Calling All Prodigals

The Prodigal Son @ Christ Cathedral CA

The Prodigal Son

Lately the story of the Prodigal Son has been on my mind because several news songs about it have been playing on the Christian radio station I like to listen to. [Luke 15:11-32]  In the story the youngest son demands his inheritance money from his father before his father has passed away.  Then he leaves his home and wastes all of the money on women, drinking, and all kinds of "debauchery," as the Bible says.  After some time the money runs out and  he has no food so he gets a job working for a pig farmer, but he isn't paid very well and even the food he is feeding the pigs looks appetizing.  So, in an effort to avoid starving, he decides to return to his home and work for his father as a servant.  His father, upon seeing him arriving, runs to him, greets him and throws a big party for him.  His father is not mad at him at all for wasting all the money.

The King of Mercy

I believe we are currently living in the age of the Prodigal.  Right now God is looking out the window just waiting to catch a glimpse of us on the road leading back to Him so he can run to us, greet us and throw us a big welcome home party!  I have come to this conclusion primarily from the writings of Saint Faustina and from Anne with Direction for our Times.  Both of these woman wrote down messages from Jesus with the central message of: Jesus is the King of Mercy.  His mercy is for everyone, He loves everyone, and He desires our trust in Him.

God's mercy is available in our current time more abundantly than ever before because we are nearing the final battle between good and evil, and the Lord desires to win as many souls as possible before He returns as The Just Judge.  This time of mercy may last only a short while, or thousands of years, we don't really know, what we do know is that God's mercy is available to us but we must ask for it and be willing to receive it.

What You Should Know About Heaven & Hell

In order to desire to receive God's mercy we must understand what the stakes are.  The battle I mentioned above between good and evil is a real battle going on throughout the entire world right now.  God is actively sending the angles, his graces, and mercy to anyone who is willing to receive them.  These will give them courage, strength and faith to choose the side of good and help with the work of Heaven, which is striving to bring other people into the fold.  

The devil is actively working to deceive people into believing that God and even himself do not exist so we will be lulled into an apathetic state where we do not care about anything spiritual or in some cases anything at all.  Or to shift people's attention away from God and onto material things and worries so they will not have time for God.  I think he tricks people into doing nothing at all more often than doing evil things.

Your job is to make a choice about which side to follow.  This is the most important choice of your life.  Your choice is eternal and can never be undone once your time on Earth is complete, so choose wisely.   

False Beliefs 

1. Sometimes I hear people say jokingly after they have said or done something they know instinctively to be wrong, "I'm probably going to Hell."  People always say this in a joking tone, but I wonder sometimes if they believe it's true.  It's kind of like they're saying, "I don't think I'm good enough to get into Heaven, Heaven is for good people and I'm clearly not good, so I'll settle for Hell."
2. Additionally there are those that believe no one goes to Hell and it doesn't actually exist but was invented by the Church as a scare tactic in order to control people.  
3. Others believe they must earn their way into Heaven by doing good works, if they don't do enough good works God sends them Hell.  

The Truth

None of the previous three beliefs are the truth and believing any one of them can cause you a lot of problems in your life.  I personally used to believe the third falsehood.  The truth about Heaven & Hell is this:

1. God never sends a soul to Hell, however a person may choose to go to Hell with their own free will.
2. Hell does exist, there are many Bible verses that reference it.  It was originally meant for Satan aka Lucifer and Angel who rejected God and all of the other Angles who rejected God as well and are now known as Demons. There are also many visionaries who have seen Hell and or Demons.  It's not a scare tactic it's simply the truth.
3. No person can ever earn their way into Heaven.  In the Old Testament of the Bible we are presented with the stories of many people, almost all of them have a very similar story; they are ordinary or particularly lowly people who God raises up to be great.  Despite this favor from God, they always end up sinning in some way and disappointing God. This tells us that no matter how hard we try or even how much favor from God we receive we will always fall short.  So God decided to get the job done Himself, He came down from Heaven as Jesus showed us how to live then took all of the punishment from our shortcomings and sins upon Himself and died on the cross so that we would not have to earn our way into Heaven.  Jesus opened the gates of Heaven and said come on in, He did the work part for us.

The Practical Reality   

What does all of this mean for all of us Prodigal sons and daughters who are living in the world today, with no thoughts about God, or avoiding God because we consider Him too demanding, or too strict, or too far away to care about us. 

You Have Been Given a Choice

If I asked you right now, "Do you want to go to Heaven?" What would you say?  I hope that most people would say "Yes."  Even the most lost soul finds it difficult to understand why anyone would willing choose eternal pain and punishment over eternal joy and freedom.  So if you said, "Yes, I want to go to Heaven," then I would say, "Prove it."  The reality is Jesus is asking each one of us a question, "Do you want to be with me or not?"  Heaven is being with Jesus, and all the perks that come along with living with the Creator of the Universe, and Hell is being without Jesus, and all of the torments that come along with being separated from Jesus and living with the Father of Lies. 

