First Friday Devotions

by Susan Miller Repasky
(San Marcos, California, USA)

As I left Mass this last first Friday and after Devotions to the Blessed Sacrament, I promised the Lord I would be back sometime that day to spend an hour with Him.

Much later on, which put me before His Majesty at about 10:30 p.m. I slowly walked into Church and saw all the wonderful, beautiful children of Christ praying, worshipping and just plain loving their God present in the most holy Blessed Sacrament of the Altar.

I genuflected with both knees - which I haven't been doing because of spinal surgery - but got up and seemed to not have any trouble, went into the pew in the front (I'm getting old and don't see well) and began to pray a prayer. I didn't do this for long because the Lord had told me to just come and look at Him without words - you see I probably just pray and read too much before Him. So, I began a somewhat uncomfortable process of looking at Him in the Host and He looking at me. This is not something I do well - I usually slip into my well memorized prayers and bring out all of my prayer books, prayer cards, devotions, Holy cards and, you get what I mean.

Well, did He have a surprise for me this night. All of a sudden there was this man handing me a book, really asking me if I wanted it. I nodded yes, without thinking and slowly unzipped the covering. There it was - all in Spanish, the language I had learned so poorly in high school but a language I learned some words and phrases during my years of working in the Maquiladoras for 3M Company.

Then, all of a sudden there was a guitar and a man's voice singing, then more people singing. I could recognize many of the words so that I started singing some of the phrases. The whole group lit up with songs of worship and love. I was in a crowd of God's beloved people just as I had experienced so long ago at Our Lady of Guadalupe when I went to Mass there during a business trip, one I will never forget for many reasons, which I am not going to mention here.

Well, this night turned out to be one that will always live in my memory of something so holy, so devoted that there are tears in my eyes as I write this.

There was glorious singing, like the angels at Jesus birth. There was a special part, where one of the men explained to me that they were going to come out into the aisle, praise God and bend their bodies down on the floor towards Him. The whole church, body of Christ, did this and the music and prayer was incredible. The man drummed His guitar as they sang. No words can express this worship.

All of this was such a special worship that I almost think it was a dream. But it wasn't. As the night went on, 1 1/2 hours flew by as it they were a few minutes and I, with all of my Catholic friends of Mexican descent, loved, adored, worshipped, sang and prayed to the most Holy Eucharist, Jesus Christ, body, blood, soul and divinity.

I feel and believe that this was a special gift that I will never forget. Just one more thing, it brings back my special memory of the time I was driving West parallel along side of Highway 15 coming out of Mexicali through a sand storm and I turned my car to the right attempting to go North to get onto the highway where I thought I might be safer. Well, during that right turn, my card slid, over an enbankment and into a sandy hole. All of my Tostado, which I had been munching on, was all over the car and on me... when over the enbankment came 12 men dressed in white. Before I even knew what was happening, they lifted my car up and onto the street in the direction of Highway 15 and I, before I even realized the incredible danger I was in, thanked them and was on my way. To this day, this is like a beautiful dream, yet I know that it happened, especially since I cleaned out the Tostado ingredients in so many unlikely places for a few weeks thereafter.

Thank you Lord God for all you have given me through these 72 years of my life.