I once read a story about St Francis of Assisi. In a town in Italy lived a man who was one of the wisest and richest noblemen. He heard about St. Francis\u2019 holiness and selfless acts, and was deeply impressed by how the saint could endure the jeers and curses of people with such patience and serenity. Even though he had watched St. Francis for two years, he still hoped to understand the spiritual secret hidden in the depths of this saint. In order to obtain first hand evidence and personal experience, he planned a bold experiment. He decided to put St. Francis\u2019 holiness to a test.<\/p>\n
He invited St. Francis to his home for dinner and to stay for a night. He placed the guest bedding in his own master bedroom because he wanted to observe the saint\u2019s private behavior. On that day after dinner, the two of them went to the room to sleep. St. Francis pretended to sleep at once, so as not to disturb his host. But the man was better at his game, he pretended to sleep and even snore loudly. St. Francis thought his host had already slept, so he got up and knelt in front of the window. He began to fervently pray: \u201cMy God and my all.\u201d All night long, he poured out his heart and wept, with intense fervor and devotion, repeating, \u201cMy God and my all.\u201d<\/p>\n
The moon dimly lit St. Francis\u2019 kneeling figure at the window while the host watched the whole scene from his bed. He was deeply moved by the Holy Spirit in the depths of his heart. When the first rays of dawn appeared, the host announced to his guest, \u201cBrother Francis, I have decided to give up everything I own in this world, to follow your footsteps, to listen to your instructions.\u201d This was a zealous commitment.<\/p>\n
There are many legends surrounding St. Francis\u2019 life. He gave his life to God, following Jesus wholeheartedly without looking back. Even though he came from a wealthy family, he was willing to leave the world and all the possessions for God. Which one would be easier? To acquire head knowledge all about God or to acknowledge truthfully that God is my all in all. I would say \u201cMy God and my all\u201d is far more difficult because it takes complete surrender of one\u2019s heart, soul and mind. Perhaps a prayer of St Francis helps us to understand better:<\/p>\n
\u201cMost high, glorious God, enlighten the darkness of my heart and give me Lord, a correct faith, a certain hope, a perfect charity, sense and knowledge, so that I may carry out Your holy and true command.\u201d<\/p>\n
Oh Lord, help me to be able to say from the bottom of my heart: \u201cMy God and my all.\u201d<\/p>\n
Winnie Chan<\/span> I once read a story about St Francis of Assisi. In a town in Italy lived a man who was one of the wisest and richest noblemen. He heard about St. Francis\u2019 holiness and selfless acts, and was deeply impressed by how the saint could endure the jeers and curses of people with such patience […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":48980,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[181,223,10],"tags":[],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23884"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=23884"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23884\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/48980"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=23884"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=23884"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/scaccmm.sarawakmethodist.org\/new\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=23884"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nLocal Preacher of Wesley Methodist Church, Sibu<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"