The Two Ways

Matthew 7:13-29

"Enter by the narrow gate, since the road that leads to destruction is wide and spacious, and many take it; but it is a narrow gate and a hard road that leads to life, and only a few find it.
"Beware of false prophets who come to you disguised as sheep but underneath are ravenous wolves. You will be able to tell them by their fruits. Can people pick grapes from thorns, or figs from thistles? In the same way, a sound tree produces good fruit but a rotten tree bad fruit. A sound tree cannot bear bad fruit, nor a rotten tree bear good fruit. Any tree that does not produce good fruit is cut down and thrown on the fire. I repeat, you will be able to tell them by their fruits.
"It is not anyone who says to Me, 'Lord, Lord," who will enter the Kingdom of Heaven, but the person who does the will of My Father in heaven. When the day comes many will say to Me, 'Lord, Lord, did we not prophesy in Your name, drive out demons in Your name, work many miracles in Your name?' Then I shall tell them to their faces: I have never known you; 'away from Me, all evil doers!'
"Therefore, everyone who listens to these words of Mine and acts on them will be like a sensible man who built his house on rock. Rain came down, floods rose, gales blew and hurled themselves against that house, and it did not fall: it was founded on rock. But everyone who listens to these words of Mine and does not act on them will be like a stupid man who built his house on sand. Rain came down, floods rose, gales blew and struck that house, and it fell; and what a fall it had!"
Jesus had now finished what He wanted to say, and His teaching made a deep impression on the people because He taught them with authority, unlike their own scribes.

Jesus compares the Spiritual Life to a journey, where we come to a fork in the road. To the left is a huge, 4-lane, paved freeway, well maintained and well lit. A very safe road. To the right, on the other hand, is a narrow, pot-hole-ridden, gravelly, bumpy, hard road. And on this journey, Jesus tells us that we must take that hard road. The world tries to tell us that all roads lead to God, but Jesus plainly tells us that these two diverging paths (and, ultimately, there are only two) go in opposite directions. The wide, safe, paved freeway leads to Destruction, while the narrow, difficult road leads to everlasting Life.

Why is it that the hard road is the right road? Why is it that God didn't make it hard to go to Hell, and easy to go to Heaven?

All living creature grow and change. To cease to grow is to die. This is true with our spiritual life as well. The hardships that come in following Christ and being obedient to His commands help us to grow. Without them, we would never be challenged or stretched, but we would become complacent, static, and we would die. Through the harships, the hard choices and hard actions, we rise to the challenge. Our faith, courage and strength are tested, and through God's Grace, we overcome and grow more and more like Christ--and that's what it is all about!

But this attitude is insanity to the world. Our world desires the easy route. It desires to live in peace and luxury, not to struggle. Like electrons, we desire to take the path of least resistance. And the world, therefore, tries to dissuade us from taking the hard road. It beckons us to follow the easy road to hell. It constantly tries to undermine the truth of Christ and His Church. Things like The Gospel of Judas or The Da Vinci Code tell us that the Church has lied to us about the Gospel. People tell us that we don't need to follow God--that it's futile and meaningless. They tell us we are our own gods. But these things are all lies, and dangerous lies, designed to lead us astray. And if we are not careful and discerning, if we are not staying close to the Truth, we can be led astray. The False Prophets, Jesus says, are like wolves dressed up in sheep's clothing. They sound clever, they sound reasonable, many times they even sound Christian. But their lies are exposed in their lives. If their message does not bring us to a closer relationship with Jesus Christ, or to a greater willingness to obey His Will, then it is false. If their message claims to bring us closer to Christ without the necessity of keeping His commands, it is false. If their message appears to lead to righteousness without Christ, it is false.

Jesus said, it is not everyone who says, "Lord, Lord," that comes into His Kingdom. We need also to do what God wants us to do. Note that many of these false prophets will even claim miraculous signs as their proof! We can't be fooled! God's will is not to do miracles (though they may often accompany those who do His will). God's will, rather, is "only this, to do what is right, to love loyalty and to walk humbly with your God" (Micah 6:8).

If we do not do the Will of God, we won't be accepted into His Kingdom. Jesus finishes with the parable of the wise and foolish builders--the wise one who builds upon the solid foundation, and his house stands against all adversity, and the foolish one who builds on sand, and his house crumbles right away. It is not enough to hear the word, Jesus says, but we must act on it.

I'll conclude with a poem that I wrote when I was 16, reflecting on a girl I knew who gave up the Christian life for peer pressure, getting into drugs and other sinful behaviour. She left the narrow road, for the wide freeway. If we walk away, know that God always calls us back, asking us to turn around and regain the Narrow Way.

