“Then, if anyone says to you, ‘look, here is the Messiah!’ or ‘There he is!’—do not believe it. For false Messiahs and false prophets will appear; they will perform great miracles and wonders in order to deceive even God’s chosen people, if possible. Listen! I have told you this ahead of time.” Matthew 24: 23-25

So at mass yesterday, I observed the lack of zeal or participation of members during the homily. However, as soon as the priest started prophesying and invoking blessings, the mood changed, and everyone started claiming the blessings; even those who were sleeping became suddenly awake, with hands raised and eyes closed, people eagerly nodded with satisfaction at the blessings that God has promised His children.

This made me realize the extent of the suffering of God’s children. It made me realize how peppery suffering is. Suffering is so bitter and uncomfortable that our desire is to get rid of all forms of suffering or discomfort. This desire makes us vulnerable to the devil.

The devil knows how much we all hate suffering. And he uses this fact to confuse God’s children. When faced with trial, rather than allow us settle down and pray, he reminds us about one man of God that is a miracle worker. And we get carried away and run after the proclaimed man of God.

You forget that even the devil performs wonders. Even the devil knows the bible. Someone once told me that he’ll go anywhere to find solutions to his problems, as long as the pastor prays in the name of Jesus. That he doesn’t care about anything else as long as his problem is solved. A lot of other Christians think this way too.

As Christians we have to be wise. The devil takes advantage of every situation just to manipulate us for his own evil purposes. There are a lot of false prophets out there. These prophets are of the devil. They are planting evil seeds into the hearts of God’s children, they are robbing God’s children of their blessings and glory; yet people still troop in large numbers into these churches. They wouldn’t go there on a normal day, but because they are so weighed down by trials, they no longer see clearly, and they no longer care.

This is why we need all the faith we can muster. We need to be more trusting of the power we carry as God’s children, rather than run helter-skelter and fall into wrong hands. There are good and bad prophets, God has told us how to distinguish them Matthew 7: 15. However, it is God that answers prayers not man.

Stop allowing your troubles weigh you down or get you confused and make you fall prey of the devil’s schemes. The Catholic Church already has powerful and miraculous sacraments. But it is your faith that makes your prayer effective. Visit the Blessed Sacrament, pray the rosary, there are lots of powerful saints, offer novenas to them. There are different catholic prayers to say, different miraculous novenas to Jesus and Mary. What could be as powerful as the holy mass? At least I have personally encountered miracles from just booking masses for an intention.

So the church offers a luxury of sacraments and prayers we could pray with. I think it’s a sad thing that we throw away our catholic beliefs just because some prophet somewhere supposedly solved our problems. You need to understand that just because a man performed miracles or just because he prophesied about you, doesn’t make him of God, neither is it enough reason to abandon your faith.

I know a man who used to be upright and modest, he was poor though, and struggling. Some other church prayed for him and he suddenly became wealthy. He left the Catholic Church immediately and became a staunch member of that church. However, his spiritual life started suffering and he found it almost impossible to avoid sin. He gradually lost his conscience and the very things he used to call a taboo in the past, have become a norm. I’m not really surprised this happened. I mean, in most churches, there’s more focus on wealth and evil spirits rather than on love and holiness. He got the wealth he wanted but now his soul is suffering.

I understand suffering and disappointment can be so depressing, but as God’s children we need to be strong and wise. Don’t allow anybody take advantage of you because of suffering. I understand it’s easier said than done, but what is wrong remains wrong regardless.

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