While it is true that we can say yes, with words, do our lives match that yes?  Consider a man who tells his wife, yes I love you, then stays out late into the night every night, and does everything he can to avoid seeing his wife.  Would you say this man actually loves his wife or not?  This is the same with God, if a man says, yes I want to go to Heaven, then does all he can do avoid God, by hanging out all night with his friends, and never even talking with God, does he actually want to go to Heaven?  It seems to me he enjoys being without God more than being with God, and so at the end of his life, Jesus will ask him, "Do you choose Heaven or Hell?" His whole life will be presented before him, and he will be given a big pie chart showing how much time he spent with God and how much time he spent avoiding God.  Whichever slice is bigger determines whether he said yes or no with his life, because his actions spoke louder than his words.  So despite it being unlikely that there is an actual pie chart, the idea is still the same, in order to prove that you want to go to Heaven, you must prove it with your life, aka time, talent, treasures, rather than words alone.

What Does my Yes Look Like?

So now that it's been established you have to choose Heaven and you have to prove you choose it based on the way you live what does that look like on a daily basis?

Jesus has given us all kinds of guidelines and advice about how to live.  We have the 10 commandments, the corporal and spiritual works of mercy, the beatitudes.  All of these are great ways to practice proving your yes, but let us remember, we have already established you can not earn your way into Heaven.  It can be a great temptation to run off and start saying 5 rosaries a day, signing up for the soup kitchen, dog shelter, and local senior center bingo night, but are you getting caught up in performing actions in order to earn your way into Heaven?  All while you are running yourself ragged? 

Jesus said, "I have come so that they may have life and have it to the full." He also said, "I give you a new commandment: love one another; you must love one another just as I have loved you."

The best way to prove you want to go to Heaven is to live your life to the full and love God and all the people in your life.  This will look different for every individual but here are some guidelines:

1. Spend some time talking to God and listening to God aka praying.  Make sure to make this part of your daily schedule, make it a priority.  Then if God wants you to volunteer at the local soup kitchen or to say a rosary or two, He will let you know, by filling your heart with that desire. When this happens you will be doing the work God designed for you specifically, this will bring you joy.  It will also be done with a genuine desire to to be obedient to God's will because you know Him and have a relationship with Him rather than in an attempt to impress Him and try to earn your way into Heaven.
2. Trust God with everything.  In regards to how you see yourself in comparison to God, try to see yourself as a little child who must receive everything from God.  Trust that He will provide you with everything that is good for you and, if you allow Him, will take away all that is harmful to you.
3. Do you duty and do it for God.  Often when we are at work or at home the people around us do not recognize our efforts and we can become lax or cut corners because no one really notices anyway.  Remember God sees all you do, so don't work for the praise of others, do your best knowing that God sees your efforts and will reward you for ever smile offered to a stranger, and every mundane task done for Him.
4. Love all the people God has placed in your life especially the most annoying person you know!  Loving someone does not mean agreeing with everything they say, it means putting their needs above your own.  This is how we put love into action: When someone asks you to grab them a soda and you just got back from the break room, put their need for a soda above your need to finish that report.  When your child wont stop crying, put their need for comfort, encouragement, and attention, above your need for some peace and quite and a clean house. 
5. Lastly if you are a Catholic be obedient to all of the teachings of the Church.  Obedience to the Church is like a support you can rest against when sin an temptation come along.  If you find a particular teaching of the Church to be difficult to be obedient to then I encourage you to research that issue, and find out just where the teaching came from and why the Church teaches it.  This kind of questioning will increase your faith because the truth does not falter under the most severe questioning, it will stand firm.  

If you can start practicing these five things on a daily basis, God will be able to work in your life in a more significant way because you will be saying Yes to him with your life.  He can then revel to you His specific will and plan for you.

But You Don't Understand I'm a really Bad Person!

If you still think there is no hope for you, because up to this point in your life you've been saying "No, you do not want to go to Heaven" with your life never fear!

Jesus is the King of Mercy and as the King of Mercy he said to Saint Faustina, "The greater the sinner the greater right he has to my Mercy."  

Jesus died for you.  If you were the only person in the world, he still would have died for you.  It doesn't matter what you've done you can be made new.

In the past I was addicted to a particular sin.  I felt like a slave to this addiction and it seemed impossible to get free.  The only way this sin was overcome was when I admitted to God that I was unable to free myself from this sin, then allowed Him to free me from it.  God did not disappoint, and I was free from that addiction nearly instantly.  I am not free of all temptation to fall into that sin again, but God's grace has protected me from falling back into it.  All you must do is allow God to work in you.  He will take care of, but you have to give Him the time to do the work, by being open to Him.

If you're a Catholic go to sacrament of Confession, Jesus gives us great graces to overcome sin in this Sacrament and washes us clean of the sins we have already committed.

Remember while we still breath it's never too late and no sin is too big, all Prodigals can return to God our Father's open arms.  He is waiting for you today!  Shake off that apathy and doubt and be free in the Father's love!