10 minutes wih Jesus are group of Catholic priests who share friendship with Jesus, plus keenness to help young people of all ages to learn the art of loving Jesus and speaking to Him. You can find them in WhatsApp, Spotify, Ivoox, Telegram, Goggle Podcasts and Apple Podcast. Every saturday, we are going to share one meditation by 10 minutes with Jesus. Enjoy it.
My Lord and my God, I firmly believe that you are here, that you see me, that you hear me. I adore you with profound reverence, I beg your pardon for my sins, and the grace to make this time or prayer fruitful. My Immaculate Mother, St. Joseph, my Father and Lord, my guardian angel intercede for me.
The gift
Have you ever received a gift that really meant a lot? Something so personal it really hit a chord with you, I’m sure we all have and normally this comes from someone we love dearly, perhaps a spouse, a parent or a child, and the gift is more about the relationship, than it is about the object itself, or rather the object chosen, that specific gift, is deeply personal in nature, because we’re so well known by the person giving it to us, he or sheknows us inside and out, and has given us something that is truly a reflection of that knowledge and that love. I heard two recent stories that reflect this aspect of love which is giving and receiving gifts, one was of a husband and wife, where she says “When we were dating, my husband bought me a pair of hiking boots, plain brown leather with red laces, the Platonic ideal of hiking boots reminiscent of the waffle Stoppers of my 70s childhood, it’s been two decades and I’ve marched all over the world in those boots, they’re worn and cracked, showing their years the way an aging face does, every once in a while my husband rubs them down with oil and replaces the laces, and then he puts them back on the shoe rack without saying a word, the next day I find them newly loved.”
Mother and daughter
Or this other anecdote that I heard between a mother and her daughter, it’s the daughter who recalls it, “My mother and I had a tenuous relationship at best, for my high school graduation, I saved my babysitting money to get a dress made, but didn’t have enough to buy a purse, my mom spent all night sewing my leftover dress material onto one of her old clutches, I remember being gobsmacked astonished, I still have that, and occasionally hold it close to my heart when I miss her.” Old boots, a handmade purse, we are made to give love, it is expressed in gift, and when we give the thing that is most dear to us, it is the greatest expression of our love, this is especially true in marriage, the gift in marriage is one’s very self exclusively and permanently. Recently the Holy Father Pope Francis said the Bible is the great love story between God and humanity, at its center stands Jesus, whose own story brings to fulfillment, both God’s love for us and our love for God. Jesus, we are spending this time of Prayer with you, and it makes sense that we be overwhelmed by this reality, that you have wanted to carry out a love story with each one of us, with me, and that this love story involves a gift, the best of gifts. In today’s Gospel, we are in the middle of that famous dialogue that you had by night with the Pharisee Nicodemus; Lord, he comes to you by night, and he comes to you seeking the truth, as we read this famous passage, perhaps the most celebrated in all the Bible, let us remember that, that Jesus is speaking personally to Nicodemus in a dialogue of love, we read and these words are yours Lord: God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish, but might have eternal life, for God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world might be saved through him. Who ever believes in him will not be condemned, but whoever does not believe has already been condemned, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God. Jesus what is this gift that you’re giving to Nicodemus in this moment, in this personal dialogue you’re havingwith him, what is this gift that you prepared with the father and the Holy Spirit, this love story, this love song, we could say that you have prepared with great affection, for Humanity, for each one of us. Well we know that just before this passage you tell Nicodemus, just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up, that whoever believes in Him may have eternal life.
The greatest of gifts
This is of course a veiled reference to your passion Lord, that you Jesus will be lifted up on the cross, before the eyes of all, so that whoever looks to you will be saved, and here we discover the gift, the greatest of gifts, the perfect gift of love that each of us has been given, which is the son given to us by the father, God so loved the world that He gave His only child, His only Son. It is you Lord offered to us as our Savior, you’re sacrificed Jesus on the cross, that has been given to us, not to condemn us, but to save us. Those who receive this gift, benefit from it, those who reject this gift, lose out. And so Lord, as we speak to you in these 10 minutes of prayer, we thank you for this gift. Do we know how to appreciate it? Let’s go back to those two stories, those boots that the husband gave his wife, they were realesed and placed back on the shelf every so often, so that the wife would remember that on going and ever new love of her husband; or that girl with the purse but she would pull it out and hold it against her heart, as a way of remembering her mother years and years later. They know how to appreciate the gift given, why is John 3:16, which is thepassage we just read, why is that such a celebrated passage from Scripture, perhaps it’s because it is the reminder we need of God’s love for us, of the gift we have been given. For those who follow sports, you’ll know that John 3:16 is often held up on posters, on science there’s a famous American football player named Tim Tebow, who once wore John 3:16 in his eye, his eye black under his eyes; when playing his quarterback for the Florida Gators, he had this inscribed under his eyes for all the world to see: John 3:16. Apparently after that game which was a very successful game, 94 million people googled John 3:16 to find out what it would had said. It is pretty amazing why this fascination with this phrase, well because it is truly a summary of the Christian faith, “God so loved the world that He gave His only Son, so that everyone who believes in Him might not perish, but might have eternal life.”
Expresion of hope, expresion of love
It is an expression of hope, an expression of love, an expression of mercy, God so loved the world, this great gift that he has given us. Just the other day we witnessed here in the u.s., the launching of a new rocket with astronauts into space, and we know astronauts receive important things, like air, oxygen through a tube, which they called the umbilical cord. Well apparently years ago, the Apollo astronauts umbilical cord receptacle for the pilot suit was called J 3:16, and this was an intentional reference to John 3:16, apparently the engineer Frank Denton said, just as the spacesuitumbilical is the lifeline for the astronauts even, so the Lord Jesus Christ can be your eternal lifeline, if you will only connect John 3:16 into your heart. Well, this is a good resolution for us for today, to connect this phrase from Scripture, these words of Jesus and inscribe them on our heart, John 3:16. We can also say that God so loved the world, that He gave us his mother as our own, Jesus tells, Lord, you tell the Apostle John behold Your Mother, and Jesus you tell this to each one of us, we have Mary as our mother, and that’s another incredible gift, that we can learn to cherish more and more. Mother Mary help us to be grateful for all the gifts of your son, but especially the gift of his very self.
It´s the end
I thank you my God for the good resolutions, affections and inspirations which you have communicated to me in this time of prayer. I ask your assistance in putting them into effect. My immaculate Mother, Saint Joseph my father and my Lord, my guardian Angel, intercede for me.
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