Holes in His Soles
(C)1996 Gregory Watson

Sweet girl, on a journey,
Growin' up, you're in a hurry.
Seek new things to get you by,
Always new, you want to fly!

Sweet girl, the road you're takin',
It looks all right, but you're mistaken.
Might look brilliant, might look bold,
But "all that glitters isn't gold."

Sweet girl, you missed the exit,
Go back a way, see if you can find it.
Careful though, wolves hide the gate,
They dress like sheep, don't take the bait.

"'Because narrow is the gate...
And there are few who find it.'
Wolves in sheep's clothing
Are trying to hide it."

So girl, take my hand,
I'll lead you back, to find the Man
Who built the gate and now protects it.
He guides us home, and will keep the way lit.

Sweet girl, look at His footprints.
See the holes in the middle of those imprints?
Listen now, I will tell how and why.
You see, He got those marks for you and I.

This Man's Dad so much loved us
He sent His Son to make a way for us.
So He came and worked from early 'til late,
And when He'd finished, there stood a gate.

One post up, one post across
It stands, a landmark to those who are lost.
The wolves, the fearsome stalkers of night,
They hated the Man, and His gate of light.

They killed Him in their hate.
Nailed His hands and feet to the gate.
All night the wolves howled and taunted,
Fear not though, this is what He wanted.

He died, and all was dark.
Those wolves, they ceased to bark.
But the Builder, dead He didn't stay!
He lived again on the third day!

The wolves ran in a defeated state.
With His blood, He christened the gate.
"It is finished!" the Son exclaimed
From Calvary, what the gate is named.

So that, sweet girl, is why
His feet are marked: for you and I.
His footprints guide us over rock and sand,
Down the road to the Promised Land.

So when the wolves come to cajole,
Follow the tracks with the hole in the sole.
This Man will keep the wolves at bay.
Follow Him close; He'll not lead you astray.

And now, sweet girl, I say adieu.
I must go and help others just like you.
They seek new things to get them by,
Always new, wanting to fly!

"'Because narrow is the gate...
And there are few who find it.'
Wolves in sheep's clothing
Are trying to hide it."

Follow close the prints with the hole.
Keep with the Guide; He'll heal your soul.
Follow the tracks over rock and sand,
One day you'll come to the Promised Land.

This concludes our study of Jesus' Sermon on the Mount.

God bless!

Reflections on Snow

Well, last night we got dumped on here in Southern Ontario, which means an early morning shovelling the driveway, and a late morning to work. I like shovelling the driveway, though. Especially when I don't have to hurry. It gives me time to think, in the quiet winter morning, or evening, depending on when I get around to it. We have a fairly large driveway (holds about 10 cars) so it's a lot of time to think, or to pray, or to listen to God.

This morning was one such occasion. Because of my recent conversion to Catholicism from Protestantism, I have a lot of Protestant friends still, and we often get into discussions or sometimes even heated debates. Actually, my comments on the Covenant and the Eucharist prompted some among good friends of mine. So when I was out shovelling this morning, I had these people, and these discussions on my mind.

I also had next Sunday's talk related to The Passion of the Christ on my mind. This week's topic is "Sin and Satan", and how Jesus defeats Satan by the cross, and frees us from our sins. Stated simply like that, our Protestant brothers and sisters agree 100% with us Catholics. It's in the details of how this Grace is bestowed that we differ. It was these differences that I was ruminating on this morning as I shovelled snow.

I looked around at the world, covered under a deep blanket of snow. It reminded me of our sinfulness and God's salvation. The prophets described the cleansing of our sins as being made white like snow (Isaiah 1:18), and indeed, at first glance, the world did look white, pure, and peaceful. The trees, formerly black bark and leafless, now seemed to glow with a radiant splendour. But when I looked at the trees closely, I saw that the bottoms of the branches were still black and leafless. The snow hadn't actually changed the tree into something beautiful, but covered the tree with something beautiful.

When I was a Protestant, this is how I looked at salvation. When we come to Jesus, and "ask Him into our hearts" as the saying goes, Jesus bestows His righteousness on us, and we wear it over our sinfulness like a cloak. Then, at the judgement, God declares us righteous, because He sees not our sinfulness, but Jesus. No intrinsic change has been made in us. We are "justified by faith" and God "reckons it to us as righteousness." In this scenario, it is no more than a legal fiction. Then, my protestant pastors, teachers, and theologians would tell me, the work of "sanctification" begins, where we gradually become more and more like the cloak-that-is-Christ that we've put on. We become more and more holy--but, they stress, this process of becoming more holy is a separate event from our salvation, which is our justification.

