Jessica: 0:05

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. In this episode we are going to be just looking back ever so briefly over season two and laying out what to expect for the future, God willing. I just want to start opening us up in prayer In the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen, god, the Father, we praise you. Praise you for the gift of life, the gift of sustaining each of us, of designing each of us with a unique purpose, and thank you just so much for being attentive to our need and for being near. Even when we can't feel you near, we trust that you are near. And, God, I just want to praise you for your deep love for every single soul and I ask that every soul might come to a deeper encounter with the love that you have for them, that they might trust and believe in that love and know that nothing can ever prevent that love. I ask for all souls to come into a deeper encounter with the Sacred Heart of Jesus, with the most Immaculate Heart of Mary, that all souls might be in heaven one day together. Thank you for the gift that season two of Ponder and Magnify has been, and please, please, accompany us and continue to guide and direct our steps as we move into the future. Amen, in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit. Amen, oh, you guys, what a gift season two was. I just I can't believe it. I'm so, so thankful. The glorious mysteries are just so beautiful in how they elevate our hearts to heaven and have us kind of step out of our day-to-day things and just really have us focus on the eternal. They're just such a perspective shifter for me and I'm so thankful for the chance to have reflected and prayed on them with you.

Jessica: 2:25

Some of my personal highlights from season two I just loved when we were praying with the resurrection, how I just felt like the Holy Spirit really put on my heart that all those places in our hearts that from past experiences, past hurts, all those places that feel like tombs, are really places where God is desiring to come and enter and transform them into places of resurrection. That was really powerful for me. I also just loved in our discussion with Father Archer and John, just the realization that Mary lived in complete trust that the resurrection would happen, despite the magnitude of her suffering. She never visited the tomb, at least according to scripture, and I just love the thought that it's because she knew in her heart what was going to be coming forth from that tomb In the Ascension, I loved how Father Archer really talked about how praise can be healing for us and for our souls. Makes me think about the book of Job, when Job was in such deep suffering and kind of finally was able to rise out of that suffering with praise of God, and I loved the beautiful example of how to pray and praise that Father Archer gave us in that discussion.

Jessica: 3:51

Then, when we prayed the Pentecost, oh, it just really hit my heart in a new way, imagining Mary's role praying for the church, ushering its birth as its mother and ushering in the coming of the Holy Spirit in that Pentecost moment by her intercessory prayer, and just knowing her as the spouse of the Holy Spirit. Just her unique ability to beckon the Holy Spirit and call the Holy Spirit to those whom she's praying for. That was just really powerful for me. I loved, in the Assumption, john's reflection that he offered about imagining the Trinity and God, the Father, god the Son, nesting for us in heaven, preparing a place for us in the way that families can prepare a place in their home for the entrance of a new child.

Jessica: 4:40

The decade meditation was particularly powerful for me, just imagining Jesus and Mary reuniting and the tenderness of that moment, the tenderness of both the Sacred and Immaculate hearts just being close to each other. And I loved also, just in my own life, thinking of people who are really suffering from all different sorts of things and just really being able to imagine I think it was in one of the full, one of our Friday episodes with the full rosary just imagining being with those who I love and holding them in heaven free of suffering, just really spoke such hope to the depths of my heart. And then I loved, in our discussion on the coronation, really learning more about what it means to be at rest in heaven, not that we're in a state of inactivity like rest on earth, but that our soul is completely at rest so that we can be completely on mission for the will of God and by our intercessory prayer from heaven bringing that about for souls on earth. And I just love the idea of Mary on mission in heaven, putting herself at our service by the authority invested in her, by her crowning and her being named as the queen of heaven and earth, and how she uses that completely selflessly and all at our service to help us become more closely united with her son. Gosh, what a gift. What a gift Mary is from the Lord. So season two was so, so amazing and I'm just so thankful for the ways that the Holy Spirit guided our conversations and our hearts and just really spoke to me personally, and I'm so thankful for the time to be able to pray with you during that.

Jessica: 6:34

Looking into season three, our plan is to take the summer off but to come in with season three in September, focusing on the luminous mysteries during our liturgical season of ordinary time. The luminous mysteries focus on Jesus's public ministry and we know in the liturgical calendar the ordinary season is a season of just growing and I love to just imagine that really receiving Jesus's preaching and healing in those Gospel stories. So we felt that the Luminous Mysteries were particularly fit for praying through during the liturgical season of ordinary time and hopefully, God willing, we'll have our same format, with priest and scripture discussions on Monday, decade meditations on Wednesdays and full rosaries on Fridays. This, of course, you guys, is our tentative plan and we like to keep all plans as tentative, just allowing the Lord room to direct us otherwise. That's our current plan and, God willing, that is when we will be meeting next on this platform.

Jessica: 7:45

So I just want to say thank you, holy Spirit, and please, please, come, Holy Spirit, come and continue to inspire us, continue to help us encounter the Lord. And, Mary, We thank you so much for your prayers, the gift of your intercession, which is so mysterious and so important for our souls. Thank you so much for being a mother to us and claiming us as your own. What a gift it is to reflect and pray with you. Please, please, count on our continued prayers and we ask you to be praying for us. Praise be to God.