YourLifePurpose Limited

The Value of Suffering

Anthony Hadeed — Mon, 07 Nov 2011 18:32:37 +0000

Have you ever wondered why there is so much suffering in our world, and what purpose suffering serves? Many people throughout history have pondered this agonizing question but not many have come up with satisfactory answers that are really convincing or comforting. What about you – what do you think about suffering? Does it have any value or purpose for us human beings?

Here are twelve benefits of suffering as listed by John Clayton (Lecturer/Writer) on his website:Pain and suffering can:

(1) help us to learn important lessons in life;
(2) bring about creativity, resourcefulness and courage;
(3) help us to comfort others who are going through similar pain;
(4) help to shape our character;
(5) test us to show what we are made of;
(6) lead to repentance and salvation;
(7) help us to trust God if we can see His bigger plan;
(8) be an inspiration to others when borne well by us;
(9) have a Divine purpose in preparing us for glory;
(10) prevent us from becoming dangerously proud;
(11) in the life of one person provide the grace of conversion in the life of another person;
(12) help us to become more like Jesus.

I would like to focus on the last two benefits above for this article. How can our suffering help to save the souls of other human beings? Normally when someone does something wrong, they must atone for this wrong. For example, if someone steals or commits murder, they are sent to prison for a number of years to suffer and atone for their mistakes. By definition, a person experiences mercy when someone else is willing to suffer and make reparation for the sins of that person. This is exactly what Jesus’ innocent suffering did to satisfy the Divine justice of His Father by atoning for the sins of mankind.

How then does our suffering factor into this equation? The clue comes from the Scripture passage Colossians 1:24: “Now I rejoice in my sufferings for your sake, and in my flesh I am filling up what is lacking in Christ’s afflictions for the sake of his body, that is, the Church.” St. John Eudes explains this beautifully: “We must strive to follow and fulfill in ourselves the various stages of Christ’s plan as well as his mysteries, and frequently beg him to bring them to completion in us and in the whole Church. For the mysteries of Jesus are not yet completely perfected and fulfilled. They are complete, indeed, in the person of Jesus, but not in us, who are his members, nor in the Church, which is his mystical body. The Son of God wills to give us a share in his mysteries and somehow to extend them to us. He wills to continue them in us and in his universal Church. This is brought about first through the graces he has resolved to impart to us and then through the works he wishes to accomplish in us through these mysteries. This is his plan for fulfilling his mysteries in us.”

So in summary, isn’t it an honor and a privilege to know that our sufferings, when united to those of Christ, can help to save souls, as depicted in the picture above of the scales of God’s justice? And by “saving souls”, I mean saving souls from experiencing the pains of Hell for all eternity, and helping them to experience the eternal joy and peace of Heaven! Imagine in Heaven how many souls will forever call you their spiritual father or mother because they made it to Heaven because of your sufferings! That’s what St. Paul told the Corinthians when he said that he was their spiritual father because of the suffering he endured to bring the Gospel message of Jesus Christ to them. So in the words of St. James 2:1, “Count it all joy, my brothers, when you meet trials of various kinds…”

Led Down the Garden Path

Anthony Hadeed — Thu, 21 Jul 2011 20:11:34 +0000

Do you know how to boil a frog? If you put a frog into a pot of boiling water, it will quickly jump out. But if you put a frog into a pot of cool water, and then turn up the temperature very slowly, the frog will eventually boil to death. It will not really notice that the water is slowly getting warmer, and that eventually it will die if it stays in the pot. The same thing has been happening to us human beings, especially in the past century. Remember the early days of television? We loved to entertain ourselves with the clean family shows that always had a father who worked a full time job and came home just in time for dinner and to talk and/or lecture the children. The mother was always a housewife who dressed in a freshly pressed dress, doing the chores, baking cookies, making meals, and tending after the children in an always loving manner. The children were well mannered, clean, and polite to adults. Do you remember a time when the great shows on TV were: “Danny Thomas Show”, “The Andy Griffith Show”, “Leave It To Beaver”, “Hazel”, “Bewitched”, “Dennis The Menace”, “Dick Van Dyke Show”, “Flipper”, “Family Affair”, “The Flintstones”, “Little House on the Prairie”, “The Waltons”, etc.? Seems like the good old days are gone. If you turn on the TV today you can watch or pay for anything you want from “The Simpsons” (hardly gentle cartooning), all the way up to pornographic shows, just with a few clicks of your converter.

