What it means to have Faith

Many of us claim to have faith.  But do we live this faith out? Do we really understand what it means to have faith?  Alpha Phi alumni, Amanda Teixeria, spoke at FOCUSgreek about her experience coming to college and realizing what it truly means to live out her faith.

 How do we live out our faith? By first knowing Jesus and then by sharing Him.

There are three types of relationships with Jesus:

1.      He is outside of our lives and has nothing to do with how we live

2.      He is only part of our lives.  We fit Him in during free time between practices, schools, and meetings.  He is just another activity in our schedule. 

3.      He is the center of our lives and everything we do revolves around our friendship with Christ

Another way that I sometimes like to think of this is: 1. We don’t realize that our actions are sins because we don’t know Jesus, 2. We know that what we are doing is wrong, but we continue to do it anyways and pretend like Jesus won’t mind, 3. we have Him in the center of our lives and try to avoid all sin because we realize how much it pains Him.  Being Greek makes it often hard to have Jesus at the center of our lives, we are constantly chasing after the next best thing to put us on top and we fill our lives with distracting temptations.

When Amanda would go to Frat parties, everyone would always feel sorry for her because she wasn’t drinking; but she knew she wasn’t missing out on anything, they were.  She knew that through her connection with Christ she was living in reality.  He reveals us to ourselves. We no longer try to be like anyone else, but are free to be who we were created to be.  It is attractive to see someone who knows who they are and is living a life of joy and freedom.  This is why we urgently need to build our life around Jesus; there will be ups and downs, but it will be the wildest adventure you have ever been on and the best.  God takes our small plans, blows them up, and then invites us to go on an even greater ride.   

Step two seems to scare people a lot more: Sharing Jesus. 

If our lives truly do revolve around Jesus and we know His love, then we would be so compelled to share His love that everyone around us would also know Jesus.  It has been said that we can see our own relationship with God based on how we invite others to know Jesus. 

People often think they are quoting St. Francis of Assisi when they say, “Preach the Gospel at all times, use words if necessary.” The thing is, hedidn’t say this.  In fact, he believed something far from it.  He would often travel to up to five towns a day preaching the Gospel using words.  If I see someone helping an old lady across the street I wouldn’t just think, “Wow that person must really know Christ, I want to know Him too.” All people see is a good person.  If we never use our words, then who are we witnessing to? Ourselves? You need your words to proclaim that your actions are because you know Jesus loves you, otherwise some people may never connect the dots.

What should really be our motto is, “Use your words to proclaim God’s love; but if your actions don’t match up, then your words are useless.” What this is saying is that unless we live out what we say our faith teaches us, people will just consider us hypocrites and never feel the need to know Jesus.   

Now, imagine what might happen if we never say anything at all:  It’s the end of your life, you are riding the escalator up to Heaven when you look over and see your fraternity brother or your sorority sister on another escalator that’s going down.  What is more awkward: bringing up Jesus in a conversation now, or the moment when they look you in the eye at the end of your life and ask “why didn’t you tell me? Why didn’t I deserve to be told so that I might be in Heaven also?” Let’s just say I personally hope I never hear those words.  Our Greek houses don’t need another funny guy who cracks jokes about how drunk they were the night before or someone who was on exec for all four years and is awesome; what they need is someone they can rely on to be a witness for Christ. They might not know it now, but being that witness is the best gift you could possibly give them.   Every year since Amanda has graduated she has gotten a letter or facebook message from one of her sorority sisters letting her know that they have come to know Jesus in their lives and thanking her for being that witness for them. 

People notice, even if they don’t say anything.  Our words might not bear fruit now, but they will later.  God’s hears our prayers and won’t let them go empty.   

One way to be a witness is through the idea of servant leadership; that by serving others, you become a leader.  (Prime example: Jesus) The small things do matter.  Do things that are counter cultural; by putting yourself last behind the pledges or simply just throwing out the trash when it gets full, our actions will back up our words and people will start to follow us on our journey for God. 

We don’t need to be perfect to preach the gospel, but we do need to be trying.  The biggest pitfalls we Greeks face are chastity, sobriety, and excellence.  Chastity and sobriety can be the biggest temptations and also the most detrimental to our witness.  If we are not living out the words of Jesus, why would they change their lives if they see that our lives are not changed?  Don’t let your actions turn someone away from finding God and spending eternity in Heaven.  

(sorry this is so long, she had a lot of great things to say)

Do not be afraid of Christ! He takes nothing away, and he gives you everything. When we give ourselves to him, we receive a hundredfold in return. Yes, open, open wide the doors to Christ – and you will find true life. Amen.” - Pope Benedict XVI

The Interior Life by Stephanie Pott

Stephanie Pott is a first year UNL Missionary. She graduated from Colorado State in May 2012. Stephanie's post is the first in our series written by the UNL Missionaries to keep our students informed on what is going on in our lives!

So what is the life of a missionary? We are supposed to have all knowledge and understanding of God and a perfect prayer life, right? If that’s what you are thinking, then you would be right; you can just call me the next Mother Theresa, how about St Spott? Sounds good? No I didn’t think so. 

