Ponder and Magnify: A Rosary Podcast

Welcome to the Ponder and Magnify Podcast!

• Jessica Helling

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The mission of the Ponder and Magnify Podcast is to seek an encounter with Jesus through praying the rosary, relying on the grace of the Holy Spirit and the intercession of Mary. Tune in as Ponder and Magnify host, Jessica Helling, discusses the impact praying the rosary has had on her life and her desire for every person to experience the joy, healing, and peace that comes with encountering Jesus through the rosary. Jessica also shares the overarching vision for the Ponder and Magnify Podcast as well as how the podcast got its name. All praise be to God!

Speaker 1:

Hello and welcome to the Ponder and Magnify podcast, where our mission is to seek an encounter with Jesus through praying the Rosary, relying on the grace of the Holy Spirit and the intercession of Mary. I am so happy that you are here. My name is Jessica Helling and I just want to say Praise be to God. The Lord has been stirring up this podcast in my heart for a few years and it just feels so surreal that this is actually happening right now. I'm so eager to share more with you about the podcast, but I'd like to start with a prayer before anything else. In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, come, holy Spirit. We invite you here, into this space, into our prayer, into our shared time together. You are the Father's gift to every single one of us through the Son. Thank you for your constant companionship. Holy Spirit, I just want to entrust to you every person who is here listening. Help each person listening see how good they are. Holy Spirit, help them, by your grace, to hear directly from the Father, directly from Jesus, how good they are. Help them to see that their goodness is not ruined by any past mistakes, nor proven by any accomplishment. Help them to see that their goodness is from the Father, constantly restored by His forgiveness and mercy. Holy Spirit, I pray especially for those listening who cannot at this time see their own goodness, who feel too far gone from God, misunderstood by him, let down by him or unworthy of him. Help these precious ones experience the deep, deep longing the Father has for them. Help them to sit in the tender, loving gaze of the Father and be restored and assured by his love. I unite my prayers to the prayers of Mary in asking that every single soul make it home to the peace and joy of heaven for all eternity. Amen, in the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit. Well, again, welcome. I am so delighted that you are here listening and I just have to come out with it.

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I love the rosary so much If anyone listening is new to the rosary. The rosary is essentially a way to pray by meditating on scripture and the events of the life of Jesus, which are referred to as mysteries. So the rosary originally came from Mary, the mother of Jesus herself. Back in France in the early 1200s, st Dominic had been trying to help lead people to Christ and was really struggling. So Mary appeared to St Dominic and taught him the rosary, calling it the weapon with which the blessed Trinity wishes to reform the world, and I can affirm that the rosary has been effective in reforming my heart and soul.

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It is one of my favorite things to share about. I should be honest with you, though, before you continue listening, that in many ways I am not feeling so equipped to be producing this podcast. I have no advanced degrees in theology. I'm not an expert on the rosary or prayer.

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Every day I come face to face with my own weakness and tendency to act in my own best interest. I'm constantly having to apologize to my husband and children, to those around me and to God. I am very much still on the journey to a greater love of the Lord, and yet, by the encouragement of my husband, my spiritual director and others, I'm moving forward with this. I'm trusting that the Holy Spirit can compensate for any lack in me, and I truly trust that God will multiply whatever little we have to offer Him. So I am talking now, feeling the weight of my lack in a way, but not allowing myself to be discouraged by it. All I have to go off is a desire to share the way the rosary has healed and softened and is continuing to heal and soften my heart. In a lot of ways it's felt miraculous, and I just know that this healing and softening is not reserved for me, but for anyone who wants it. God is so eager to meet every single one of us. Pope John Paul II so beautifully described the rosary as the way to "sit at the school of Mary and be led to contemplate the beauty on the face of Christ and experience the depths of his love. I think this describes the rosary beautifully and succinctly. The rosary has given me an experience of the depths of Jesus' love that has become a new lens for me across my whole life.