So what does all of this mean to us humans in general. Have we been duped by a higher power of evil? Are we being led down the proverbial garden path that will end in the eventual demise of our families and our societies? It sure seems that way unless we are able to notice that the temperature in the “pot” of life is getting warmer and warmer with each passing year. There is an old saying that “Evil flourishes where good men do nothing.” What can good people do today to stop the moral demise of our children, our families and our societies? For starters, we can speak up with courage when we hear and see material that is inappropriate for public consumption, in particular, things that belong to the bedroom of married couples. Sex before marriage by a dating couple is wrong, sexual relations between two people of the same sex is morally wrong, and viewing sexually explicit images online or in print is morally wrong. Remember that many television programs and movies display a lot of graphic content as well as violence, and by not watching these programs, we decrease their ratings, which helps to eventually get them off the air. We can also write to our politicians about the lack of government control around what the public mass media is allowed to air to our societies. Finally, let us continue to dialog with one another to re-sensitize our awareness around the increasing “immorality temperature” in the world around us, and to come up with creative solutions to reverse this trend. Otherwise, we will all end up like the frog in the pot above – dead! And by the way, our death will be an everlasting one, because we have immortal souls. So death for us means everlasting suffering in that place we all hate to acknowledge – Hell!

What the World Needs Now

Anthony Hadeed — Wed, 20 Jul 2011 20:38:57 +0000

Do you remember the popular song entitled “What the World Needs Now is Love?” The song’s lyrics were written in 1965 by Hal David and the music composed by Burt Bacharach. First recorded and made popular by Jackie DeShannon, the song reached number 7 on the US charts in May of that year! The next line in the song says:
“It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.” Seems like a prophesy for our world today, so much in need of healing love.

We search for love in many areas of our lives, and all too often, the wrong areas. Another popular song by Johnny Lee in 1979 entitled “Lookin’ for Love” has as its chorus:
I was looking for love in all the wrong places.
Looking for love in too many faces,
Searching your eyes, looking for traces
Of what.. I’m dreaming of…
Hopin’ to find a friend and a lover,
God bless the day I discover
Another heart, lookin’ for love.

How often have we put our trust in another person’s love only to be disappointed or hurt? This has happened to most adults on several occasions in their lifetime. The results are a lot of broken relationships, friendships, and yes sadly, marriages. The consequences are damaging and even devastating in the case of broken marriages, especially when children are involved.

What’s the cause of this epidemic and what’s the solution? Saint Augustine of Hippo in the 4th Century once said: “Our hearts were made for Thee, O God, and they will never rest until they rest in Thee.” Nothing but God can satisfy the deepest longing for love in our hearts – that’s the way God created us. That is why the 1st of the Ten Commandments is: “You shall have no other gods before me.” Jesus reiterated the importance of keeping the Ten Commandments when he summarized them as follows: “You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your mind, with all your soul, and with all your strength; and you shall love your neighbour as you love yourself.”

We cannot love our neighbour and ourselves if we do not first love God above all else. And we cannot love God above all else if we do not believe that we are unconditionally loved by God! Nothing that we have ever done or will ever do (good or bad) will ever change the fact that God loves us unconditionally. After all, He created our souls even before we were knitted together in our mother’s wombs. He has always loved us because he conceived of us long ago. It is sometimes very hard for people who come from broken homes or from families where little love was shown by parents toward their children, to believe and accept this truly amazing gift of God’s unconditional love. I have great sympathy for such people because I have had the same struggle all my life. My parents never showed love toward me or any of my siblings in an outward fashion, and they never showed love toward each other. So not having experienced love in the home makes it difficult to believe and accept the love of a God whom we cannot see. Yet, this is the key that can unlock such great joy and healing for us and indeed for the whole world!

