Woman of Revelation Series: The Way… Her Hands…

[THEME MUSIC]

[ANNOUNCER]

This is the Woman of Revelation Series with a Friend of Medjugorje.

 

[CLIP]

[A FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Why is God sending Our Lady every single day if He wants you to just have an option to hear it or not? It’s because something’s happening in these private revelations of the apparitions of the Virgin Mary, Queen of Peace of Medjugorje that’s never happened before, and not just when Moses heard from God, but since the Garden of Eden.

 

[END CLIP]

[COC]

That was a Friend of Medjugorje on March 18, 2008.

 

One of the frustrations with being involved in Medjugorje, especially at that period of time in 2008, was hearing people speak about Our Lady as if She was somebody who they barely knew. And when a Friend of Medjugorje started Radio WAVE, there was such a freshness to it and a perspective that people in the Medjugorje and in the world in general were simply not getting.

 

The message that Our Lady gave this day, which was March 18, 2008, She gave an amazing revelation, and nobody caught it. A Friend of Medjugorje reveals it in this broadcast that you’re about to hear.

 

So, this is a Friend of Medjugorje March 18, 2008.

 

[CLIP]

[A FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Well, of course, today is March 18^th, and it’s always a joy for us to know that Mirjana has this apparition once a year.

 

In 1982, Our Lady appeared to Mirjana and said She would no longer appear to her. And this caused great distress to Mirjana. She was one of the first visionaries who ceased seeing Our Lady, but the first one to receive the Ten Secrets. Ten Secrets are something that is more of in the hands of Mirjana. We hear more of it through her than any of the other visionaries. And Mirjana’s charism is partly that, in that she is the witness to Our Lady coming on the second of the month, which these apparitions started sometime after she lost her daily apparitions. It started with an innerlocution and then Our Lady praying with her, and then it evolved, in the last year or two, where now Our Lady’s giving messages on the second of each month.

 

And of course, Marija has nine secrets, and with her tenth secret, typically, what’s happened to the other visionaries is they no longer see Our Lady on a daily basis. But they’re promised an apparition once a year.

 

So, we still have Vicka, Ivan and Marija seeing Our Lady daily. We have Jakov, Ivanka seeing Our Lady once a year apparition, Jakov’s being at Christmas and Ivanka being on the anniversary of the apparitions on June 25^th. And so, for some time, the annual apparition Mirjana had before these second of the month apparitions started back, she saw Her only on March 18^th. And of course, it is her birthday, of Mirjana’s that is, but Our Lady said She has not chosen that date because it’s her birthday. There’s something in the future that we’ll understand on March 18^th for whatever reason. I’m reluctant to say that may take place, or what may happen, we don’t know. All we know is that the date March 18^th will have some significance that we’ll be aware of sometime in the future.

 

So, Mirjana has said Our Lady’s never greeted her with a “Happy Birthday” salutation on March 18^th.

 

So, we’ve looked especially at some of the March 18^th messages with great significance that they, sometimes, are very strong to Mirjana, and we’ve always had things that happen with this monthly message.

 

But this is probably a sweeter message and a more beautiful message in some ways that we normally don’t see from Mirjana that she receives on March 18^th.

 

So, Joan, if you will go ahead and read this message.

 

[COC]

Mirjana’s annual March 18, 2008 apparition from Our Lady Queen of Peace in Medjugorje:

 

“Our Lady appeared to Mirjana on March 18^th for her annual apparition. Our Lady appeared to Mirjana at 2:01 p.m. (Medjugorje time) The apparition lasted 7 minutes. Mirjana relayed the following:

 

‘I have never seen Our Lady address us in this manner. She extended Her hands towards us and with Her hands extended in this way, She said:

 

“Dear children, today I extend my hands towards you. Do not be afraid to accept them. They desire to give you love and peace and to help you in salvation. Therefore, my children, receive them. Fill my heart with joy and I will lead you towards holiness. The way on which I lead you is difficult and full of temptations and falls. I will be with you and my hands will hold you. Be persevering so that, at the end of the way, we can all together, in joy and love, hold the hands of my Son. Come with me; fear not. Thank you.”

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

So, obviously, this message tonight that we’re going over that was given today earlier in Medjugorje, the focus is Our Lady’s hands. And She’s said this often about hands, and that means something. The fact that Our Lady is working in the world so strongly, and She asks us to be Her extended hands on several messages, and one being we received in Italy just specifically for the Community of Caritas when Marija and I were alone at her house with her apparition. And during the apparition, there was no special request from her or from me to ask Marija to ask anything. And out of the blue, afterwards, Marija ran and got a piece of paper and said, “Our Lady had a message for you and the Community.” And that message was May 31, 1995, and it says,

 

“Little children, I desire that through your lives you are witnesses, that you are my extended hands, my instruments. Get as many hearts as you can close to my heart and lead them to God, to a way of salvation.”

 

Our Lady talks in in the end of this message today,

 

“…Be persevering so that, at the end of the way, we can all together, [all] in joy…hold the hands of my Son…”

 

So, this way is, of course, the same way that was spoken about two thousand years ago, and the way is what Jesus brought to us. Often, we look at Our Lady’s messages, and we don’t put them in a proper context in that She’s giving them…

 

I was just reading just recently about a priest, a well-known priest. I won’t say his name. But he said, “The messages of Medjugorje are boring.” Well, the messages are profound. Our Lady said that. She said, “Pray that you may understand the profoundness of my messages.” (December 4, 1988) Either this individual is right or he’s wrong. And if Our Lady’s saying simple things, and yet, She says they’re profound, and She says, “You can’t comprehend my messages without praying.” She says, “You must pray to comprehend them.” (November 8, 1984)

 

So, it’s something that, if you approach them from the intelligentia side, that you’re going to miss.

