Lenten Challenge:

Amanda presented FOCUS Greek with a challenge during this Lenten season: go to Mass every day and go to confession once a week for a month. Now I know most of you think this is insane due to the crazy busy schedule of a Greek student because we are constantly on the pursuit of excellence. But just hear her out. 

Going to mass and confession transforms us, every time we receive these sacraments we are made more into the image and likeness of Christ and get stronger every time we go. I know that it seems like an extra hour a day is a lot to give up; that between homework and meetings there is no time. But the point she made was that if you start to go to mass every day you won’t need to study as much or work as hard on your projects. (And no she isn’t telling you that you will stop caring about school). 

When Adam and Eve fell in the garden, our relationship with God was broken and our intellect diminished. But, every time that we expose ourselves to Christ, He makes us more himself. When we go to mass and confession we can think clearer in all aspects of life because we no longer carry around the burden of sin. When we grow in closer to Jesus we no longer worry about what others think of us, how we look, or what are future will hold because we know that our relationship with God is what truly matters. She personally experienced just how true this was as she started attending daily mass and realized her school work got easier and she built stronger relationships with her sorority sisters. She promises that if you do this for a month you will never stop, you will realize how much better your life has become with Jesus as the center and will want to continue to grow.

Mother Teresa had the Missionaries of Charity saying a holy hour a day and as they began to expand and help more and more people the sisters asked her to decrease the holy hour to a half hour so that they could have more time helping people. Instead of following their request Mother Teresa upped the time to two hours. However, instead of helping less people, they ended up doubling the amount of people they were able to help.

Lesson learned: when we give the time to God that he deserves, he gives us the time to accomplish the things that we need to do. Think of what the Greek system could become if we all committed to going to daily mass and confession every week.

What it means to have Faith

Many of us claim to have faith.  But do we live this faith out? Do we really understand what it means to have faith?  Alpha Phi alumni, Amanda Teixeria, spoke at UNL's FOCUSgreek about her experience coming to college and realizing what it truly means to live out her faith.

 How do we live out our faith? By first knowing Jesus and then by sharing Him.

There are three types of relationships with Jesus:

1.      He is outside of our lives and has nothing to do with how we live

2.      He is only part of our lives.  We fit Him in during free time between practices, schools, and meetings.  He is just another activity in our schedule. 

3.      He is the center of our lives and everything we do revolves around our friendship with Christ

Another way that I sometimes like to think of this is: 1. We don’t realize that our actions are sins because we don’t know Jesus, 2. We know that what we are doing is wrong, but we continue to do it anyways and pretend like Jesus won’t mind, 3. we have Him in the center of our lives and try to avoid all sin because we realize how much it pains Him.  Being Greek makes it often hard to have Jesus at the center of our lives, we are constantly chasing after the next best thing to put us on top and we fill our lives with distracting temptations.

When Amanda would go to Frat parties, everyone would always feel sorry for her because she wasn’t drinking; but she knew she wasn’t missing out on anything, they were.  She knew that through her connection with Christ she was living in reality.  He reveals us to ourselves. We no longer try to be like anyone else, but are free to be who we were created to be.  It is attractive to see someone who knows who they are and is living a life of joy and freedom.  This is why we urgently need to build our life around Jesus; there will be ups and downs, but it will be the wildest adventure you have ever been on and the best.  God takes our small plans, blows them up, and then invites us to go on an even greater ride.   

Step two seems to scare people a lot more: Sharing Jesus. 

If our lives truly do revolve around Jesus and we know His love, then we would be so compelled to share His love that everyone around us would also know Jesus.  It has been said that we can see our own relationship with God based on how we invite others to know Jesus. 

People often think they are quoting St. Francis of Assisi when they say, “Preach the Gospel at all times, use words if necessary.” The thing is, he didn’t say this.  In fact, he believed something far from it.  He would often travel to up to five towns a day preaching the Gospel using words.  If I see someone helping an old lady across the street I wouldn’t just think, “Wow that person must really know Christ, I want to know Him too.” All people see is a good person.  If we never use our words, then who are we witnessing to? Ourselves? You need your words to proclaim that your actions are because you know Jesus loves you, otherwise some people may never connect the dots.

What should really be our motto is, “Use your words to proclaim God’s love; but if your actions don’t match up, then your words are useless.” What this is saying is that unless we live out what we say our faith teaches us, people will just consider us hypocrites and never feel the need to know Jesus.   

