The greatest prayer we can make is the “prayer of offering.” A prayer of offering is a sacrifice offered to the Father in union with the One Sacrificial Offering of Christ on the Cross. We do not offer ourselves, by ourselves. We offer ourselves in union with Christ Jesus. Specifically, we must offer our prayers, fasting, mortification and daily work to God. Pray prayers every day. Mortify your fleshly desires regularly through fasting and other forms of self-denial. And do all your daily work as a gift to God and as a result of His daily Will. Offer all of these to the Father with the Son, and God will accept your offering as a pure and holy sacrifice (See Diary #531).

When you pray, do you make your prayer an offering? Too often we pray for this need or that and stop there. It is good to present our needs before God. He knows our needs even before we present them, but He still wants us to ask Him to meet our specific needs. But don’t stop there in your prayer. The Lord wants you to go further. He wants sacrifice from you. Reflect upon whether your prayer becomes a daily sacrifice to God. If this sacrificial language is not part of your daily thinking, begin to make it so. Think and act sacrificially in your daily life and prayer and the Lord will receive your sacrifice, using it in powerful ways for your own holiness and for the holiness of the entire Church.

Lord, You not only offered the perfect sacrifice of Your life to the Father, You also set for me a perfect example of true prayer. Help me to daily offer to You the sacrifice of my life so that, through this sacrifice, You may make me holy and bring greater holiness to Your Church. Jesus, I trust in You.

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Image: Benediction of God the Father by Luca Cambiaso