We are all athletes in God’s stadium! Catholics want to win! Who are The winning athletes in God’s Stadium? They are among “You are My friends if you obey My commands.”
Every Catholic strives to be among them!
St. Paul’s gives us profound advice! 1 Corinthians 9:24-27 tells us to work hard in God’s Stadium. “Do you not realize that, though all the runners in the stadium take part in the race, only one of them gets the prize? Run like that — to win. Every athlete concentrates completely on training, . .”
The best athletes work hard for an earthly “prize”! ” . . and this is to win a wreath that will wither, . . .”
Catholics work for more! “whereas our (prizes) will never wither. So that is how I run, not without a clear goal; and how I box, not wasting blows on air. I punish my body and bring it under control, to avoid any risk that, having acted as herald for others, I myself may be disqualified.”
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St. Paul is telling us that we have two spirits living in us.
1. Our mind and body want earthly prizes.
2. The Spirit of Jesus tells us to focus on winning His award!
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St. Paul tells us what our job is! We must bring our mind and body “under control”.
Prayers are requests for God’s help. Prayers should include, “God, let me bring my earthly desires ‘under control.'”
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Catholics know there are two kinds of earthly desires!
1. Catholics avoid The Sins of Commission.
2. We must also avoid The Sins of Omission! We must not fail to be as good as we can be with every choice we make.
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We must strive to defeat every vanity that keeps us from obeying Any Teaching of Jesus Christ! If we don’t, we are “wasting blows on air”.
An athlete knows! “I must train well! I must not be ‘wasting blows on air’. Every Catholic prays to fight against every vanity that tries to swallow our immortal soul with sins of Commission and Omission!
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Simple reasons to be Catholic! catholicfundamentalism.com
