Prayer - March 3, 2024
Ricky Bevington, C.S.C.

Good and loving God, in a world full of office buildings, stores, businesses, and factories, you give us the gift of churches, sanctuaries where we can better learn to see your presence among us. Enkindle our hearts with zeal for your house! That all people may marvel at the God who chooses to have his house among us. We ask this through Christ our Lord, Amen.

Prayer - February 1, 2024
Rev. Louis DelFra, C.S.C.

​​Lord, today you send your disciples out on a mission, to spread the good news that the kingdom of God is now among us. You sent them two-by-two. Grant us both the zeal to spread the message of your gospel wherever you have placed us in life, and grant us the support and encouragement of companionship in faith, so that we may never lose heart in our daily efforts on your behalf. Amen.

Prayer - January 19, 2024
Members of the Holy Cross Novitiate

Eternal God, as we await the coming of your Son in glory, raise up men and women to bring your message of hope to a waiting world. Instill in them an unshakable trust in your divine providence and a zeal for ministry to inspire your people to a deeper confidence in your saving power. We ask this through Christ, our Lord. Amen.

Surprising Sovereignty

December 31, 2023
by Pastor Chuck Swindoll
Scriptures: Esther 7:6–10
All the time Haman was having the gallows built, he could see—enthusiastically anticipate—Mordecai impaled there. Now he is condemned to die there himself. We call this irony. Theologians call it sovereignty. I call it God's surprising sovereignty!

I can remember a time early on in my ministerial training when the sovereignty of God was frightening to me. Not understanding its implications as fully as I do now some thirty-five years later, I felt it would make me passive and virtually irresponsible. Furthermore, I feared what it would do to my theology of evangelism. If I really threw myself into this doctrine, God could become a distant deity, sort of a celestial brute, pushing and maneuvering His way through nameless humanity, as He did what He pleased to get what He wanted. I could see my zeal waning and my passion for souls drained to the point of indifference.

Through a series of events far too numerous and complicated to describe, I've come to realize that, rather than being frightened by God's sovereignty, I'm comforted in it. Since He alone is God, and since He, being God, "does all things well" and in doing them has only good as His goal, how could I do anything but embrace it?

Does that mean I can explain it? No, only rarely, when hindsight yields insight. Does that mean I always anticipate it? No, like you, I occasionally rush to judgment or respond in panic, wondering why He is so silent, allowing wrong to run its course so long. But looking back in more reasonable moments, with my emotions under better control (His control!), I can see what He was about. I can even see why He delayed, or why He acted when He did. Usually, I freely admit, I think He is awfully slow (I can't number the times I've pleaded, "O God, please hurry up!"), and I am usually surprised, though I shouldn't be, at how beautifully things work out, right on time.

In the final analysis, God is God, and He will have His way when He pleases and for His glory. What could be better than that? In all the mystery of His waiting and working, and in the wrong of our doing and undoing, He can still be trusted. The main thing is that you and I remain sensitive to those moments when He finally breaks the silence and suddenly intervenes on our behalf. At least to us it seems sudden. To Him, it happened exactly as He had planned it all along.

Prayer - November 9, 2023
Rev. Ricky Bevington, C.S.C.

Good and loving God, in a world full of office buildings, stores, businesses, and factories, you give us the gift of churches, sanctuaries where we can better learn to see your presence among us. Enkindle our hearts with zeal for your house! That all people may marvel at the God who chooses to have his house among us. We ask this through Christ our Lord, Amen.