The truth is we are still a bunch of sinners. We even have feelings. That’s right we fall into desolation and consolation just like anyone else. So what makes a FOCUS missionary so special? Well honestly nothing, that doesn’t make anyone else striving for holiness special. Every day I try to grow closer to God and I know every day there are ways I let Him down. I’m not perfect but it is about the journey. Its about striving for holiness. It is about perseverance. God called me out of Colorado because he wanted to work on me. He said “Stephanie, I am calling you to greatness, I want you to bring my children back home”. The first step he showed me was in order to bring his children to him I would have to become a child as well. I would have to completely depend on him for everything. I would have to die with him so that I may rise with him. 

Anyone can be a FOCUS missionary. 

Everyone is called in some way to serve God on a deeper level, to have a deep-soul relationship with him. I answered his call through FOCUS. How will you answer yours?

Student Missionaries: Upper Room

Calling all Student Missionaries! Join us for our February Upper Room.

Friday, February 1 at 7:00pm in the FOCUS Building

Highlights include: a Eucharistic holy, time to reconnect to your call to evangelize, and stories from John Wojtasek and Laura Foley on their time in their personal mission.

RSVP here.

FOCUS greek: Who is Jesus????

Many of us have grown up our whole life learning about who Jesus is. But do we really know him? Who is Jesus? Lord, Liar, Lunatic? He has to be one of these three. Learn why from our own FOCUS missionary Jacob Pieper at Pi Beta Phi Tuesday, Jan. 29th at 8pm. Discover where Jesus is in your life and find out how your relationship can grow.

Best Version of Yourself

While in Florida for the FOCUS convention Mathew Kelly was the opening speaker and his talk focused on becoming the best version of ourselves. A lot is us probably think, ‘well ya we want that,’ but how many of us actually take the steps to become that person? What is required of us to be the Best version of ourselves? Let’s be honest and say that there are many things in our lives that need changing, but God doesn't expect us to be able to change everything at once. This is a new semester; it's time to start working on the new you, the best version of you.The first step is to think about the biggest thing that is preventing you from becoming the best version of yourself; what is it that thing that we put first before our relationship with God…..(pause and think).

Now think about what that thing was that came to your head that you tried to shut out and argue with yourself that it really isn't that big of a deal. What was that sin that came to your mind that you get to much pleasure from so you tried to immediately stop thinking about it so you didn't have to admit it is wrong and interfering with your relationship with God?

This is what God is calling us to change right now in our lives. By changing our lives in this way we are saying ‘yes God’. Yes God I do believe you know what is right for me. Yes God I love you more than worldly pleasures. Yes God I want to give my life totally to you because you are the reason for my existence.

Momentary pleasure does not create everlasting happiness. I can almost guarantee that whatever it was that you thought about gives you pleasure during it, but that next day guilt sets in and you have to start denying to yourself that you did anything wrong. You start trying to prove to yourself that you are still a good person because “hey at least I didn’t do what Bob did last night, that’s way worse.”

I know this seems like a lot to handle and how do we go about becoming the best version of ourselves and turning away from our favorite sin? Well in Mathew Kelly's book, The Rhythm of Life, he says that it is as simple as simply 'doing the next right thing.' You don't have fight giant battles all at once and expect to never be tempted to sin again. All you have to do is tell yourself that in every situation you come across you are simply going to do the next right thing. It makes our battles seem a lot more manageable.

Someone asks you if you want a drink even though you are underage, or if you are of age and that next drink that will put you past your limit, you don't have to try to decide if you will look stupid not doing what everyone else is doing or if someone will judge you, all you have to do is the next right thing and say no thanks. What about when see that last cookie sitting on the counter temping you even though you just had two and are full. It's not World War Two with yourself; it's simply doing the next right thing and showing a little self control and walking away. Is that pleasure of ten seconds of eating the cookie worth the guilt you feel the next few hours as your stomach is complaining because you ate too much? Or maybe it’s trying to decide if you should go to mass or do your homework. You could argue for thirty minutes with yourself and say you don’t have time for mass when in reality you should do the next right thing and go to mass because you will end up spending that hour on Facebook anyways. 

I hope that as humans aware of God’s love and as Greek students wanting to change the culture and grow closer to God, that we will all take this step to face the individual challenge that separates us from God; so that together we may grow to become the best version of ourselves and therefore producing the best version of the Nebraska Greek system.

USCCB Call to US Catholics

The USCCB has called all American Catholics to intensify their prayers for life, marriage and religious liberty in response to the current state of our country. If you feel so called to pray for our country in this way, we strongly encourage you to join your FOCUS Missionaries in response to this call! 

Here is how they have asked us to pray for these issues:

1. On the last Sunday of every month until November 23, 2013, hold a Eucharistic Holy Hour 

2. Pray a daily rosary

3. Add these intensions to the prayers of the faithful at our masses

4. Abstinence from meat and fasting on Fridays

5. Participate in the second Fortnight for Freedom that is being planned for June

Check out these links for more details: USCCB & Dioceses of Lincoln 

SEEK Reunion!

Join us for 5:30 mass on Tuesday, January 15! To follow will be dinner, stories from SEEK, and lots and lots of fun! We will end the night around 8pm with optional adoration and praise and worship. Come reconnect with the SEEK community and encounter the same Jesus you met in Florida!

Help us out by RSVPing on the facebook event so we can try to get a count for dinner!