 

The walk of Our Lady with these messages is not just words, but it is a way of life. And we’ve got in our Rule book we live here in the Community is called, “A Way in a New Time.”

 

There was a young missionary who lived in Ecuador in the 1950s, and he was martyred there. And just before he was martyred, he wrote the following. He said,

 

“It is good to think of the first days of the Church on earth when Christianity was not called merely a religion or thought of only as a code of doctrine but regarded as a way. Those believers had a manner in carrying themselves observable direction that so-called ‘Christians’ today do not have. For a way is a display of patterned behavior. And what a display. Nothing anyone had was his own. All in one place with one accord, while a spirit of love, responsibility and conviction of truth possessed the whole. God sends us one of those days to vindicate the truth.

 

“Glorify Thy Name, disperse the knowledge of Thy Son.”

 

And we see this. We don’t spread the message through our presses. We don’t spread the messages through the countless books we produce, the writings. They are weak. They have no power. They’re ink on paper. They’re only empowered if you have a way of life you live.

 

And so, when we transmit something through the writings, through the presses, through that, you’re reading real life. We live that here. It’s part of our life.

 

And so, we always have this way where, while it’s not perfect in the way we live it, it is a perfect way.

 

So, we don’t claim to be holy. We claim to be chosen by Our Lady to do what we do, and that’s May 31, 1995. Because I was passive with the mission at that point, and it was at that point that Our Lady gave us instructions that we “Get as many hearts as close as you can to My Heart to lead to God, to a way of salvation.” (May 31, 1995)

 

And in this message, when Marija’s husband came back to translate it that night after work, I asked him, “Did Our Lady say the way or to a way of salvation?”

 

He looked at it, discussed it with Marija. He said, “No. Clearly, Our Lady said, ‘to a way of salvation.’”

 

And this was very critical for us as far as understand what Our Lady did and what She said by this. There was no prompt question. There was nothing, even during my prayer and during the apparition, that asked for this. But we had matured in the mission up to 1995 from 1986 to a certain point that Our Lady had saw us at that point, it was time to move out of the passive role and be proactive in our role as Her “extended hands,” Her words, “my instruments,” Her words.

 

She didn’t just say, “Be extended hands.” She said, be “my extended hands.” “…you are witnesses…”

 

So, the important thing we do here is live the message. That’s our life. And while we fall and we fail at it and it’s difficult, it still doesn’t change that the way’s a perfect way.

 

We live a holy life. We’re not necessarily always holy or walking perfection and holiness, but Our Lady talks about that in this message. She said,

 

“…The way on which I lead you…”

 

Again, the way,

 

“…is difficult and full of temptations and falls…”

 

I know Jesus talks in the Poem of the Man-God that sometimes God lets a fall happen because He gets the reaction of betterment.

 

I know in Medjugorje on a Thursday message, Our Lady said, “God wants to test you through your harvest.” (October 11, 1984)

 

There’s several messages that relate to this testing. And so, God, sometimes perfects us.

 

Peter fell. The apostles fell. They abandoned Christ at the Cross.

 

And so, we have constantly this testing of God, strengthen us, falling, getting back up and walking this way with Our Lady that shows us that She expects to not just stay down, not quit because it’s difficult, not quit because I don’t want to do it anymore, but take the falls, get back up, and get back to the Way.

 

“…The way on which I lead you is difficult and full of temptations and falls. I will be with you and my hands will hold you [so that we can] Be persevering…[and] at the end…the way, we can all together, in joy and love, hold the hands of my Son…”

 

So, we fall. We get back up.

 

[SONG]

Cursing every step of the way, he bore a heavy load to the market ten miles away. The journey took its toll. And every day, he passed a monastery’s high cathedral walls. And it made his life seem meaningless and small. And he wondered how it would be to live in such a place to be warm, well-fed and at peace, to shut the world away.

 

So when he saw a priest who walked, for once, beyond the iron gate. He said, “Tell me of your life inside that place.” And priest replied…

 

We fall down, we get up.

We fall down, we get up.

We fall down, we get up.

And the saints are just the sinners who fall down and get up.

 

Disappointment followed him home. He’d hope for so much more. But he saw himself in a light he had never seen before. ‘Cause if the priest who fell could find the Grace of God to be enough, then there must be some hope for the rest of us. There must be some hope left for us, ‘cause

 

We fall down, we get up.

We fall down, we get up.

We fall down, we get up.

And the saints are just the sinners who fall down and get up.

 

We fall down, we get up.

We fall down, we get up.

And the saints are just the sinners who fall down…Yeah, the saints are just the sinners who fall down and get up.

 

[INSTRUMENTAL]

 

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

And the saints are just the sinners who fall down…

 

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

And the saints are just the sinners…

 

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

And the saints are just the sinners…

 

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

(We fall down, we get up)

And the saints are just the sinners…Yeah, the saints are just the sinners who fall down, and get up.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

This, of course, is a beautiful part of this message that Our Lady speaks of, and it’s best illustrated by a story with Marija and her son. She’s got four sons. One of them’s Francesco. And Francesco’s a little rambunctious.

 

But he had done some bad work one day in school in Italy and not done what he was supposed to do. And he was supposed to take this home and have his mother sign it.

 

Well, he fell, what Our Lady said, on this difficult task of giving his mother to sign his papers. He fell into a temptation, and that temptation was that he thought he could forge her name.

 

So, here’s the son of a visionary forging the mother’s name, takes it back to school. Well, he gets caught. Well, of course, he’s in big trouble. His mother’s upset with him. His father’s upset with him. His brothers are down on him.

 

And his birthday was going to be the next day.

 

And so, here it is, that he’s done this, and he’s got to go into the apparition knowing he’s done something bad on his birthday.

 

And Our Lady has never told Marija to say anything to her children about “Happy Birthday” to their children, things like that. She doesn’t give them salutations.

