God sees you in ways the world does not….God knows what you are capable of….All we have to do is surrender….And then watch and see what happens

Today at Holy Mass we hear from the gospel of St John…..I want to bring to your attention the words Jesus said to St Peter the very moment he sees him…..”Jesus looked at him and said, “You are Simon the son of John; you will be called Cephas,” which is translated Peter”…How did Jesus know this about Peter?…….At the time Peter was just a simple fisherman, but Jesus saw something else…Today the Universal Church honors Elizabeth Ann Seton….Like St Peter she too had “another life” before Christ called her…Elizabeth Ann Seton was a wife and mother…But after her husband died, she used the wealth she had to found a school in Baltimore…This led her to becoming a nun, start an religious order and the schools she opened were the beginning of the parochial school system in America….Again, another example of God knowing Elizabeth better than she knew her self…..Within each of us are deep caverns of potential…Jesus sees these aspects of our self in ways we do not…In essence, God knows you better than you know your self…He sees what you are capable of doing….…..This is how God works…The world “sizes you up” based on your credentials - Your wealth, Your education, Your connections, Your family, etc….Jesus “sizes a person up” based upon their willingness to be molded and shaped in the image and likeness of God…So in the final analysis, its not so much what gifts you have or our resume, its more about how much are you willing to abandon your will to God and be used……I will tell you this….God can do so much more with your life than you can….Don’t believe me?…..Look what he did with a simple house wife and widow (Elizabeth Ann Seton), who founded the parochial school system in America….Look what he did with a simple fisherman (St Peter), how this fisherman became the first Pope……God sees us in ways the world does not…God sees what we are capable of doing…If only we give God a chance….Then step back and be amazed at what happens next!

They said to him, “Rabbi”, “where are you staying?” He said to them, “Come, and you will see.”

When you look at the first 12 apostles of Christ, one can say to themselves, how can this bunch of ragtag guys accomplish what they did?….In essence these men shook the foundations of the world and they were just “regular guys”….How did they do it?….The answer - They were willing to abandon their will radically and turn it over the God……Using an analogy, which these men took to heart - “God - You are the potter, I am the clay - Mold me as you will”…….And in turn, Jesus did just that, he turned these simple men into earth-shakers, who are remembered to this very day….What about you?….Do you think Jesus can use you in the same way?……..We have to dare to attempt to do the ridiculous in order to allow God to use us to accomplish the miraculous……..I was always attracted to traveling….....For 15 years I traveled extensively for work and in my spare time I backpacked to many cities all around the world…On one of those backpacking trips in Cambodia, I met for the first time Mother Teresa nuns…It was a Sunday and I found the one Catholic Church in the city of Phnom Penh, Cambodia…The Church was basically the second floor of a warehouse, no pews and an altar…Everyone sat on the floor and I was one of three western people at the Mass (the other two were from France)…..As the Mass was just about to begin, in walks Mother Teresa’s nuns…And they sat right next to me for some reason.....After the Mass we struck up a conversation…..While in Cambodia, I saw poverty like I never saw in my life…More so then what I saw in South America….And I wanted to do something about it…..So I gave the sisters a small monetary donation and they gave me their mailing address…From there we began to exchange letters and they encouraged me to go to Kolkata India, which I did….During my time in India, many things happened…But the reason why I believe God sent me there was to link up my hometown parish, led by the late and great Fr Stanley Kostrzomb with the poor of India….Fr Stanley took interest in my trips to Mother Teresa’s sisters in India and offered to sponsor a parish there, becoming a sister parish to St Michael’s in Lyndhurst New Jersey…..When I spoke to the sisters in India about Fr Stanley’s offer, they introduced me to a very poor priest who ran a parish on the outskirts of Kolkata…Fr Stanley and this priest exchanged emails and over the course of time Fr Stanley sent over around $40,000 dollars (which is an enormous amount of money in India), which was collected in a poor box in the back of St Michael’s Church in Lyndhurst…Frankly, it could have been even more money, that was just the number I heard at one point in time…This is the reason why I believe God sent me to India…To link Fr Stanley up with this priest….In the end and after all the generosity shown by Fr Stanley to this parish…They re-named the church in India after St Michael the Archangel in Lyndhurst NJ….That is a true story and many people many not know about it…..This is how God works…He uses simple people….All we have to do is say YES…..And be willing to do the impossible, so God can do the miraculous….There are no coincidences with God!….All we have to do is say YES

“In the past God spoke to our ancestors through the prophets: in these last days, he has spoken to us through the Son.”

Today in the Gospel at Mass, Jesus with just one look saw in Peter what no one saw….The fisherman became the first Pope…..So here is the question….What does Jesus see when he looks at you?…..My guess is, He sees GREATNESS!…..Be willing to do the impossible…….Like the first 12 regular men that Jesus chose….It was not their resume that impressed Jesus, it was their willingness to “go into the deep”…..We need to “get out of the boat” of our comfortable lives….In that “space” of surrender - That “space" of the “unknown” - That “space” of having no control….God will meet us there….And when he does, he will say to us with a shy smile on his face….”Now we can begin”……God sees you in ways the world does not….God knows what you are capable of….All we have to do is surrender….And then watch and see what happens