Now, imagine what might happen if we never say anything at all:  It’s the end of your life, you are riding the escalator up to Heaven when you look over and see your fraternity brother or your sorority sister on another escalator that’s going down.  What is more awkward: bringing up Jesus in a conversation now, or the moment when they look you in the eye at the end of your life and ask “why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t I deserve to be told so that I might be in Heaven also?” Let’s just say I personally hope I never hear those words.  Our Greek houses don’t need another funny guy who cracks jokes about how drunk they were the night before or someone who was on exec for all four years and is awesome; what they need is someone they can rely on to be a witness for Christ. They might not know it now, but being that witness is the best gift you could possibly give them.   Every year since Amanda has graduated she has gotten a letter or facebook message from one of her sorority sisters letting her know that they have come to know Jesus in their lives and thanking her for being that witness for them. 

People notice, even if they don’t say anything.  Our words might not bear fruit now, but they will later.  God’s hears our prayers and won’t let them go empty.   

One way to be a witness is through the idea of servant leadership; that by serving others, you become a leader.  (Prime example: Jesus) The small things do matter.  Do things that are counter cultural; by putting yourself last behind the pledges or simply just throwing out the trash when it gets full, our actions will back up our words and people will start to follow us on our journey for God. 

We don’t need to be perfect to preach the gospel, but we do need to be trying.  The biggest pitfalls we Greeks face are chastity, sobriety, and excellence.  Chastity and sobriety can be the biggest temptations and also the most detrimental to our witness.  If we are not living out the words of Jesus, why would they change their lives if they see that our lives are not changed?  Don’t let your actions turn someone away from finding God and spending eternity in Heaven.  

Hurting Jesus

Getting hurt, hurts. It’s as simple as that.  Especially if it is someone close to you causing the pain.  Recently I was let down by someone and I was really finding it hard to forgive them.  I wanted to, I know I needed to, I know that God was asking me to.  We know that anger only wears us down, so why do we stay angry?  I needed some advice, so I figured why not just go to confession and talk a priest (AKA Jesus).  After I was finished explaining the hurt and my inability to make it go away and forgive, he gave me some simple advice: 

                   

“Think about the last time that you hurt Jesus the way that you were recently hurt.”

After finally being open and entrusting once again, I just felt alone and lied to.  I think I am only beginning to understand how I do this to Jesus daily.  I tell him that I love him; that I want to give him my whole life (like I have said millions of times before).  He starts to trust that I will follow through this time and that I am willing to drop all worldly things and distractions for him.  He gives me his whole heart; he dies for me so that my sins may be forgiven and I can start fresh.  And then what do I do?  I say, just kidding I still want control; I want to do my own thing and forget about how You trusted me when I said I would give up my life for You, like You did for me.    I lie to him, I leave him alone. 

I couldn’t have asked for better advice.  Whenever someone wrongs me and I start to feel angry, I just think back to when hurt Jesus in that way; and let’s be honest, it was probably in the last ten minutes.  I can’t begin to imagine how much more pain Jesus feels when we wrong Him, way more than we have ever felt.  We should all make a commitment to stop hurting Jesus, stop lying to him, stop punching him in the stomach.  Thankfully, no matter what we do, He still loves us, and that alone should make us cringe at the thought of ever wronging Him.  

Second Sorrowful Mystery

While on a rosary walk the other day, we were reflecting on the mysteries and as he read the second sorrowful mystery, something really hit me hard.

Second Sorrowful Mystery

Pilate said unto them: “What shall I do then with Jesus who is called Christ?” They all say unto him: “Let him be crucified!” And the governor said: “Why, what evil hath he done”? But they cried out the more, saying: “Let him be crucified!” (Mathew 27) So Pilate, wishing to satisfy the crowd, released Barabbas to them and, after he had Jesus Scourged, handed him over to be crucified. (Mark 15:15)

I remember growing up and even to this day being discussed at this story.  This crowd had no reason to hate Jesus and still yelled crucify him, crucify him; trying to condemn him to a miserable and torturous death.  And Pilate, finding no fault of his own, decided to go along with the crowd to satisfy them by handing Jesus to be crucified to prevent the crowd from turning on him. I always got so angry thinking that it was so easy for them to turn their backs on Jesus, the savior of the world, and wish unthinkable pain upon him.  What hit me hard during that rosary was the fact that every day I am the crowd, and I am also Pilate. 

While I might not physically yell out crucify him, every time I sin that is exactly what I am saying.  Every time I know God’s will and yet decide to break his rules and do my own thing, I am saying crucify him, crucify him.  Jesus died for my sins, for your sins. That means that every time we sin, we are the one driving the nail deeper into his hands; that little sin we don’t think is a big deal is an extra lash from the whip tearing into his skin.   