 

And so, it was bad enough that, you know, Marija would just ask for a blessing for him that he was underneath this thing. So, he was pretty much in a sour mood, bad mood, depressed mood.

 

And what happened was that, the next day, Marija went into the apparition, and she typically says, “And would You bless Michele,” if it’s his birthday. And of course, this was Francesco. “Would You bless Francesco on his birthday?”

 

And after the apparition, Francesco knows that if he got a blessing, it would be a big deal. But he didn’t only get a blessing. He got words. And the words were:

 

“Give Francesco My best.”

 

Now, this is just like Our Lady, when we’re expecting something bad to come from it. And he lit up like a Christmas tree. He saw that he was forgiven. He saw that it was difficult. He saw Our Lady hold his hands through this, and opposite of us, thinking that She’s not going to do anything, She tells something so positive that this is illustrated in this message.

 

“…The way on which I lead you is difficult…full of temptations and falls…”

 

But just like the song we just heard, we fall down, we get back up.

 

And that’s what we need to realize in the spiritual life, that the “way” that Our Lady gives us, the way of life that She gives us, will have falls in it. These falls keep us humble. These falls keep us spiritual. These falls keep us walking where we need to go.

 

Jesus fell three times in His mission to carry the Cross.

 

Don’t think that doesn’t relate to you and your fall that you’ve got to get back up.

 

Sometimes, we need somebody else to help us, just like Jesus had Simeon.

 

And so it is the same thing with Our Lady. “I’m holding your hands.” (March 18, 2008) And with Her hands, She’ll help this difficult task for us to carry forth with what She wishes us in the way.

 

[THEME MUSIC]

[ANNOUNCER]

This is the Woman of Revelation Series with a Friend of Medjugorje. Stay tuned. A Friend of Medjugorje will return after this short break.

 

[COMMERCIAL]

[NARRATOR]

What if Our Lady hadn’t appeared in 1981?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

We know, Our Lady, had She not come and appeared to these visionaries, She revealed that the world would have destroyed itself.

 

[NARRATOR]

Why is the Holy Virgin coming?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

“…Read Sacred Scripture, live it, and pray to understand the signs of the time…”

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

At 6:40, June 24, 1981, the world was on a downhill slide toward evil and darkness and hate, that that changed in one moment toward the good.

 

[NARRATOR]

Has anything been said about Christians?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

There’s many Christians in the world, but also She gave a message that said, “There’s many Christians living as the pagans.” (1984 – 1985) They live pagan Christianity.

 

[NARRATOR]

With daily apparitions, do we know if there is some kind of plan?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

It’s Her words saying, “I want to use you in a great plan. You must pray to understand what your role is in that plan, and it’s for the salvation of the world.” (January 25, 1987)

 

[NARRATOR]

How will it happen?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Because you are the chosen ones, in the time of grace, walking with Her who are going to instruct the others after the time of grace.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

When Our Lady came, June 24, 1981, it was at that point that God had decided to bring us Ten Secrets, three admonitions, and it’s gonna happen. They will happen.

 

[NARRATOR]

Do not put off drawing closer to God, now in the time of Divine Mercy.

 

Find out more about the most extraordinary plans in 2,000 years of Christian history.

 

Be kept informed of the most important event in your life, your children’s, and your grandchildren’s, and all your posterity to the end of the world.

 

See M-E-J.com

 

[END COMMERCIAL]

[THEME MUSIC]

[COC]

When Our Lady gives a message during the day, there’s not a whole lot of time to prepare for the program that night. And so often, a Friend of Medjugorje may say, “Look for this song,” if it strikes him in the message, that would go with this message, or…

 

We’re pulling things together, and it’s not until we’re actually here sitting in our seats, playing the music, and really reflecting on the message for the first time, if we haven’t had a whole lot of opportunity to look at the message. And we see that Our Lady really does knit everything together.

 

But this song that was just played, it’s the priest, in the few words that he speaks to this man, that brings a whole new understanding to his life.

 

And then, the song ends up with the children coming in in the chorus singing, “We fall down, we get up.” The new generations who are learning from the older generations who are living a way of salvation.

 

And it struck me in this song that these words—the words of Our Lady—“my extended hands,” this is a very meaningful message, first of all to a Friend of Medjugorje because of his long walk with Our Lady. Many times, he has been prayed over with Her hands over him.

 

And the message that he received, and then the Community after him, the May 31^st message where She called us to be Her hands and Her instruments and to get hearts close to Her Heart…

 

I remember that, when you received that message, you described that you felt empowered by that message, that you felt that it is time to hold nothing back anymore, to go forward in a strong way to get hearts for Our Lady.

 

And maybe you can explain a little bit more in depth what it means to be the extended hands. What do you think Our Lady means when She brings this up in the message of being Her extended hands? And being in those apparitions, through these years, where Our Lady has intimately prayed over you, prayed over members of the Community, She does that for a purpose.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Well, I think that the stages that you go through in the spiritual life, it’s like St. Paul. When he was blinded and then He spoke and then he’s knocked of the horse, that he was told by the voice of Jesus, “Why do you persecute Me?”

 

“Who are You that You are that I persecute You?”

 

And of course, He identified Himself as Jesus.

 

But something interesting about that, that St. Paul had a conversion. And people go to Medjugorje, they have a conversion. But with that conversion comes a walk of the way and learning the way. What is the way?

 

To be walking off the streets and not live a Godly life, and then to walk into a church and say, “I’m born again! I’m saved!” Well, you’ve accepted Jesus, but do you know the way?

 

And so, there has to be a learning of the way.

 

And of course, we as Catholics have from our Baptism as youth, we were raised in that way. But, you know, other denominations may not have that.

 

But even Catholics themselves have lost the way, and that’s why Our Lady’s coming to the world today.

