Its the small things in life that make life beautiful…And more times then not, God speaks to us through the small things….Do you notice the small things?

Today the Universal Church celebrates the Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe…For those who are not familiar….In December of 1531, Mary appeared to a man named Juan Diego, a Mexican Indian requesting that a Church be built…When Juan Diego brought this message to his bishop, the bishop was not convinced….Until Juan Diego returned with his cloak full of roses, which do not grow in December and when those same roses dropped from his cloak, Our Lady’s image appeared on the cloak miraculously…This same cloak with the image of Mary can be viewed to this day in the Cathedral, which was built as Our Lady requested in Mexico City…That same Church is visited by more people throughout the world, only second to St Peter’s Basilica in Rome….Why is all this important?……The message Juan Diego brought to the bishop was something most if not all of us would not believe if he told it to us in real time as it happened…Yet, what was asked by Our Lady, that a church be built happened!….What can we learn from this?…God’s ways are not our ways!…With that said and something to keep in mind…Mankind can not thwart the plans of God!…Oh, how we think we can…But its like trying to hold back the ocean….Those who fight against God are fighting a losing battle, both in the world and within themselves…In the Book of Revelation, which was written by St John - When Mary gave birth to the Child Jesus - This is what John wrote….”Then I heard a loud voice in heaven say: “Now have salvation and power come, and the Kingdom of our God and the authority of his Anointed”…..The world 2000 years ago saw a child born in a barn - But God in heaven saw something else…What do you see?……I will tell you what I see - What is to be revealed will be like nothing the world has ever seen!….”A great sign appeared in the sky, a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet, and on her head a crown of twelve stars”

“The angel Gabriel was sent from God to a town of Galilee called Nazareth, to a virgin betrothed to a man named Joseph, of the house of David, and the virgin’s name was Mary”

The “language of God” is very different then the language of man…..What do I mean by that?….God uses events and people that the world seems to always miss….The message of Our Lady of Guadalupe was given to a poor Mexican Indian…..St Peter was the first Pope and he was a humble fisherman….The children of Fatima were poor peasants……To name a few examples…..And lastly Jesus, the King of King was born in a barn to humble parents…It always seems that while the world is looking for “extravagant signs”…God sends us messages and messengers, who are far from extravagant…And because they are not “flashy” we ignore them or miss the message….So the question is…How can we become receptive to the messages of God?……The answer to that question does not come from a persons resume or intellect…It comes from the purity of heart of that individual…Our Lady spoke to the children of Fatima and gave them one of the most important messages since the birth of Christ…Would you give such a message to children?…I will answer that question for you - I would not….And a better question…Would you have believed the children of Fatima in real time if they told you they saw and spoke with “a beautiful lady”?…Again, I will answer for you - I probably would not have believed them…So how do we purify our hearts?……Jesus instructs us in Scripture….”Amen, I say to you, unless you turn and become like children, you will not enter the kingdom of heaven. Whoever humbles himself like this child is the greatest in the kingdom of heaven”…Jesus did not say, the people who graduate from Harvard will enter the Kingdom of God..He said we must become like children, who have pure and trusting hearts…The world has a way to make our hearts jaded and cynical…We all have “seen too much”…We have been disappointed by people…We have been hurt…..While this is true…Only God can heal our hearts and keep them pure…Only God!……Our world today thirsts for sophistication….God thirsts for us to remain pure, like a child…To look with wonder at everyday things and events….To trust…My youngest child is three years old…When I pick Maria up from Pre-K3, when she sees me, she runs with open arms directly at me…When I pick her up, Maria always places her face up against my cheek and keeps it there….Maria is so precious and so pure - Its tangible…..This is how we must strive to be….A person who is a “pure drop of water in the world” can do more than 100 people with Ivy league degrees!….God continues to “write his story” with and through the small and the pure of heart in the world…..And if we do not look with “eyes wide open”, we will miss it

“The LORD will possess Judah as his portion in the holy land, and he will again choose Jerusalem. Silence, all mankind, in the presence of the LORD! For he stirs forth from his holy dwelling”

The Feast of Feast of Our Lady of Guadalupe should be a reminder to us of what God values….God is not interested in our resume…He is interested in our heart…We must learn to value the “things of God”…Because the “things of God” are very different from what are valuable to the world…..Why is this important?…Because if we do not value what is important to God, we will miss his message of Salvation…We will miss the guidance God provides to us day in and day out…..Only when our hearts become “childlike” will we “hear” this message…Like my three year old daughter Maria….Who is so pure of heart and trusting….When she presses her cheek up against my face…As her Dad, I get a small taste of heaven here on earth each and everyday…..Its the small things in life that make life beautiful…And more times then not, God speaks to us through the small things….Do you notice the small things?