Pilate on the other hand, didn’t want to harm Jesus because he knew he was innocent and Pilate didn’t want to do anything wrong; but he was more worried about what the crowd would think of him than doing the right thing.  By standing by and watching other people sin and not saying anything, I am being Pilate.  I am going along with what I know is wrong and ignoring Jesus’ silent plea to help him. By lack the courage to stand up for my beliefs and continuing to watch others sin, I am allowing Jesus to be crucified.

This is a sobering fact, when you think of all the things you do throughout your day that are just adding extra pain and suffering to Jesus’ crucifixion.  Take a minute to think about where your life needs to change so that you are no longer silently yelling crucify him, crucify him.  Even those little sins are an extra blow of the hammer, are they worth it?

False Humility

What is Humility? Well the dictionary describes it as the quality or condition of being humble; modest opinion or estimate of one’s own importance, rank, etc. Humility can be one of the hardest things to master because as soon as you try to say that you are humble, you are no longer humble because you think you are good at being humble, confusing I know.  I think that most people think that to be humble means to think you are bad at something and that your talents are less valuable than they are.  But let’s be honest, it is real annoying when someone who is a great painter tries to tell you they are terrible, you both know that it’s not true, so why pretend like they aren’t good?

In C.S. Lewis’ Screwtape Letters, one of the devils is explaining false humility states, “And sense what they are trying to believe may, in some cases be manifest nonsense, they cannot succeed in believing it and we have the chance of keeping their minds endlessly revolving around themselves in an effort to achieve the impossible,” (trying to believe that their talent is not valuable).

 It’s not bad to admit that God gave you a special talent.  When someone gives you a compliment, thank them and then thank God for giving you that gift. 

One way that I think about humility is that to be humble means that you don’t admire something greater just because you were the one who did it and not someone else.  You should find just as much joy in someone else making the last three throw or bringing your best friend to Jesus (even though you have been trying for years), as if it were you.  We should not think greater of ourselves just because God gave us different gifts than he gave those around us.  We should admire all that God has created and the different talent sets he has given. 

Next time you start to feel prideful because you are the super star athlete or an amazing poet, remember it was God who gave you this talent and He who deserves the praise.  And if you say that you got to be good because you practiced the last ten years, well then just remember God gave you the patience and the drive to keep practicing.  We all have special talents and gifts so why not use them to glorify the Lord and give him thanks. 


"False humility downplays one's genuine strengths to receive praise.  Arrogance plays up one's genuine strengths to receive praise.  Humility raises up others to they can be praised."  

When I'm 80

Today I was asked to think about what I want people to say about my life when I am 80.  And since I am only 21, I have a lot of time till this day actually comes.  No matter what I write down about what I want people to think about me in the future: she was always willing to talk to anyone, motivated everyone she met to be a better person, helped those around her to find God, put others before her, always striving to improve, humble, committed; it’s impossible to know if this is really what people will say about me. Or is it?  The only person in control of my life is me (besides God).  I have the next 59 years to live my life and determine how people will see me.  What if I started now, could I guarantee that this is what people would say about me?  I don’t see why not.  If I wrote these descriptions of how I want my life to be and looked that them every day and made sure that I lived everyday in such a way that it represented these qualities; there is no reason that people would describe my life any differently than how I hope. 

But let’s be honest, do all of my actions truly represent the list that I told you up above of how I hope to live my life? Why is it that we constantly do things on a daily basis that cause us to go against what we hope to stand for and represent?  To state the obvious, the devils is often behind our lack of motivation and drive to be the person that God has planned for us to be and that we hope to be one day.   He is so good at placing the thought of “I will start tomorrow” in our heads that tomorrow never comes. He is so good at distracting us with worldly desires and material goods that we lose focus on our true goals and we start to work towards being who the world says we should be.  

  So my goal for us this week: write down 10 things you want people to say about you when your 80.  Hang them up on your wall and look at them every night and decide if someone would describe you as this person based on your actions from the day.  

You Are More

Some days I think we all need to be reminded that who we once were doesn't define who we can become and I don't think anyone says this better than Tenth Avenue North:


You are more than the choices that you've made,
You are more than the sum of your past mistakes,
You are more than the problems you create,
You've been remade.

'Cause this is not about what you've done,
But what's been done for you.
This is not about where you've been,
But where your brokenness brings you to

This is not about what you feel,
But what He felt to forgive you,
And what He felt to make you loved.

You are more than the choices that you've made,
You are more than the sum of your past mistakes,
You are more than the problems you create,
You've been remade.