To me, though, that seems like being a tree covered by snow. So the question becomes, I think, what happens to the deathbed Christian, the thief on the cross, for example, who is "covered" by Jesus' righteousness, but no inward change has taken place? What happens when his sinful humanity still under the snow meets God's consuming fire (Hebrews 12:29)? It's one thing to have our righteousness "imputed" to us as some sort of "legal fiction" loophole. But when that fiction meets reality, it must be exposed. In that sense, it seems to me that Protestants are more in need of a doctrine that they got rid of -- Purgatory -- than Catholics are!

In Psalm 51, which David composed after having his affair with Bath-Sheba and then killing her husband, he cries out to God in repentance for his grave sin. In verse 9, he says, "Cleanse me with hyssop, that I may be pure; / wash me, make me whiter than snow" (italics added). David isn't content with being even as pure as the driven snow, as the saying goes. He wants to go deeper, to go farther. "Why? Because snow is white, but it quickly turns black and filthy with any dirt," as St. Ambrose points out. And, at best, snow only covers us. It cannot change us (unless it gives us frostbite, and that's not a change for the good). David cries out for something deeper. He knows that he needs a change from the inside out, just like all of us.

Catholicism teaches that when we are saved, we are both justified and sanctified. The two, in the Bible, are interchangeable terms--two sides of the same coin. God declares us righteous based on Jesus' victory on the cross, but He also literally infuses us with Jesus' righteousness. It actually becomes our own! Granted, it is an ongoing process that never ends until we're dead (or after, in Purgatory), but Catholics, unlike many Protestants, do not believe that Salvation is a one-time event in our lives, but a lifestyle and a process. It has a definite beginning, which is baptism. It is at this point that we are born again, according to the Bible. It is here that, not only does the righteousness of Christ cover our sins, but actually, literally, washes them away!

Ezekiel prophesies about this in his 36th chapter: "I will sprinkle clean water upon you to cleanse you from all your impurities, and from all your idols I will cleanse you. I will give you a new heart and place a new spirit within you, taking from your bodies your stony hearts and giving you natural hearts. I will put My Spirit within you and make you live by My statutes, careful to observe My decrees" (Ez 36:25-27). God tells His people that He will wash them with water, removing their sins and giving them His Spirit.

This passage is explicitly fulfilled when St. Paul discusses God's salvation with St. Titus, in the third chapter:

"But when the kindness and generous love
of God our Saviour appeared,
not because of any righteous deeds we had done
but because of His mercy,
He saved us through the bath of rebirth
and renewal by the Holy Spirit,
whom He richly poured out on us
through Jesus Christ our Saviour,
so that we might be justified by His grace
and become heirs in hope of eternal life.
This saying is trustworthy" (Titus 3:4-8a italics added).

This "Bath of Rebirth" is what Jesus was talking about in John 3, when He was talking to Nicodemus: "Jesus...said to him, 'Amen, amen, I say to you, no one can see the Kingdom of God without being born from above.' Nicodemus said to Him, 'How can a person once grown old be born again? Surely he cannot reenter his mother's womb and be born again, can he?' Jesus answered, 'Amen, amen, I say to you, no one can enter the Kingdom of God without being born of water and Spirit'" (John 3:3-5, my italics again).

This phrase, "Born of water and Spirit," refers to baptism, and all the earliest Christians, right up until well into the Reformation, understood it so--and the Catholic Church still teaches this. My Protestant friends tell me (and I used to believe it myself) that the "water" meant either the Word of God or the amniotic sac that the baby is encased in in the womb. But these do not make much sense, especially in light of the passages quoted above. Moreover, one still has to explain why the earliest Christians, including the Apostles themselves, interpreted this to mean baptism, and have done so for nearly 2000 years.

According to St. Paul, Baptism takes the place of Jewish Circumcision (Colossians 2:11-15), and is our entry into the New Covenant that I talked about below. Through this sacrament, we are forgiven our sins, born again, and made heirs of the Kingdom. But we must continue in the faith that we were baptised into. This is why our salvation is a process. Initially, it's all about God's grace, and not our works. He gives us the grace of forgiveness of sins, and the grace to accept that forgiveness in faith, and the grace to act out that faith in our works. But, that grace comes with the responsibility to use it, to participate in our own salvation, as St. Paul writes, "Work out your salvation with fear and trembling" (Philippians 2:12b). But God doesn't expect us to do that alone, as the next verse says, "For God is the one who, for His good purpose, works in you both to desire and to work" (v.13).

