Thursday December 5, 2024

We enter the kingdom of heaven by listening to Jesus’ words and acting upon them.

Good News Reflection for:

Thursday of the 1st Week of Advent
December 5, 2024

Today’s Prayer:

Lord, may I always remember Your promises of salvation when I’m in the midst of trials. May my words and my deeds be the fruit of a life full of faith totally founded in You. Amen.

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Today’s Readings:

Isaiah 26:1-6
Ps 118:1, 8-9, 19-21, 25-27a
Matthew 7:21, 24-27
bible.usccb.org/bible/readings/120524.cfm
USCCB Podcast of the Readings:
bible.usccb.org/podcasts/audio/daily-mass-reading-podcast-december-5-2024

Will obedience get us to heaven?

Today’s Gospel reading answers the question: “Can a person lose their salvation?” Many Protestants believe in the theology of “once saved always saved” and that heaven is forever guaranteed on the day of conversion when a person says yes to the redemptive death and resurrection of Jesus.

Catholic teaching, however, acknowledges that a conversion might not be sincere or complete, and that deliberate, terrible sins will turn an unrepentant sinner away from Christ forever (we call such sins “mortal”, because they kill the soul).

Knowing this can happen, many good Catholics fear that someday they might choose to turn away from Christ. This leads some to become very scrupulous in obeying every Church law, rule, and norm as an insurance policy.

Salvation is more than knowing who Jesus is. Many know who he is without having faith in him. He is more than a who. Demons know who he is and obey his commands. Obedience alone does not get anyone into heaven.

Jesus is more than an authority we must obey. To know Jesus is to know what he’s all about (his purpose, his love, and his life). Salvation is placing our faith in this to such an extent that we want to follow him, doing what he does, changing the world around us, all the way to heaven.

We can believe in Jesus and yet remain in the darkness of sin and eternal death. To have faith in Jesus, we must not only believe that he is God. We must not only believe that he is Savior. We must also believe in everything – oh yes, everything! – that he taught by word and by deed.

We enter the kingdom of heaven by listening to his words and acting upon them. Salvation is more than a statement of belief. It’s more than going to Mass and reciting the Creed (“I believe in …”). It’s faith in action. We act the way Jesus acted and we do what Jesus did, because we love him so much that we want others to love him too.

This scripture ends the Sermon on the Mount, which started with Matthew’s fifth chapter. Read this entire sermon as an examination of conscience. How well are you are behaving like Christ with the people around you? We let our faith shine, for example, when we love our enemies, and when we forgive others as he forgives us and, as he said earlier in this sermon, when we do more than what is asked of us, going the extra mile – not because he told us to, but because we genuinely care.

Obedience is merely the minimum. To be heralds of hope and flames of light that Christ brings to the world, we have to embrace the way he delivers that hope and light. Going the extra mile is the way we go to the cross with him. And while the cross looks like the antithesis of Christmas, it is sacrifice that opens the door of hope in the hearts of others.

Faith is what motivates to do more than the minimum. If we have faith in Christ, we love as he loves and thus we cannot help but want to do more for others. There is the guarantee of heaven: If we love others in him and through him, of course we will have eternal life with him.

To reflect more on the topic of this subject, use our WordByte, “Why sawing wood on a summer hot day isn’t as bad as you think” @ wordbytes.org/franciscan-moments/sawing-wood/.

© by Terry A. Modica, Good News Ministries

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