Here is another way to understand it: God is infinite, and GOD IS LOVE (1 John 4:16). Therefore, GOD IS INFINITE LOVE. So that is why God loves each and every human being unconditionally, 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. All we have to do is to accept this love from God – it’s that simple! A daily prayer like this will do: “Dear God, I know that You love me very much, but I sometimes have difficulty understanding and accepting Your love. I open my heart at the start of this new day to You and I accept the free gift of Your love. Love in me and through me as I go about my day. Amen.” That’s it – let God fill you with His love and then you will love yourself. In turn you will have an abundance of love for others in your life. So we might change Hal David’s lyrics slightly from:
“What the world needs now, is love, sweet love. It’s the only thing that there’s just too little of.“
to
“What the world needs now, is love, God’s love. It’s the only thing that we need to fill us.”

From Captivity to Freedom

Anthony Hadeed — Tue, 19 Jul 2011 02:41:21 +0000

What are the chances of meeting two people within 24 hours who both went to prison for crimes that they had committed years ago, only to find out that they knew each other from prison! This is exactly what happened to me on June 17 and 18, 2011. I met a former high ranking official at my parish and he suggested that we meet over coffee to get to know one another, which we did at a well known coffee shop in Trinidad on June 17. He told me his life story and in summary, many years ago he did something which was not befitting of his office, and he was charged for doing so. While awaiting sentencing, he gave his life to Jesus at a prayer meeting, and was certain that the Lord would not let him go to prison. Much to his surprise, he was sentenced to prison for some years. On his release, he gave his life completely in the service of the Lord.

Then, on the next day June 18, I met a former security guard Adrian Hernandez at Maracas beach on the north coast of Trinidad. Adrian was caught up with the wrong “friends” as a young man, and was sent to prison for eight years for theft and drug trafficking. While in prison, his mother became critically ill from Tuberculosis, and died in her fifties. Adrian was not allowed by the prison guards to attend his own mother’s funeral, which hurt him deeply. His father has disowned him and claims that he only has one son now, Adrian’s brother. On his release from prison, Adrian became a beach chair renter at Maracas as no one else would hire him because of his past record. He now lives with his wife in a small hut in the mountains near Maracas because of the meager living that he makes. Adrian also gave his life to the Lord and asked God to give him the strength not to return to his former way of life.

Both these men in this story have a deep faith in God, and now walk closely with Jesus in their newly recreated lives. As I was talking to Adrian for the first time on June 18, and he was telling me his life story, I told him that I had just met with a former high ranking official the night before who had also been to prison. When I told Adrian his name, he exclaimed that he knew this man because they had been in the same prison for a few months together before he was transferred to another prison on the island!

Both men were eager to share their life stories with me, and they were not at all afraid to give God the glory for rescuing them from their former ways of life. I told Adrian about my new profession as a Life & Career Coach, and he immediately went to a hut on the beach to get a hand-written article which he composed when he had gotten out of prison. He showed me the article, which he had tried unsuccessfully to publish in one of the local newspapers. He was keen to try to help young people in schools to avoid making the same mistakes that he had made in his youth. He firmly believes that education about the realities of life and peer pressure is vital in shaping the youth of today to become responsible citizens of tomorrow. He said that if the students could just listen to his story, and even if only 10% of the them took the message to heart, then we would have successfully planted good seed in these youth, and they in turn could become the catalysts to positively affect other youth in their own communities.

When I told Adrian that I had a website for my Life & Career Coaching profession, he humbly asked if I would consider publishing his article in a blog, to which I gladly responded yes. Here is Adrian’s article:

“Those people who have moral and spiritual values, will understand what I am about to say. For those of you who don’t, please give it a chance, and listen to what I have to say, so that we can embed it into our lives for the sake of our youth. Let us give the youth a chance to carry on the legacy of respect, brotherly love, and regard for other people’s property. To all my fellow citizens, please stop and think: this is what past and present prophets were sent here by God to teach us – proper moral and spiritual values! Here are some examples of moral and spiritual values that I think are important to pass onto our youth:

“Moral Values: Respect for people and their property, and consideration for the feelings of others. What you do not like for yourself, you should not do to others. Put another way, it’s the Golden Rule ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ Our youth also need to return to the moral value of courtesy toward others, especially toward their elders.

