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August 5, 2020

May The Lord's blessing be with you Dear Heart Dwelling Family. How many of you want to go deeper and sweeter with the Lord Jesus? Are you tired of the plateau you've been on? Well, I am dear ones, and He is shedding light upon the path I must take. I will share this with you and perhaps you will arrive their sooner than I. This would be delightful, because my heart longs to see each one of you in deep union with Him.

This morning I was inspired to pick up the book "Complete Spiritual Doctrine of St. Therese of Lisieux, that's published by Alba House in 1961 and it's written by Rev. Francois Jamart, OCD". Anyway, that's for all of you who want to look up the book. And I opened to page 138 under the chapter heading of Simplicity....Wow. --

Jesus, the Holy Spirit and my guardian angel, Michael have all been prompting me to give up more things to my liking. I have lived this way before and it is so liberating. It creates a vacuum that Jesus rushes in to fill with His love. I have been very stingy with offerings for a long time, and I know it has affected Our closeness. So when I opened to the following quotes, I really felt a strong confirmation that if I want to go forward and deeper into my Love for God, I need to start showing it by doing everything from a motive of love and denying myself the "little" pleasures, in order to have all my pleasure in God alone.

Here are the quotes I opened to:

"Little things done out of love, are those that charm the Heart of Christ."

"Let us not refuse Jesus even the most insignificant sacrifice! Everything that belongs to religious life is truly great." And here I want to say to the christian evangelical community religious is a bad word, but religious life really means the consecrated life where you leave the world behind and give up everything just to live for Him.

The author went on to say, "Nothing is insignificant or negligible in the service of God, for the value of an action does not come from the importance of its object. It comes from the intention with which we perform it and the love with which it is animated."-- -- --

Therese said, "God made me realize that in order to attain true glory we do not have to accomplish brilliant works, but we must hide ourselves and practice virtue in such a way that our left hand does not know what our right hand does."

And I knew guys when I opened to this page that the Lord was giving me a mandate and a confirmation to be more simple and deny myself more of the little things. I can see I have truly become a tyrant, a coffee snob. A snob in many ways and liking things just so, and it's time for me to shed that. For instance go without ground pepper in a meal, or let someone else have the last piece of fruit or avoid my favorite flavor of yogurt. These may seem childishly simple, but then again doesn't the Lord say that unless we become like little children we will not enter the kingdom of God?

I have spoiled myself to the point where I now have a stronghold for delicate foods. Once upon a time, I'd get up in the morning, have instant coffee and get off to a good day and now it's got to be ground a certain way and brewed a certain way before I'll drink it, I mean that's awful. Once upon a time, at my first conversion as a Franciscan sister, these things were not important to me. Now I feel that these earthy things and preferences are feeding a monster inside of me, and I need to let them go. I need that monster out of me. Jesus, have you anything to say to this?

Jesus began,--"Hurray!!!! I've been waiting for you to act on this knowledge that has been lingering in your conscience, and you would make Me so happy Clare if you shifted your emphasis onto the value of spiritual things as opposed to the palate and really enjoying food.-- -- It simply does not serve your purposes as a servant leader in My Church. Thank you for asking My help when you received Me in communion, you need a very special grace to give up those things you really enjoy."

Look, for instance, at it this way, "You can be very fat and relaxed, eating your favorite foods and watching my ministers moving in the Spirit on YouTube or you can be a very skinny minister working side by side with Me. I know there are certain foods you do need to eat, but there are many that you could forgo and would also abound to your health. It's your choice." Boy it didn't take me long to prove this out. I was getting hungry before dinner and, I had to do something, so I was making a butter sandwich and I wanted so badly to put raspberry jelly on it, but I heard the Lord say "honey". So I just put a little honey on it, but the whole time I was eating it I was still thinking, Lord, really, I love raspberry jam rather so I ate it with the honey and let it go. And I think the less importance I put on those things the better it's going to be.

He continued, "In essence I cannot fill a vessel full of my spiritual gifts if they are already filled up by their corporal pleasures. You cannot do this alone My Love, you are pitifully incapable, but I can do it through you, if you will cooperate."

Lord would you please give me the gift of cooperation and corresponding to Your gifts?

"Yes My Love, that is part of this package. The kingdom of God is not meat nor drink, but righteousness, peace and joy. And how can you have peace and joy when your conscience is being tugged at by renunciation?" Boy that's for sure, I feel it very consciously.

Lord, it has never worked. No matter how much I try to pretend I'm enjoying myself eating something I like, still there is a little voice saying, "You're going the wrong direction if you want to get closer to the Lord."-- --

Jesus continued, "Oh how wonderful the gifts and blessings of those who lead a life of self renunciation for My sake, and do all things from the motive of Love. These are the giants in My Kingdom, however on earth you see them only as the very littlest ones. Their works cry out to mankind, "Love the Lord your God with all your heart and mind and strength, and love your neighbor as your very own self."

Truly this is the hallmark of Carmelite spirituality. And the more it manifests in a soul, the more the soul embraces it, the holier they become and influence others to become. You have noticed My dear one, that as you have slowly renounced some of your favorite foods, you are hearing Me much more clearly. Truly, gluttony, preoccupation with the palette is the slippery road to Luke warmness. Of course, there are other ways to give of yourself, and I give you those occasions during the day as well. You can take them or leave them, but truly they are gifts from Me. Don't you know that I want that intimacy with you just as much as you desire it with Me?

Lord, "If I had to make an answer, I would say You want it even more than we do."

"And that answer would be 100% correct. I would give you an A+ on your paper." He smiled.

So, at this point you have a good start...just work at it everyday a little more and see how brightly I illuminate your path. How I long for this Clare. You remember, when you were doing penances, I said to you, "I am so happy with you Clare." And you asked Me why? And I answered you, "Because you are becoming who I created you to be." There is a reason that conversation has never left your memory. It is because I am calling you back to it. Please correspond. Please, I need this from you. There is so much more I want to do through you. And just so you don't worry, because I just heard that thought about vain glory go through your head, most of what I am talking about you will never know until Heaven. Then you will be shocked. So let's dig in and do this!!

Amen Lord. Amen. I will count on Your strength, but correspond with my whole heart. I want to show you how much I love you, Jesus. I know it is one thing to say, "I love you, while eating a cookie, and entirely another thing to say I love you and walk away from that cookie."

He answered me, "Yes, you've got it right. My blessing is upon this way, follow it and do not depart from it My Love."