 

But St. Paul, or Saul at the time, he went off, and for at least eight years was silent. He didn’t go preaching. He wrote almost three quarters of the New Testament. But you don’t see that in those first eight years, and possibly all the way to eleven years before he really started preaching and teaching.

 

Well, what did he do during that time? He had to walk a difficult way. He had to learn the way. He had to deal with a way that was difficult, full of temptations, as Our Lady says, and fall and learn about getting back up.

 

And so, that’s one thing in the Poem of the Man-God, Jesus reminds Peter that, “You abandoned Me,” you know. “Be sensitive to others who fall.”

 

And so, it’s not different with Medjugorje.

 

When I went to Medjugorje in 1986, I knew and felt that I need to work on my conversion, not everybody else’s. Our Lady gave me a personal message, October 1986, in which She said for “you to live in humility, for you to walk through prayer.” (October 6, 1986)

 

And so, in this message, when Our Lady gave this message to me, I felt I wasn’t supposed to be doing anything other than except growing in the way, growing, “What is holiness?” “What is that walk?”

 

And so, as I began this walk, and I wanted to find out how to learn it, I knew I just couldn’t go out and start pronouncing it to anybody else.

 

And so, when Our Lady said to me, “Pray and by your life witness…” (October 6, 1986) that meant by my life. She went on, actually, and She said,

 

“…Not with words but rather through prayer will you attain what your desire is. Therefore, pray more and live in humility.”

 

Of course, this was a personal message for me. I had to act on this, and I had to realize that Our Lady was saying, “It’s by witness, and it’s not by words.”

 

But what is witness? She was giving many messages. I had to learn those message, learn that in my life, in corporate them.

 

And I think this is what has to be understood with the messages of Medjugorje. When you go through conversion, you’re not ready to go out and convert everybody else. Why? Because there’s a process in conversion that you have to change your life. You have to change your direction.

 

January 25, 1987: “…call you to live a new life as of today…”

 

Another message where She says, and we’ve said it before and repeated it, “…change the direction of your life…”(March 25, 1990) And Our Lady’s saying this to the villagers after years and years of living the way.

 

When you convert, you don’t necessarily change the direction of your life. You see the four basic messages, prayer, fasting, penance and confession. And you start incorporating that into your life. Those draw a strength for your spiritual life to start growing in holiness and then identifying things in your life that you have to change.

 

But when those things come along, and you realize. “Uh-oh. Our Lady’s confronting me with this,” then that’s what She’s talking about is difficult, because there’s things you’ve got to change in your life, and this is a difficult thing to do because we have mentalities that’s so ingrained in us, especially today, that the only way the world can be saved is for God to send the Mother of Jesus to teach us and put us in Her school of holiness.

 

And so, to answer your question, what did I feel at that moment that I felt empowered? I did feel empowered, because I felt very confident and at peace that I had sat in the background. I was writing, but I did very little promotion. I had already wrote I See Far. How to Change Your Husband was actually sitting on the counter during the apparition. How to Change Your Husband, when that first came out was very controversial in the message it was speaking of. And we didn’t know how it would be received. We thought, maybe we’ll lose half our mail list, at the time, because it was so strong. But at the same time, I wasn’t going out really doing a lot of things as far as being aggressive in promoting these things.

 

In that apparition, what took place was a commission: “Now.” And that commission came when I questioned Paolo that evening, when Our Lady says, “Get hearts…” She didn’t say “Get hearts.” She said,

 

“…Get as many hearts as you can close to my Heart, and lead them to God, to a way of salvation.”

 

That empowered me, and therefore, I transferred that to the Community and said, “We’re strong.” People sometimes wonder how can we be so strong and confident in what we do? We have the authority of Our Lady. Not many people who walk the face of the earth have that authority. I have it. Everybody in this community has it.

 

You can convert. You can get it. But you have to learn the way, and the way is a difficult way.

 

So, I don’t have any lack of confidence that I’ve grabbed something or a position for the sake of the position. I never wanted it, and I still don’t want it. But it’s Our Lady Who says, “Okay, now, you quit being passive,” in other words. “I want you to be more aggressive.” And She says, “…you are my extended hands, [you are] my instruments…” “…through your lives you are [the] witnesses…” And then She says,

 

“…Get as many hearts as you can close to my heart and lead them to God, to a way of salvation.”

 

So, that gave empowerment because we know that what we do is from Our Lady Herself, and how many people have a commission like that, physically, through one of the visionaries of Medjugorje?

 

Now, we’re not saying we’re any privileged than anybody else because we have more crosses. We have more difficulties. We have to do more to do that. But somewhere, somebody has to show the way. Somebody has to teach the way.

 

And that’s simply what we talked about in the beginning of the program, that our presses, our materials we put out, all that’s secondary. Everything’s secondary. Our life that we live on a daily basis, how we do our work together, how we communicate to do our work or a project or put things together, how we put books together or our building together, or we work on the agrarian side together. All these things are important that we walk in a physical action, like this man who was martyred in Ecuador said, that their demeanor, the way they carried their life, meant something. He says, “What a way it shone.” And our life is that way.

 

So, all we have from there is it transmitted on ink on paper, through the presses, of what we do.

 

[COC]

The message that you received on behalf of yourself and the Community in May of 1995, that was thirteen or fourteen years ago. So, we’ve been progressing on this way. We have many, many people who have been following a way of salvation through this mission who have been very faithful in living the spirit of what Our Lady has shown us here to live that we share with others.

 

And I wonder in this message tonight, if Our Lady’s not saying this also to Her children, that this is March 18^th. This is the day for nonbelievers, the big one, outside of the second of the month apparitions. This is where it all started after Mirjana stopped receiving her daily apparitions.

