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Word of Life – John 6:29 (14/9/2025 – 28/9/2025)
Post date: 2025-09-16Autor: BCP
“The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent.”
Reflection on Jn 6:29
Post date: 2025-09-16Autor: BCP
A group of people once asked Jesus how they could do the work of God. Jesus replied, “The work of God is this: to believe in the One He has sent.” (Jn 6:29) God desires belief and faith from us, for “without faith it is impossible to please God” (Heb 11:6). The word of life we now repeat during our prayer stops also tells us that if we believe in the One whom the Father has sent, that is, Jesus, in a specific situation or problem, God responds to our faith by acting. The following verses give a deeper insight into this truth related to faith.
Be a warrior of God! (video)
Post date: 2025-09-15Autor: BCP
Be a warrior of God! + Elijah Patriarch of the Byzantine Catholic Patriarchate
Do you have a place for Him? (video)
Post date: 2025-09-07Autor: BCP
Do you have a place for Him? + Elijah Patriarch of the Byzantine Catholic Patriarchate
The necessary law of the grain of wheat
Post date: 2025-09-05Autor: BCP
As was the case with Abraham, every work of God must have at its core obedience of faith unto death. This is the law of the wheat grain. The devil will attack us with depression, pressure, gloom, tension, or an indefinable apathy, but there is no reason to take these feelings seriously and remain in that state. That is the wealth of vanity. We must pray with faith. God alone knows how He will resolve the matter. He wants us to have absolute faith in His omnipotence and to surrender completely! What He will do with it, we will see later or in eternity. The death of a grain of wheat always bears manifold fruit.
Word of Life – 1 Pet. 5:6-7 (31/8/2025 – 14/9/2025)
Post date: 2025-08-30Autor: BCP
“Therefore humble yourselves under the mighty hand of God, that He may exalt you in due time, casting all your care upon Him, for He cares for you.”
Reflection on 1Pe 5:6-7
Post date: 2025-08-30Autor: BCP
Jesus should truly be the Lord of our lives. We should talk to Him in prayer about our problems, seek His will and, if He is truly our Lord, we have not lived our lives in vain, but fruitfully – both for time and, above all, for eternity.
How to carry our cross
Post date: 2025-08-25Autor: BCP
The enemy of God attacks in order to destroy the work of God, Christianity, to steal Christ – the life of God – from the souls and to lead them to eternal damnation. His attacks are from both without and within and have a meaning. We need to see them as a cross to be borne. The carrying of this cross is the will of God. However, before we can carry this cross, we need to deny ourselves. Jesus first demands: “Deny yourself!” and only then He adds: “Take up your cross!” To deny oneself means to be poor in spirit, to be humble.
Word of Life – John 13:13 (17/8/2025 – 31/8/2025)
Post date: 2025-08-18Autor: BCP
"You call me Teacher and Lord, and you say well, for so I am."
Reflection on Jn 13:13
Post date: 2025-08-18Autor: BCP
Jesus Himself says to you: ‘You call Me your Teacher and Lord,’ and He adds: ‘and that is what I am.’ In this short Bible study, we will examine some quotes from Scripture and consider whether Jesus truly is my Lord. If He is not, and if my ego is my god, then I must pray: Jesus, be truly my Lord! Let us call out to Jesus from the depths of our hearts. Only then can we confess with the repentant Thomas: ‘My Lord and my God!’ Jesus, be truly my Lord and God! Jesus Christ is Saviour and Lord. Of all the titles of Jesus, the title ‘Lord’ became by far the most commonly used, wide-spread and important. It would hardly be going too far to say that the word ‘Lord’ became a synonym for the name of ‘Jesus’. What does Jesus mean to you? Which areas of your life do you feel are subject to His control? Anyone who wishes to be His disciple must carefully consider this often overlooked aspect of Christian practice.
Recourse to the Mother of Jesus
Post date: 2025-08-10Autor: BCP
Even an unbelieving person, when suddenly confronted by a difficult situation, subconsciously cries out like a small child: “Mummy!” We can have recourse to Mary as our Mother. Jesus gave her to us as our Mother. Eve is the mother of the human race. Mary became our spiritual Mother. The task of a mother is not only to give birth to or receive children, but to feed and rear them. Mary accompanied Jesus on His Way of the Cross. None of the people knew Him so intimately, none was in so deep unity with Him as His Mother. And Jesus gave His Mother to us, His children. We have the same Mother: you and I and Jesus.
Word of Life – Eph. 4:11-12 (3/8/2025 – 17/8/2025)
Post date: 2025-08-04Autor: BCP
"As for His gifts, to some He gave to be apostles, to others prophets, or even evangelists, or shepherds and teachers. So He prepared those who belong to Him for the ministry, in order to build up the Body of Christ."
