15pm, or daily Mass in the morning or evening. I even saw her when I’d go to my early morning holy hour. She was a little mysterious fixture around the church. “Who is she?” we’d ask each other. “Why is she always there?” She would be praying the Rosary in the chapel at odd hours. She never seemed to leave. She certainly seemed devout and emanated what we thought was charming piety, but apart from being a source of pleasant amusement to us, we didn’t think too much about her. We were too pleased with our intellectual knowledge of the faith to be very impressed with simple devotion.

My husband and I converted to Catholicism five years ago. After years of reading and researching about Church history and Catholic doctrine, we realized that despite being somewhat reluctant converts, we had nowhere to go but to the Catholic Church. If it’s true, how could we not want to participate in it? The Easter Vigil when we were received into the Church is one of my favorite memories, but looking back I had so much to learn (and still do).

Some of my failure to understand important truths stemmed from pride, but some of it originated from my misperceptions of the Christian life. I thought that because weknew a lot about our Catholic faith that the Church was really lucky to have us. Because poor catechesis is such a big problem, cradle Catholics and converts alike are often undereducated about their faith. In contrast, our knowledge of Church teaching seemed admirable. “We’ve read the Church fathers. We can jabber on about St. Augustine’s definition of evil and St. Thomas Aquinas’ definition of virtue! We’re winning at this Catholic thing!” I thought. “They must be thrilled to have some Catholics who actually know about the faith!”

And you know what? The Catholics we met were thrilled that we were converting. But it wasn’t because we’d taken classes on the Summa. We thought we were doing our faith community a big favor by joining in. But as I grow in the faith I realize that they were happy for us, happy that we had the opportunity to participate in the life of the Church, happy that we could receive the sacraments and have our hearts transformed.

Intellectual knowledge is valuable, of course, and knowing about one’s faith is crucial. It’s disconcerting that we knew more about Catholic doctrine before we converted than many Catholics who have grown up in the Church. But we only understood a piece of the equation. We elevated intellectual knowledge above everything else. It seems so silly now, but I really think we had no sense of what true holiness meant and we didn’t understand the beauty and value of simple devotion.

Coming out of a rigorous academic season of life, my husband and I found much of our worth in what we knew: what books we read, what writers we could quote. Because we idolized the intellectual life we thought our knowledge of the faith made us better than other Catholics. We didn’t understand that while gaining knowledge about our faith can draw us closer to Jesus and help us grow in our spiritual lives, it isn't a fast track to holiness. God isn't impressed with how many times we've read St. Augustine’s Confessions, but He desires us to know him more deeply and to love him more completely.

We were so wrapped up in ourselves that we didn’t comprehend that the Catholic faith wasn’t just for intellectuals but for everyone. There are saints from every background: academics, illiterate peasants, warriors, queens, mothers, farmers, and hermits. St. Bernadette isn’t less important than St. Augustine because she didn’t share his towering intellect. And St. Therese of Lisieux, a cloistered nun writing about her little way of serving God through the minutiae of daily life is a Doctor of the Church just like St. Thomas Aquinas—possibly the most brilliant man who has ever touched pen to paper.

There is a place for everyone in the Catholic faith. Thank God there was a place for us, where we could learn from the saints and our fellow Catholics in the next pew. As we delved more deeply into life at our new parish, we found out who our mystery walker-screeching Rosary-sayer was. She lived next door to the church and had been the sacristan for 75 years (since she was 14!). She spent a life of quiet service to the church. She never married and offered all her energies to serve our parish and love Jesus. How much we owe to her for her prayers and her decades of devotion! She passed away the same night our third child was born on the feast of St. Joan, her favorite saint, and she is deeply missed by everyone she touched.

I’m embarrassed now to think of my lack of respect for simple piety and my misplaced confidence in my intellectual knowledge. Holiness isn’t a list of books to check off or doctrines to understand. We can’t make ourselves holy through the acquisition of religious knowledge. We need the humility to open ourselves to God and let him work in us. And we can’t acquire holiness in an afternoon. It’s the day-in-day-out submission to Jesus and quiet, daily devotion that changes us. It’s the work of a lifetime. For some of us it’s saying, “yes, Lord” and offering forgiveness when it hurts, waking up with a sick baby when we’re exhausted, or changing what feels like the 5,000th diaper of the day. For others it’s walking across the street to the church everyday and filling your years with quiet acts of love for your parish.

I have a lot to learn. Some of it will be from books I have yet to read and intellectual truths I will encounter. But I think most of it will come not from the knowledge I fill my head with, but rather how faithfully I empty myself so God can transform me into something holy. And some of the lessons will come from the inspiring faith of the old women praying the Rosary in the next pew, whether they've read St. Thomas Aquinas or not.

Tagged as: Best of Week, conversion, devotion, Mass, rosary

Source: Confessions of a Catholic Convert - Haley Stewart

As part of my personal mission for Jesus, I would always share conversions story hoping they will inspire readers here. 

We all have missions from God we just have to find out what it is that God wants us to do for him. 

Our purpose in life is "to know Him, love Him and Serve Him" not to serve ourselves and our own desires. 

Everyday now, each time and as soon as I wake up, most of the time still lying in bed, I would immediately pray and surrender the 'free will' He gifted me and would always pray to my Lord 'Thy will be done not mine' and ask Him to always purify my heart, my soul and my mind, so that I will have pure thoughts, words and actions during the day, so that I shall not offend or hurt anyone, but most of all not offend my Lord and my God. I would asked God to forgive any shortcomings and failures I would have during the day and to guide me through so I could put a smile in everyone's faces but most of all so that I could give my Jesus a smile in His face as well.

Though I am 4 years to go to be 70, I will never be tired loving and serving my Lord Jesus my God. I shall continue to do so until it is time for me to go and be with Him - not in my time but in His time. (I am getting closer to my home sweet home).

Silent Crusader