 

And so, when Our Lady says,

 

“…today I extend my hands towards you. Do not be afraid to accept them…”

 

Is it possible to look at this and say, what She’s referring to, in one respect of the message, that “my hands,” Her hands, She’s saying, but Her extended hands, Her children out in the world, that She’s almost saying to the nonbelievers, “Don’t be afraid to accept these children of Mine who are My extended hands, because they can give you peace. They can give you love. They’re going to help you find your salvation.”

 

Later, when She says,

 

“…I will be with you and my hands will hold you…”

 

We’re Her physical hands in the world. We’ll be the ones to hold. Is She, perhaps, telling us, as Her children and all those who are listening and who are reading this message, “I want you to be ready, because I’m going to bring you…” Someway, somehow, we are going to be accepting these lost children of Hers that She’s about to bring into the fold?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Well, I think we have a much larger world with a shorter amount of time to reach more people and a more massive way to reach people that, while Jesus may have started with His Twelve and his disciples, Our Lady’s going to have pockets of people all over the world that will be Her hands.

 

And so, while we, Her children, what you addressed that as far as Her hands, we really are also Her apostles. And of course, I mentioned last program, Louis de Montfort saying that Our Lady would raise up apostles of the latter days, and they would spread across the earth on silver wings. They would be tried as the children of Levi. Our Lady says, “I lead you on a way that’s difficult.” (March 18, 2008) “You’ll be tried as the children of Levi,” Louis de Montfort says.

 

And we are living in that time. There can’t be any question if you’ve just got common sense to look at the message to see what’s happening, to see a spiritual event that’s taking place that’s not comparable to anything in 2,000 years of Christendom. It doesn’t exist. And nothing like this experiences, in this way, even matching it up to the Old Testament. Yes, you have the flight out of Egypt. You have Moses and all these great things happening. But we’re living in a glorious moment of history, a rescuing time. Our Lady said that “This world does not know in what sin it is sinking. I have come to save it.” (February 17, 1984)

 

And so, how is She going to save it? She says, “I can’t do anything without you.” (August 4, 1988)

 

And so, you become Her hands because God’s not affording Her to appear to every single person and go make every single person a visionary. And it’s not the way of God to do that anyway. In fact, it’s not necessarily the way of God to do what He’s doing with Our Lady right now. You can be She’s the one that’s in front of Him that says, “Let Me do this. Let Me come as a Mother.”

 

With the state of the affairs of the world today, do you really think God would just sit there and say, “I’ve got nothing better to do. Let me send the Archangel Michael and do something”?

 

This is Mary. This is Her time. She’s won this. Her glory, Her honor, Her purity has won this to come to the world that has no honor, has no glory, and has no purity.

 

So, it’s important that we understand the significance of being Her hands and what She’s asking us to do.

 

[THEME MUSIC]

[ANNOUNCER]

This it the Woman of Revelation Series with a Friend of Medjugorje. Stay tuned. A Friend of Medjugorje will return after this short break.

 

[COMMERCIAL]

[NARRATOR]

Do we, as Christians, lead the world, or are we being led by the world?

 

Compromise has infected the Christian value system.

 

We are called by Our Lady to change our life, and through that, to change others through our witness to the Light.

 

In today’s world of technology and traffic jams, it can be difficult to understand how to live Biblically.

 

As Go God’s People, So Goes the World, a remarkable writing that will open your eyes to Our Lady’s plans to free us from the bondage of things and help us to understand that peace can only be found in a society where love reigns and God is acknowledged.

 

As Go God’s People, So Goes the World, by a Friend of Medjugorje. Available on mej.com, spelled M-E-J.com. Or call in the U.S. 205-672-2000.

 

[END COMMERCIAL]

[THEME MUSIC]

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

We have Our Lady coming, and to finish up your question, the extended hands part, Our Lady has done many things. We have been privileged to be with Our Lady. We have been privileged to be given a certain relationship with Our Lady through Marija and Our Lady coming to us through the means of the apparitions where She has done many beautiful things for us, as using Her hands praying over us and things like that. And of course, that’s a great joy for us.

 

At the same time, those things happen because God’s put us in that position.

 

[COC]

Well, we know that Our Lady has done beautiful things, and we can only just think back in August of 2005 being in the thunderstorm on Our Lady’s Birthday, or many, many graces we’ve received over the years.

 

So, why does She say, “…Do not be afraid to accept [my hands]…”? Why would we be afraid to accept them?

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Well, I think we have to go back and realize that, when you start going into the messages, and you start to really look at what Our Lady is asking for, it’s to do not what you want to do. Anytime you’re doing what you want to do, you’re doing something God doesn’t want you to do. Because to live underneath God and His principles of what He tells us to walk, He’s always first. The flesh wants to put itself first. So, there’s always this contentions between your wants and God’s wants.

 

Now, the more you pray and the more you want to follow God, the more you want to walk with God, the more you’ll want your wants to be His.

 

That’s kind of the relationship of what, in the Garden of Eden, Adam and Eve was told after the Fall. They fell. And the woman was told, “Your wants should be for your husband’s, for his wants.” If you do everything your husband wants, then you’re going to get everything you want.

 

Some people don’t like to hear that, but that’s a Biblical principle.

 

At the same time, if we want what God wants, we’re getting everything we want.

 

Now, is it always sweet? No. Is it always what we want on our palate? Nope. It’s not always that way. And that’s why Our Lady doesn’t shy from this. She doesn’t say that everything’s going to be a beautiful life. She says,

 

“…The way on which I lead you is difficult…”

 

What? The way.

 

So, it is a difficult way. It’s a way of purification. It’s a way of changing. It’s a way of changing your mentalities. Because that’s what the messages are about in the end: change your mentalities. Once you change your mentalities, and you get the grace to change, that’s conversion. Conversion is a change of mentality. You’ve got to think different. The messages are trying to get us instilled with the way, through Her words, to compute things in a different way, compute the way we look at society in a different way, to see how we are to fit into society and to change society, not conform to it, but to radically change it.

