Playing the Offence

This time of year many of us prepare for travel whether it be on vacation or just simply going home for the summer. In College Station I have been blessed with a wonderful Catholic community at St. Mary's. I have grown more devout in my faith than I could have ever imagined. Having St. Mary's feels like I have been on a retreat all year. As we all know, when we come off of a retreat we have the "Jesus High" and it becomes hard to maintain the spiritual growth once the high is gone. Now we've all heard the classic talk about not letting the high be the end and how to stay on top of it. However, no matter how great the talk is, it is never works the way we wanted it to. This begs the question: why is it so hard?

"In my opinion, there is hardly anything else that the enemy of our soul dreads more than confidence, humble confidence in God.  Confidence in God is the very soul of prayer."Servant of God Solanus Casey 

The answer because we come back knowing the "other side" has beat us before and are probably stronger than us. We go into battle with a strong defensive line, we prepare to keep the enemy from advancing and this works for a while because most enemies don't have the defence to fight our weaker offence. What happens though when we face an enemy with a strong offence? If you haven't figured it out yet I'm building up to one of the most memorable games in Texas A&M History.

Defence is a great skill to have and Alabama was known as the best team in the SEC, for many  reasons but a big reason was, because of their strong defensive line. Their defensive line was great at getting the ball back to the offensive line. No other team could beat them because no offence could stand against Alabama's defence.

Now we look at A&M's Fall 2012 season leading up to that game. Everyone saw that A&M was in fact good enough to compete with SEC teams in "big boy football" and that the strong offense played a major part. Still though, many wondered if A&M's offensive line would still look as good next to the defensive line of Alabama. A&M showed Alabama, and all of college football for that matter, that even the number one ranked team in the nation look weak when faced with a team that could withstand their defensive line.

My point to all of this is that in our spiritual battles it is not good enough just to have a good defence. Instead we need to go into the battle knowing we are strong enough to defeat the enemy. We need to go into battle ready to win. We need to have the confidence that our offence.

“The nature of the enemy's warfare in your life is to cause you to become discouraged and to cast away your confidence. Not that you would necessarily discard your salvation, but you could give up your hope of God's deliverance. The enemy wants to numb you into a coping kind of Christianity that has given up hope of seeing God's resurrection power.” Bob Sorge, Glory: When Heaven Invades Earth 

At the first game of the season for A&M everyone laughed thinking the Aggies would get their butts kicked. Even though A&M did loose that first game, though not by much, A&M from the start was never afraid and many wondered why. Maybe it was the loyalty to their team, maybe it was the excitement of the first game of the season, maybe it was the excitement of the first game in the SEC, or MAYBE it was the fact that A&M placed all their confidence in a certain redshirt freshman quarterback Johnny Manziel who would go on to win the Heisman Trophy. Johnny Manziel, or as us Aggies call him Johnny Football.

The reason we play defence instead of offence is because we have forgotten that we have Jesus on our side. Jesus a man who was the son of a carpenter and conceived out of wedlock. Everything and everyone says that he should fail but he didn't. Jesus, the one destined to fail, WON. He didn't win a Heisman Trophy, he didn't beat the number one ranked football team in America, and many people thought he was crazy. Instead, he did the one thing no man has the power to do. Jesus defeated death. Not only that he sent us the Holy Spirit to be with us wherever we go. For that reason, whether are coming home from college, a retreat, or just trying to hold onto a sense of hope, we should always be confident.

I heard a story the other week (I may have parts of the story wrong so bare with me) about a man present during the collapse of the Aggie Bonfire. Many foul words came out of the mouths of many who were there that night but one man who was hanging from a harness above instinctively said "Jesus, Mary, Joseph!". The next thing he remembered was standing safely on the ground and out of harms way. This is a perfect example of the type of confidence we should have in the man we call Jesus.

Harlem Shake and Jesus

I would like to first start off with a Harlem shake video that was made at Steubenville on the Bayou this past weekend.

Now on a more serious note:

This past weekend I witnessed one of the most incredible things in my life. I was in a room that was dead silent with 3,000 teenagers. On top of that, not one teenager had a phone out to text and no one was getting up to go to the bathroom because they were bored. There was no music playing and every teenager was kneeling. Why? To gaze at a simple piece of bread. 3,000 teenagers completely captivated by a piece of bread.