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When I go to pray the rosary, I like to imagine Mary beside me, starting to pray for me and with me. Sometimes in my imagination she's holding my hand. Sometimes I'm a little child clinging to her around her waist under the security of her mantle, as she kneels and prays. Most recently, I like to imagine myself as an infant in my baptismal gown, just sleeping in her arms, safe and secure. Sometimes Mary and I are at the foot of the cross together. In my imagination, sometimes we're in Jesus's childhood home in Nazareth, together sharing a cup of coffee. Sometimes I'm just near her in whatever mystery of the rosary we're praying, but she's always loving me, praying with me and for me, and I know that her prayers beckon the Holy Spirit, who arrives quickly to facilitate what comes next through His grace. I get so excited to pray the rosary because I never know what's going to happen. The Lord constantly surprises me. I offer the Holy Spirit my imagination and he guides it so that the mysteries of the rosary, the mysteries of the life of Jesus, come to life for me in a new way that often speaks directly into my own life circumstances.

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The Rosary has really become a method for me, by the grace of the Holy Spirit and the intercession of Mary, to be with Jesus every day in a very personal way and to allow myself to be loved by him, which I'm convinced is all he really wants to do when we come to prayer. The effects of being with Jesus every day like this have really been remarkable for me. The change has come over time, little by little, not all at once, but I can say that the rosary has been a consistent source of joy, peace, perspective, consolation, strength, confidence and just affirmation in my most fundamental identity as a daughter of the Father. In some situations it's helped me move through anger, bitterness and resentment to freedom and love. It has helped me to see others through the lens of the love the Father has for them. I've begun to understand that sin comes out of wounds on the heart and, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, I'm beginning to desire everyone's healing more often than harboring frustrations.

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In the past, I've really struggled with anxiety at times and since praying the rosary regularly, things that historically would have put me in a panic haven't rattled me. In fact, I've had confidence that things were being led toward good, even if something appeared bleak. I have grown more and more hungry for the sacraments. The Holy Spirit has reignited in me a desire to receive the Eucharist whenever possible and more and more I'm noticing that my thoughts are more centered on Jesus and I've been able to see things through the lens of heaven and let that order my thinking. Of course, all of this still isn't perfect, because I do get in my own way, but I am leaps and bounds ahead of where I started and my sense of interior freedom and peace has been consistent, even when my circumstances have been difficult. And I am 100% certain let me be clear, 100% certain that none of this has anything to do with me. It is all by the grace of God that he just joyfully pours out on me whenever I go to pray the rosary, and again, I know this is not just for me, but intended for every single soul.

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Another change that I've noticed through praying the rosary is that I really feel an extension of the love I have for my husband and children extended to every soul in a way. More and more I am learning from Jesus just how precious every single person is to the Father. And so, as you are listening now, know that I have a deep love for your soul and a desire for your eternal salvation through Jesus Christ. Yes, I realize we may have never actually met, but still I love you, and this is because I am completely convinced and utterly confident that the Lord loves you and cherishes you, and I want to love and cherish everything that the Lord loves and cherishes. So, yes, I love you, whether we've actually met or not.

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I so badly want your eternal good. I want you to be in heaven so badly when it is time, but for now, I am so happy that you're here right now, exactly as you are, no matter what your past looks like, no matter what you did in your worst moment, no matter what sin or addiction you struggle with, no matter what's hidden away in your heart that no one knows, no matter how hopeless or afraid or how resentful you feel, no matter what your relationships look like, no matter what your feelings toward God might be right now, I love you because God loves you exactly as you are in this moment. He can't help but love you at every single moment, even in those moments where you're rejecting him. He desperately longs for you to draw near to him. Gosh, his love is so gentle, so humble, so tender. He just wants to heal you and set you free to go forth in peace. The truth is that our God is in a state of heartache over you, out of pure love for you, and when you take even a split second to consider him, you bring so much consolation to his heartache. I desire for the heart of God to be consoled and, at the same time, for you to be healed and set free by receiving his love. That is the motivation for this podcast. I truly believe that the most profound need of every human soul is an encounter with the tenderness of the Lord, and it is my hope and prayer that the Holy Spirit works through this podcast to help you experience the tenderness of God toward you more deeply. With that, I hope you'll keep listening and pray with me.