Reflection on Eph 4:11-12
Post date: 2025-08-04Autor: BCP
We must realize that there are natural gifts and there are spiritual gifts. God gives the natural ones at birth. For example, some people have a good memory, they can learn quickly, others have a natural gift of caution, others of zeal, which is directly connected to their nature, so they do not have to force themselves into it. Some have the gift of mildness, patience, while others have to overcome themselves and deny themselves a lot in order to be patient. However, even these natural gifts are integrated by God through the Holy Spirit after conversion, so that on them, as on a healthy foundation, there is also a special grace that develops these natural gifts. For example, someone has a natural sense of self-criticism, of truthfulness, cannot be inactive when they see that it is necessary to make sacrifices and suffer for the truth, so they also have a natural disposition for the gift of prophecy. If someone recognizes these traits in themselves, it is necessary to pray that God, by His grace, will further confirm the prophetic gift in this disposition. Another has a natural gift to teach others. It is also necessary to pray that the Spirit of God will add to this gift the supernatural gift of being a teacher and explaining the truths of God. But I emphasize again that in order for all gifts to be functional, they must have a common denominator, and that is: denying yourself, taking up your cross and following Christ. If we put into practice the words of Jesus, ‘Repent and believe in the Gospel,’ the gifts develop. Otherwise, they stagnate and are ineffective.
The Parable of the Two Debtors
Post date: 2025-07-30Autor: BCP
In one of the gospels, Jesus tells a parable of two debtors – one who owed ten thousand talents, the other who owed a hundred denarii. You forgive something small and the Lord forgives you millions in debt. What folly it is to know this and not act on it. We need to put this into practice on a daily basis. By eagerly forgiving others and walking in truth and light, we get healed and free from all sorts of indefinable or definable gloomy emotions or feelings of guilt. These are false emotions. Ask yourself – Where is Jesus in all this? And where are you? Are you in your self or in Christ when you have such thoughts? If you are in Christ, God’s word is your guide as interpreted in the Spirit and in truth, rather than by the evil spirit in the wilderness.
“Lord, let fire come down from heaven!”
Post date: 2025-07-21Autor: BCP
At Elijah’s word: “Lord, let fire come down from heaven”, fire came down and consumed the bull on Mount Carmel, and then it came down twice more and consumed fifty soldiers each time. However, that fire had come down into him first. The Prophet Elijah had experience of the fire of God. This fire had already purified his soul. So this fire should purify us.
Word of Life – Rom. 12:2 (20/7/2025 – 3/8/2025)
Post date: 2025-07-21Autor: BCP
"And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God."
Reflection on Rom 12:2
Post date: 2025-07-21Autor: BCP
Today’s world is characterized by many inventions which meet people’s needs quickly and easily: instant foods, instant electronic communication, instant information stored in high speed computers, etc. These are the hallmarks of today’s ‘instant’ generation. Christians must remember, however, that there is no such thing as ‘instant maturity’ in the Christian experience. Becoming a Christian begins a lifetime adventure of knowing God better and loving Him more. God’s Word says: “And do not be conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good and acceptable and perfect will of God.” (Rom 12:2) Don’t let the world around you squeeze you into its own mold, but let God re-mold your minds from within, so that you may prove in practice that the plan of God for you is good, meets all His demands and moves towards the goal of true maturity.
Christ helps us carry our daily cross
Post date: 2025-07-17Autor: BCP
Every day we can call on Jesus, when worries and vanities overwhelm us and we lack the strength to do the will of God, when we have an urge either to do nothing or to immerse ourselves in a problem which produces another problem and consequently we lose the essence, when we do anything else but not what we are to do. Then we need to fall to our knees, look into the eyes of Christ on the cross and say: “Jesus, I trust in You. You will give me the strength to carry the cross of this duty which I loathe and try to avoid. Please, give me the strength; I have none.” And Jesus will. Sometimes in an extraordinary way.
My cross is also the specific circumstances and situations
Post date: 2025-07-10Autor: BCP
To carry our cross means first to identify what this cross is concretely. My cross, with regard to my character and my nature, is one thing and my brother’s cross is another thing. However, our cross is not just our character but also the specific circumstances and situations in which we are powerless. Whatever we do, nothing works. One can say: we just sink deeper and deeper. Then we must either suffer a blow through our own fault, or we need someone else to give us a blow so that we can finally be pulled out of the swamp.
Word of Life – Mt 5:16 (6/7/2025 – 20/7/2025)
Post date: 2025-07-07Autor: BCP
"Let your light so shine before men, that they may see your good works and glorify your Father in heaven."