This past week I went to be apart of Mercy Crew which helps with anything and everything in order to make Steubenville on the Bayou run more smoothly. I had the time of my life. I myself spent most of the weekend working to spotlight for the conference. Like every job it had it is a rose but it still has its thorns. I was able to be apart of almost the entire conference but at the same time I was separated from everyone.

He came to Jericho and intended to pass through the town. Now a man there named Zacchaeus, who was a chief tax collector and also a wealthy man, was seeking to see who Jesus was; but he could not see him because of the crowd, for he was short in stature. So he ran ahead and climbed a sycamore tree in order to see Jesus, who was about to pass that way. When he reached the place, Jesus looked up and said to him, “Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.” And he came down quickly and received him with joy. When they all saw this, they began to grumble, saying, “He has gone to stay at the house of a sinner.” But Zacchaeus stood there and said to the Lord, “Behold, half of my possessions, Lord, I shall give to the poor, and if I have extorted anything from anyone I shall repay it four times over.”And Jesus said to him, “Today salvation has come to this house because this man too is a descendant of Abraham. For the Son of Man has come to seek and to save what was lost.”Luke 19:1-10

Here I was up in the tree. I was a spectator, not a participant. I felt disconnected and lonely but God was still with me and I still had purpose. I was separate from everyone yet God used me where I was. In fact I had possibly the most important job of all. My job was to put the spotlight on Jesus, the single most important person in the universe.

What's the point to all of this? I'll tell you. Something cool about the picture of the Eucharist at adoration is that it was in the same place where the penguin had been dancing in the harlem shake video. The Lord grants us the ability to be in his presence through the Eucharist yet so often we blow it off as just a piece of bread. The same goes with anything in our lives. We forget that Jesus is always with us and present in our lives until we meet him in adoration. I did not come to Jesus because I was hanging in a tree. Jesus in his power and love came to the tree and said “Zacchaeus, come down quickly, for today I must stay at your house.” Let us never forget that even when he is absent he is present and he is coming to be with us.

The Harlem Shake may have seemed silly and unnecessary but when Catholics can do something so normal, so cool, it speaks to teens and they become more intrigued by the Catholic church. That simple act may seem like nothing but to a teen it may have been the only thing to open up their hearts to the Catholic church. Even though Jesus wasn't present in the Eucharist during the Harlem Shake, he was still present desperately calling out to us.

Show Me the Love

We spend our entire lives searching for one thing. Love. There are many forms of love such as the love for a spouse, love of science, love of art, love of music, love for a brother or sister, love of sports, etc. In every place where love can be found sin can be found.

Music can be beautiful when it expresses God's love and love for one another while at the same time, in today's culture, music is often the expression of a life of sin. Sports show the beauty in which God has created the human body and we see God's love in our abilities to push the limits. On the other hand, sports drive competition which can lead to pride and jealousy. Science shows the intricate work of the hand of God but science is also used to try and discredit God.

There is a song by Rihanna called We Found Love. If you have never seen the music video DON"T. The music video is one of the most sinful and depressing things I have ever watched in my entire life. However, if you have never seen the cover of the same song done in Africa by Lindsey Stirling WATCH IT. It is the most hopeful beautiful things I have ever seen.

We can't escape sin because it is the sinners who need God the most. For those of you who don't know, the song God of This City was not written by Chris Tomlin. The song was actually written by an Irish band called Bluetree. Bluetree actually wrote the song in a brothel. In this video Chris Tomlin tells the story of the song. (The video is kind of long so feel free to skip to the 2:40 mark)

We find love when we bring the light of Christ to those who need it most. When we lead a sinner to the light we are seeing love flow from us, love is shown to us from them, and best of all God's love for us is magnified. The Father's love for us is magnified because we have brought his child safely back into his arms.

If they had been thinking of the land from which they had come, they would have had opportunity to return. But now they desire a better homeland, a heavenly one. Therefore, God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared a city for them. 

Hebrews 11:15-16