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The vision for this podcast is four seasons, one focused on each set of the mysteries of the rosary. For those who are newer to the rosary, the joyful mysteries of Jesus's life draw on scriptures from the events of Jesus's early life with Mary and Joseph. Then there's the luminous mysteries of Jesus's life, and these draw on scriptures from Jesus's public ministry, starting from his baptism and leading up to his passion. Next are the sorrowful mysteries of the rosary, and these are focused on Jesus's suffering and death, Jesus's passion. And then the glorious mysteries of the rosary are focused on the events of Jesus's life from his resurrection onward. So, as I said, my hope is to have one season for each of these set of mysteries where we take time to really dive deeper into prayer with each set of mysteries. God willing, we'll have episodes that feature a Catholic priest to help us dive deeper into the Scripture, episodes where we will imaginatively pray through one mystery at a time, and then episodes where we'll pray a full set of five mysteries of the rosary together. We'll start with the sorrowful mysteries of the rosary to align with the season of Lent in the liturgical calendar.

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And I just want you to know that every time I come to work on this, I am praying to the Holy Spirit for guidance and praying for you to know the Lord's love for you. I'm calling on the intercession of our Mother Mary and also the intercession of John the Baptist and St. John the Evangelist. John the Baptist, by the grace of the Spirit, helped prepare hearts to meet the Lord, and I'm convinced that this is the power of the rosary, and so I know that his prayers will be a powerful aid. And then we learn from scripture that St John the Evangelist laid his head over Jesus' sacred heart at the Last Supper, and then he was the only apostle to stand at the foot of the cross. And from the cross, Jesus entrusted John to take care of Mary and Mary to take care of John, and Scripture tells us that John took Mary into his home at Jesus' direction. It is my hope that in praying together, like John, we can all draw near to His Sacred Heart, the Sacred Heart of Jesus, and then invite Mary into the home of our hearts more and more. I know St John's intercession will be powerful for us as well.

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And finally, I just want to share why this podcast is named Ponder and Magnify. It's because these are the movements of Mary's heart toward the Lord that come from Scripture, specifically the Gospel of Luke. At different points in Luke's Gospel, Mary does not fully understand what God is orchestrating and Scripture tells us that, in response to her unknowing, she ponders in her heart what the Lord is doing. And, gosh, this just moves my own heart so much, because so often I feel like Mary, like I can't see the full plan of how things will unfold or even what I'm supposed to do next, and my temptation in these moments is to cling to control and try to direct things on my own, according to what I think is best, rather than just to sit and exist in the unknowing, accepting the invitation to greater dependence on him. But Mary never closes herself off from the Lord, even when the unimaginable happens in her life. Her pondering is not her ruminating in her own thoughts over what just happened, but it's her invitation to the Lord to continue to reveal to her his love and activity. She keeps herself open to continue to receive from God by this constant pondering, and her pondering becomes her prayer. I'm convinced this is how she survived being present to Jesus and his suffering and death. She just kept pondering and the Father kept revealing, little by little, exactly what she needed to make it through

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I like to imagine when I pray the rosary, Mary is teaching me how to ponder, or maybe even that I'm pondering with her. As I meditate on the life, the events of the life of Jesus, I'm inviting the Lord to speak into my circumstances and guide me. And then there's "Magnify. This comes from the story in scripture, also from the gospel of Luke, where Mary, with Jesus in her womb, visits Elizabeth, who's pregnant with John the Baptist. This happens to be the second joyful mystery of the rosary, but it's also a story that has had a special staying power with me over the course of my life. In this story, by the grace of the Holy Spirit, elizabeth affirms God working in Mary's life and in response, mary offers an elated proclamation of praise.

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She says "y soul magnifies the Lord. I mean, is this not what we're all living for? We experience fullness of joy when we magnify the Lord. This is what we're made for, and I'm convinced that, as Mary shows us, our pondering with the Lord leads to our magnifying him, and we reveal his image and likeness, which is imprinted on our very being, to the whole world, to whoever's in our circle. I want my whole life to be a constant cycle of pondering and magnifying. So here we are then the Ponder and Magnify podcast. Thank you for being here. It is bringing me so much joy and delight to imagine, pondering and magnifying with you. Thank you, god, for this gift. Thank you, mary, for your intercession. Before I wrap up, I just want to remind you of the truth that you are a delight to the Father, his precious, cherished gift. Please know that I am praying for you and please pray for me. Praise be to God.