 

And just because everybody goes that way, doesn’t make it normal. It always…It still amazes me how even Christians say, “Well, a Gallup poll says this…” It don’t matter what that says. If 99 people were doing something that’s not right, and you’re one, it doesn’t justify them. It doesn’t say that that’s correct.

 

With this message, Our Lady gives us something beautiful today and of course, the messages always mean something for the future as well as it does in the present. And that present can be one year from now or five years from now. But it’ll always say something later. Of course, this message goes into an overall view of something beautiful, which we’ll go into in a little bit later. Our Lady constantly puts us in Her hands. And there’s no better hands to be in than Our Lady.

 

If we put ourselves in Her hands, we follow Her, we do what She says, everything will work out for the best, even when everything looks like it’s falling apart.

 

And you asked the question, why should we be afraid? Because there are things you have to give up. There’s things in your life you have to change. There’s directions you have to change. You know your children may not like it. Your spouse may not like it. It may be something that’s bitter or something that you don’t want to do.

 

I cringe when I hear somebody say, “Well, I want to do what I want to do.” No. That’s not what you’re saying. You’re saying, “I want to do what the devil wants me to do.”

 

Again, to live the way of God is to live with self-restriction. You’re not free to do what you want to do. I’m not free to do, in this mission, to do and guide it the way I want to. I’ve got to live self-restricted, self-imposed restrictions. That’s the keys to peace. Not because you have something or a certain way or certain thing you can do. Or if you’ve got a lot of money! You’re not free to spend that money the way you want to. You can do that, yes, because you have free will. But if you want to live for God, you’ve got to restrict. You have a responsibility for that. And like wise, with the position you have, the power you may have, whatever you may have, you have restrictions.

 

This is not always pleasing to the flesh or pleasing to do what your wants may be. There’s plenty of people out there that have funds and money, then give away 90% of what they’ve got and still not change anything in their way of living. Ninety percent of everything they have that can always be given away and still be living everything they live in their life.

 

So, 10% is what we’re commanded by God. That’s your duty to give. Everything above that, you’re being generous. And there are some people that do that. There’s a lot of people that don’t.

 

But, again, this comes back to fear. Don’t be afraid. Why be afraid? What is Our Lady saying here? What is there to be afraid of? There are frightful things in the future.

 

Our Lady once gave a message that says, for “…The one who prays is not afraid of the future…” (June 25, 2000)

 

Now, we had somebody write us a letter this week that said, “You’re becoming fear-based.” Well, what are the Secrets about? C’mon, get with it! We don’t know the Secrets. If they’re secrets, why do we got to even say they’re secrets? Why does He want me, why does He want you to know, or why did He let Mirjana say, and Marija and others, that there’s secrets? What’s the purpose of that? Why do we know about the Secrets that there’s three admonitions? Those are friendly reprimands.

 

You know, my dad used to give me friendly reprimands. I didn’t like them one bit.

 

God is a good Father. There’s some friendly things He’s got coming our way, and they ain’t gonna be anything that you’d say, “Oh, it’s just a little tidal wave.” We don’t know what it’s going to be, but we know it’s going to be some purification of the earth, some purification of us, something that’s so purifying that will correct our conscience. A correction of conscience by the Father. And there’s nobody that can estimate what that might be.

 

But, at the same time, that fear is a motivation to act, to pray, and the fear can bring you to conversion. Conversion can bring you to prayer. Prayer brings you to no fear of the future.

 

You can say what you want. We don’t speak about this fear factor for the sake of a fear factor, but Our Lady says it. “Don’t be afraid.”

 

What would be the opposite of not being afraid? Why would you be afraid unless there’s something to be afraid of?

 

So, you see, for Her having to say that proves there’s some frightful things. There’s something to be in fear about. We’ve got a society today that decades have not seen one physical consequence—a Divine consequence—of our actions.

 

Let me say that more clear again. We have, for decades, fallen into decadence, repeatedly, that past civilizations no longer existed for it, and we have not seen any Divine consequences to our actions.

 

So people have gotten used to, “God’s tolerant,” because we teach diversity, and we teach tolerance, and we teach all these things, that God’s just accepting everything now. We’re deceiving ourselves.

 

While God may be slow to act, He will act. History proves that.

 

Now, if He acts, what happens? It’s out of love. It’s not to make us fearful of this wrathful God. Because if we continue on the path we’re on, we will self-destruct. satan will have the means to control and destroy the whole earth.

 

And so, we must realize that, when Our Lady’s speaking of fear and don’t be afraid, is that there’s circumstances that the people out there in society that don’t get with Our Lady, they’re going to be afraid. I would be in fear right now if I had not been walking with Our Lady, had I not been doing what these messages for years. I feel very secure, no matter what happens to me or the Community or to those walking the way. We’re with God. Whatever circumstances He puts us in, I’m at peace! It may be suffering. It may be joys. It may be whatever! It doesn’t matter.

 

But to have a naïve and an ignorant attitude and mentality that you’re fear-based is a contradiction of the fact that God has even let the visionaries say these are admonitions. These are secrets.

 

The secrets are mentioned to build up an audience, because when the Secrets are released, God wants an audience. And when you hear the Secrets, is it going to be hunky dory? There’s something to them. God’s got a lot better things to do than come to the world and be doing this unless it’s something very, very serious.

 

So, there’s no hands I’d rather be in, no better hands, than Our Lady. And we need to realize that to be in Her hands is our safest place. It’s to be put in Her mantle and to be able to serve Her, to be strong because of Her. And that’s what She says in this.