“Spiritual Values: Love for God and love for those He sends into the world and into our lives to teach us His ways (i.e. His prophets). Love for our fellow human beings (i.e. our neighbours), love for His creatures, love for His planet, including the simple but life-giving resource of water, without which we cannot have life on our planet!

“If parents, grandparents, uncles, aunts and teachers were to teach our youth these and other moral and spiritual values, then we would have a better society and a better world. Spreading the seeds of love and respect among our youth would be like planting seeds of a healthy crop. In years to come, when the harvest is ready, we as a society will reap the virtues in our youth from our labours.

“This is my long-term solution to crime, domestic violence, rape, incest and many more parasitic vices that plague our communities, our towns, our nation, and indeed the whole world. So please my fellow human beings, let us try to get these teachings back into our schools and into our homes, so that the youth of today have a fighting chance to become fine young men and women of tomorrow. Let us try to make this a better world for us all. Will you join me in the fight to get this message into the hands of educators and adults everywhere?”

Adrian can be reached by cell at (868) 327-4045. He would love the opportunity to come into your school or community to share his life story with the youth, so that they can learn from him and not make the same mistakes he has made, which cost him dearly. In fact, he lost eight years of his life in prison, and in many ways he is still paying for his mistakes, by struggling to make a living renting chairs on a beach. He is happy and content but he realizes that his past mistakes have cost him the chance at having a better life.

Discovering Your Life Purpose

Anthony Hadeed — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 18:00:31 +0000

We live in a world of ever increasing speed and complexity, with technology driving us all to dizzying heights. We all wonder why the quality of our lives is not what it used to be, and we know that something is missing. This is because life was meant to be lived as a balance between the mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual aspects of our beings. This is how we have been created.
It’s like a wheel which spins smoothly when all four quarters are evenly weighted. Can this wheel spin with three quarters only, for example, with the emotional piece missing? Sure it can, but only if the weight from the other three quarters (mental, physical, and spiritual) are shifted around to balance the wheel evenly, which means, hiding our emotional issues evenly among the other three aspects of our lives. If however the emotional issues come together at the same place and time, then it becomes obvious that there is no weight on that quarter of the wheel to support these issues, and the wheel can spin out of control, and even fly off its axle. Furthermore, the wheel certainly cannot spin properly with two quarters missing (e.g. spiritual and emotional). Since this is so critical to our sense of well being, including our family life, our work life and our social life, how do we try to regain this balance? This is where the fields of Life and Career Coaching can assist. By meeting regularly with a Life and Career Coach, you can assess the state of your “wheel” i.e. the balance or lack thereof in your life, and create a plan to regain and keep that balance. The rewards to you, your family members, your friends and co-workers will simply be amazing. Your sense of joy, peace and well-being will radiate from you to those around you.

I hope that you will consider using a Life and Career Coach to help you on your life’s journey. You owe it to yourself and your loved ones. I am an International Professional Coach currently studying at an accredited International Coaching Academy. I have a Masters degree in Physics from University of Toronto. I worked for over 23 years in the Information Technology (IT) field, 8 of which were spent in various IT related positions at GE Capital Technology Services, and 15 of which were spent running my own successful IT Consulting business in Toronto, Canada. I sold my IT business to become a Life and Career Coach because I have an intense passion for helping others find and pursue their purpose in life. You can contact me via:
E-mail: ahadeed@yourlifepurpose.com
Mobile: 1-868-474-1198
Office: 1-868-224-3474

Protected: Religious Reflections and Quotes

Anthony Hadeed — Tue, 26 Apr 2011 01:39:52 +0000