My Adoration Experience

I have done adoration several times before, yet last Friday was one that was special for me. My past adoration was usually part of bigger church events, such as: Life in Spirit Seminar or Novena. However that day I went to church of Saint Mary of the Angle specifically for the adoration session.

At that point of time, I did not really “believe” on the effectiveness of adoration and I was not very sure what I should do in the adoration room itself. Nevertheless I thanked God for blessing me with a committed heart to serve him that led me into experiencing a wonderful reflection that night.

I started the adoration session with a silent prayer in front of the Blessed Sacrament. I remembered asking God to give me strength, confirmation and direction for my incoming talk. I had been wondering if I could really serve him as a speaker during the incoming YISS. I was afraid of not being able to present well, being nervous during the talk or imparting wrong understanding to the audiences. I had been worried if the session would be a disaster to ME and my humanly EGO.

Kneeling before the sacrament, I felt something great, something beyond my capacity and a peaceful scent overcoming me that night. I was not very sure what and how to describe it. Yet I sensed the peace and felt as if God was trying to comfort and communicate to me. The time I opened my eyes, I saw an insect near the Blessed Sacrament case. Yes, I meant a real insect, a small animal... black in colour... sounds familiar?

The insect kept walking around the sacrament, hovering around it. Sometime it was near the foot of the Blessed Sacrament, it even tried to climb up but not successful, it went down and start to hover around again, and even went further. It kept hovering around with several time closer to the host and tried to climb up and felt again. However it never went out from the cage that was surrounding the Blessed Sacrament.

At that moment, I felt as if God was trying to tell me that my life had been like that insect, sometimes I came near to Him and try to live my life according to God's will with my own strength. As it was very difficult to follow Jesus with my own strength, I lost focus and started to be distracted by my busy life style. I become further from him. Until someone or a community dragged me back and remind me of His love, I started to immerse in His love again. Yet when difficult times and distraction arise, the downturn cycle prevail all over again.

I believe at that moment God was trying to tell me that it was not by my own strength should I follow him but by asking the power of the Holy Spirit to give me the correct direction in life and to be obedient and have faith in Him.

After sometime reflecting, I moved to sit at one side of the adoration room. There I was prompted to grab a bible and open it. Although my first intention was to read Revelation yet I opened Genesis and very strongly felt that I should read that section. I came onto the story of Jacob and one of his daughters that was asked to be a wife by a man. Due to this, the man and his whole city agreed to be circumcised as per Jacob’s requirement before the man was allowed to marry his daughter. Yet Jacob's sons who knew nothing on what had actually happened become angry and took the initiatives to kill every man of his in-law and did evil to the city. After realizing that his family was in a big problem, Jacob returned to God. As the response, God asked him to leave his town and Jacobs followed God's command.

Through this story, I found God is trying to ask me to believe in him and told me the purpose of serving him was to save God's people. We all need to be saved from sin, including me. That should be the objective of my service. Just like Jacob who was asking God for direction to save his family. At that time, I closed my eyes and just be thankful to God and open to any message that he might want to give me.

Again, I got the urge to open another bible page and came across one psalm. There it was written “look to the hand of the Lord” and it was ended with “contempt of proud”. Upon reading this I felt God clearly told me to focus and surrender my service as God's work. I have been pondering if my choice of being the speaker of YISS was due to my proud or self fulfilment. I was very scared of doing it with my own strength; I believed it would be a total disaster. But how could I ensure that I am giving this service 100% for God’s glory? This passage was telling me to focus on God's hand. It was him that would work and it was him that should move me. Not to focus on self but on how the work reflecting God's initiative in calling His people. This passage again reminded me to focus on the purpose of our service and keep away from self-proud.

After another silent moment, I opened the bible one more time and surprisingly it landed on a page of the New Testament section, particularly the gospel of John. Jesus was healing a disabled and he did it on the Sabbath that infuriated the people, which later try to bring him to court. At this point of time, I felt God was telling me that He could do anything; time is not a constraint to him. And this Saturday would be a time where he would work and touch all the people despite their doubt and unbelief. Something great would happen. He is the one to decide and as his servant, we need to be open and faithful to him.

After that I opened the prayer journal and reflect on this week topic. Upon reading the topic, I felt as if God was giving me something simple to be presented, something simple yet critical to be presented to the participant. It was so simple compared to what I have been thinking to be presented before. It went to the centre of my topic.

Looking on how God is speaking to me through bible that resembles a Sunday mass liturgy (2 reading + 1 gospel reading), I feel really amazed and thankful. I thank God for giving me all this experience and most important for his patient and unending love in bringing me back and even closer to him.