All that is to say, snow looks pretty, and adds some flavour to the bland death of winter, but it is no substitute for the inward change that Spring brings, when the trees burst forth with New Life. May we all, "like [trees] planted near streams of water," burst forth in the New Life that Christ has given to us, and "yield [our] fruit in season" (Psalm 1:3)!

For we have been saved, we are being saved, and we will be saved! Alleluia!
God bless.

This post makes a nice segue between "Why did Jesus Die?" and "Sin and Satan" -- Due out next Monday!

Wayward Hearts

Greetings to all reading this. As the intro thingy says just under the title, this blog is sort of the information home base of St. Andrew's Youth Ministry, which takes place, obviously, at St. Andrew's Roman Catholic Church, in Oakville, Ontario. Right now, at the time of writing, this is a brand new ministry venture begun by the parish, and I'm a brand new youth minister. More, I'm a brand new Catholic! But I'll probably take another post to talk about that!

"Grace for the Wayward Heart" is a song from my favourite band, Jars of Clay, in which they talk about the struggles and failings of trying to live out this thing called Christianity. It despairingly asks, "Is there grace for the wayward heart?" It reminded me (as most of the songs on the album that it comes from, "Who We Are Instead") of the most famous and best written short story of all time (so say scholars and critics who know about such things), one I'm sure you've heard, that of "The Prodigal Son". It was a parable told by Jesus in the 15th Chapter of the Gospel according to St. Luke. Jesus tells the story of a rather rebellious young man who says to his father one day, "Dad, I hate it here so much, living under your stinking rules [I'm paraphrasing here ;)], that I wish you were dead. I want my portion of the inheritance, and I'm out of here!" Now, this would break any father's heart, but the father gave the son his share of the inheritance, and off the jerk went. Not being too wise (which hopefully is obvious just in the way he treated his father) he squandered his money on what the Bible terms "prodigal living", thus the title of the story. Prodigal means wasteful. So he blew his money, maybe on booze, maybe on women, maybe on "friends", maybe at the track, or maybe (probably?) on a little of each. He's broke, he's stuck feeding pigs (the ultimate disgrace to a Jew), and he's starving to death, wishing he could eat even the pigs' food. Finally, something happens. The Bible says, "He came to his senses" and we say "about time!" He thinks to himself, "You know, back home I had it really good. Roof over my head, good food, a family that loved me. Even the servants lived better than I do here!" So he decided to go back to his father, and beg that he could be just one of the servants, since he didn't deserve to be a son any longer. As he made his way back, get this, the father saw him while he was still a long way off! The father waited daily by the window to see when his son would return. That's love! What's more, this elderly fellow threw off all social convention and dignity, and ran out to greet his son, embracing him in the hugest bear hug you could imagine! The son gets about halfway through his rehearsed apology when he hears his father cry out to his servants to bring out the finest clothes, kill the best livestock and prepare a great feast, "for," he says, "my son who was dead is alive again!"

"Is there grace for the wayward heart?" Jesus tells us "Yes! There is! Just come home to the Heavenly Father, who loves you!" So maybe you're feeling a little wayward, a little distant from God. Realise that He loves you, and waits eagerly for you to turn to Him again. He's not sitting in Heaven waiting to smite you every time you do something wrong. He's not looking for excuses to send you to hell! He's looking for excuses to welcome you into heaven. He's bending over backwards in order to know you personally!

Maybe you're tight with God. Jesus is your best friend, and you're a regular Joe Churchie. Well, Jesus didn't end the story of the Prodigal Son with his return home. See, the punk kid had an older brother, and this older brother was the "good son", never did anything wrong, was always faithful and obedient. When his black sheep of a brother came wandering home, and his father rolled out the red carpet for him, Joe Churchie got a little offended. He goes to his father and says, "All my life I've been a good guy, I've done what you wanted, I've never done anything wrong! And this son of yours, who cursed you out, took his inheritance, and bailed, is getting a party?! What's the deal with that?!" The father said to him, "Why should I not rejoice? You have been faithful and will get your reward! But this, my son, who was dead, has now come back to life! Rejoice with me!"

We need to be careful not to get that kind of attitude. After all, to some degree, we're all a little wayward, we all need the grace of God to get anywhere. Let us be welcoming to all who darken the doors of the Church, and receive them with open arms! In fact, let's go out and invite them ourselves!

That's what the Youth Ministry at St. Andrew's seeks to be, a place where all of us wayward hearts can come and experience the love and the grace of God in our lives.