 

“…[and] together, in joy and love, hold the hands of my Son [Jesus]…”

 

You know, She’ll be our strength if we take these promises that She gives to hold our hands, walk with Her in faith, and have Her Son shining on us, whether it’s raining, or whether we’re down or whether we’re up.

 

[SONG]

It’s hard to stand on shifting sand. It’s hard to shine, in the shadows of the night. You can’t be free if you don’t reach for help. And you can’t love if you don’t love yourself. But there is hope when my faith runs out, ‘cause I’m in better hands now.

 

It’s like the sun is shining when the rain is pourin’ down. It’s like my soul is flying though my feet are on the ground. So take this heart of mine. There’s no doubt, I’m in better hands now.

 

I am strong, all because of You. I stand in awe of every mountain that You move. For I am changed. Yesterday is gone. I am safe from this moment on. And there’s no fear when the night comes round. I’m in better hands now

 

It’s like the sun is shining when the rain is pourin’ down. It’s like my soul is flying though my feet are on the ground. So take this heart of mine. There’s no doubt, I’m in better hands now (better hands now)

 

It’s like the sun is shining when the rain is pourin’ down. It’s like my soul is flying though my feet are on the ground. It’s like the world is silent though I know it isn’t true. It’s like the breath of Jesus is right here in this room. So take this heart of mine. There’s no doubt, I’m in better hands now.

 

I’m in better hands now.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

“It’s like the breath of Jesus right here in this room.”

 

We should be so excited to get a message like this today, so thrilled that we live in this generation. While there’s so many things to be concerned about, there’s the hope that we have that past people and civilizations didn’t have. And this is the time that the Queen of Heaven is to be made known. She is to conquer the earth.

 

There’s something being in the works now that we don’t quite have the full picture of it, but that something’s ordained from Heaven to be a second Pentecost, a second rebirth of the world, a second time that Christianity will renew itself.

 

And you are called to be a participant. No different than when Jesus walked the earth and He picked His disciples and apostles. And it’s your choice!

 

And while the means of communication has made it where it was in a small little area, this is worldwide. It’s not going to be a globalization-type plan. It’s going to be a localized plan, not globalization.

 

But Our Lady’s raising up people coming from all over the world to Medjugorje. They go back to their villages, go back to their homes, go back to their cities, go back to their towns, so that they can be the apostle there. They can do just like St. Paul went over. She’s sending us out, and we’re in no better hands than what Our Lady’s doing with us right now.

 

We’re living in a tremendously exciting time. We’re living in, actually, a very dire time. There will be fear, things to be fearful of, if you’re not walking the way. But there’ll be no fear, and there’s no reason to fear if you are.

 

We see, and if you read the Poem of the Man-God—I’m reading right now about the Passion of Jesus and His Death on the Cross—how the Pharisees, at the point of death, went totally in terror, totally in fear, totally terrified, because they’re not in the way.

 

So, Our Lady does not want that for us, and She doesn’t want this fear factor, but it doesn’t mean, because She says, “Come with me and fear not,” (March 18, 2008) that the fear won’t exist. It won’t exist for us as Her children, as Her apostles. And when we grasp that, we understand that, then we can’t be in any better hands.

 

And think it’s an exciting, exciting time to really be with Our Lady.

 

These are private revelations. You can’t say they’re public revelations, because all public revelation ceased with the death of the last apostle. That’s Scriptural.

 

But public revelations are invigorated and more understood through private revelations. And while the Church teaches that apparitions, if they’re approved, are only said that there’s no requirement to believe in them for salvation, we have to not put it in that context. We have to realize Our Lady’s coming to convert the entire world. This is something major that hasn’t happened in the Church before, so the Church has never looked at it. Everything here with this is new. It’s a new way. It’s not public revelations, but these private revelations have a great significance that the public revelations aren’t doing because they’ve grown sterile and repetitious.

 

You say, “How dare you say that! Anathema to you!” And I’ll have people say that. “How dare you say that the Scriptures can be sterile, they can be repetitious.” I’m quoting Cardinal Ratzinger who’s now Pope Benedict. That’s what he said in June of 2000 when he released the third secret, that private revelations—he gave a whole talk about it—that they don’t need to have a negative connotation.

 

“Well, that don’t mean nothing,” or, “I’m free to accept it.”

 

Why is God sending Our Lady for 27 years every single day if He wants you to just have an option to hear it or not?

 

It’s because something’s happening in these private revelations of the apparitions of the Virgin Mary, Queen of Peace of Medjugorje, that’s never happened before. And not just when Moses heard from God, but since the Garden of Eden.

 

And again, to repeat it, because Our Lady’s repetitious and because we need to be repetitious until we get it, just like a school teacher at school,

 

“I will give messages as never before in the history since the beginning of the world.” (April 4, 1985)

 

Adam and Eve walked in the cool of the evening. They talked to God, and now, we’re talking to Our Lady. Something like in the Garden of Eden.

 

While this isn’t the Garden of Eden, the Woman Who is the Garden of Eden Herself of Heaven is coming to talk to us.

 

And so, we need to realize that there’s power in this, the gift we have to know something that’s kind of new for us that they didn’t know 100 years ago. They didn’t know that you could really…And maybe it wasn’t afforded to them at that time. But now, because this is Mary’s time, and we’re bringing Mary’s Gospel, and it says,

 

“…They way on which I lead you is difficult and full of temptations and falls. I will be with you and my hands will hold you…”

 

In the beginning, She says,

 

“…I extend my hands towards you…”

 

Mirjana physically saw that. She’s just not giving words. She showed Her, “what I’m going to do.” “I’m giving My hands towards you.”

 

Was She saying that to Mirjana? No, the messages are for all of us. When She gave Her hands toward Mirjana, and Mirjana says,

 

“I have never seen Our Lady address us in this manner. She extended Her hands toward us…”

 

Mirjana took that and interpreted it for everybody there and us here.

