Mental Prayer for February 2, Our Lord Is Presented in the Temple

First Friday

Mental Prayer Meditation Helps

Presence of God

Grace I Ask: That I may help light the way to God for others.

Mental Picture (cf. Luke 2: 22-39): Our Lord is presented to God His Father in the Temple. Mary and Joseph bring Jesus to offer Him to God's service... and stand by in wonder as the old man Simeon gently takes Him in his arms and, inspired by God, joyously tells great things of Him. He is the salvation prepared in the sight of all men, a light for every nation, the glory of His people.

My Personal Application: Our Lord was offered to God through the hands of His Mother. Whom can we, as Catholics, better choose to present us to God, to offer us, completely, absolutely, to God's service? In that service Christ is going to show God's goodness to all men; He is going to save them; He is going to glorify His Father. Finally, He is going to be a light in whom God's message shines out for everyone.

That prophecy we remember today in receiving blessed candles, a sign or symbol that each of us too is called by God to be what our Lord was. In our words and actions we must show God's good­ness to all men, the man down the street and the man in the African jungle. We must be a light guiding others to God, whom they otherwise might miss in the darkness. Are my words, my actions, my prayers aimed at this? Why not ask our Lady to help make them so? Offer ourselves to God through her. Ask her to make us see our privilege of being other Christs, other lights in whom God's message shines out.

I Speak to Christ and Mary: Lord, later on you called yourself the light of the world. You told all men to let their light shine before men so that they might glorify their Father in heaven. Help me to do just that. Help me to carry on your work. And since this means giving myself to God's service, no matter what I am to be - doctor, plumber, lawyer, priest, secretary, sister - may you, Mary, offer me for it as you offered your Son.

Thought for Today: "I am the light of the world."
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Adapted from Mental Prayer, Challenge to the Lay Apostle
by The Queen's Work,(© 1958)