 

“…and with Her hands extended in this way, She said:”

 

“…I extend my hands towards you. Do not be afraid to accept them. [I] desire to give you love and peace and to help you in salvation. Therefore, my children, receive them…”

 

What is “them”? Her hands! They didn’t have the knowledge of this 100 years ago. This is something of a gift to us today, something profound, something that’s coming through private revelations that you can, tonight, get in your bedroom, get beside your bed, pray a Rosary, and formally consecrate your hands and give them to Our Lady, and know, with confidence, that that is accepted! Because She says,

 

“…receive them…”

 

“I want your hands. I want you to have my hands. Receive my hands.” She wants to be our hands.

 

This is not something with just, “Oh, what a little sweet thing Our Lady’s going to do. She’s going to touch and pat us on the back of the hands.”

 

This is something real, an action that you can take that’s going to affect you in this life and at the close of your life.

 

Can you imagine Her taking your hand and putting it in the hand of Her Son, Jesus?

 

We live in extraordinary times, extraordinary times unlike anybody has had, and again, what Louis de Montfort said, “I long for that time.” He wanted to sit where you sit! And why are you just sitting there?! When this show goes off, you get by yourself. Our Lady says, “Find you a corner to pray in.” (July 25, 1997) Find a corner. But you consecrate…And just don’t do it flippant, “Okay, She said this. I’m going to give Her my hands.” Take some action with it. Put some prayer into it. Put the heart into it, make it mean something, and you’re really doing this!

 

Our Lady really will receive your hands, and you’ll receive Her hands.

 

She said once in a message, “I can do nothing without you.” (August 4, 1988)

 

We’ve heard Fr. Jozo say it for years that Our Lady told him, “I need you. You are important. I want you.” (June, 1981)

 

Our Lady has a special plan for you. Do you want to be a part of it? Or are you in fear you’re going to have to give something up? You better be in fear of not giving something up, because we know the times we live in, we know how the things are that we live in. And when we see God in His actions and what He’s done in past history and what we’re headed to, we know that we have never seen the love that the world’s been off today until Christ came 2,000  years ago, and now, He sends His Mother for the second Pentecost, the second rebirth of the Church, to renew the new way.

 

You know, a love that’s amazing to us, and it’s more than a dream. This is not a dream. This message today is like a dream.

 

Can you imagine if somebody told you thirty years ago,

 

“What if Our Lady would come, and you knew when She said that She wanted to give us Her hands, She wanted us to accept them, and She would make a promise…”

 

This is a promise. She doesn’t say the word “promise,” but Her words are a promise. You can take it to the bank.

 

“I will hold you, hold on tight to you.”

 

Just like Ronald Reagan when he was in trouble of losing his life. And then, I’m sure She was there at the end of his life, too, and then hold Her hands and place them in Jesus’ hands.

 

So, this dream, this love, it’s everything. Our Lady is love. And with this love, we should be amazed, really amazed at it, because we can go higher. We can fly higher. We can do more things than we could ever with Our Lady than ever in history.

 

[SONG]

Until Your love, I never knew, everything I wanted was there in You. Until Your love, I couldn’t find the answers to the emptiness I had inside. My life was in search of finding who I was. Until Your love.

 

Until Your love, all the clouds were gray. One whisper from Your voice drove them all away. Until Your love, I had never flown. But You’ve taken me to heights I would have never known. I never thought a single touch could change my world so much. Until Your love.

 

Your love is more than amazing, more than a dreamer’s dream. Your love makes my world go round. Oh, your love is everything. Yeah, your love is everything.

 

Until Your love, life was black and white. Faded dreams of yesterday just cast aside. Until Your love, it was the same old song. Heartache, heartbreak, and I’d just sing along. These feelings I’d heard of, but didn’t know what it was, until Your love.

 

Your love is more than amazing, more than a dreamer’s dream. Your love makes my world go round. Oh, your love is everything. Yeah, your love is everything.

 

Until Your love, I had never flown, but you have taken me to heights I would have never known. Until Your love, it was the same old song. Heartache, heartbreak, I’d just sing along.

 

Until Your love.

 

[FRIEND OF MEDJUGORJE]

Just thank God that Our Lady’s coming to the earth. You know, the love that we have through God, through Her, through Her Son.

 

This message today is really, really truly a dream message. I can’t get over it. When I read it, I was really excited about it. It’s so undeserving for us to receive something like this. Little Francesco being so many people down on him and him losing heart, and Our Lady speaking in here about the difficulties and the falls. And the first thing She says with this pure love of Hers, Francesco going into this apparition knowing that, “Oh, boy. Now it comes from Our Lady. She’s going to look down on me,” and does just the opposite. She says, “As far as Francesco, I give him My best.”

 

And as far as you, Our Lady says, “I give you my best. I give you My hands. I give you My Son. If you fall, get back up.”

 

The impulse of Her leading us toward holiness and leading us up and growing is the parallel for you as an individual to change of what Her plans is for the whole world.

 

So, we have hope. We really have hope. You can’t read the world. You can’t read society. You can’t read the things that’s happening in society and think that. You can only have faith that it will happen. It will happen simply because Our Lady says so. What does She say?

 

“…God desires the conversion of the entire world…” (June 25, 2007)

 

So, as we end our program tonight, we’d like to tell you and remind you of the message today, that you find you a little corner of your room and remember that it’s like the sun shining when the rain is pouring down. It’s like the soul was flying, though your feet are on the ground. So take this heart of mine. There’s no doubt that you’re in better hands now.

 

Consecrate yourself in prayer tonight. Bring your hands to Our Lady. Take Her hands. Receive them.

 

And tonight, as we end our show, we want, with all our heart, this holy week, to wish you Our Lady. Good night. And we love you.

 

[END CLIP]

[THEME MUSIC]