Where sin abounds, grace abounds all the more!

[Music] there was a man who fell in love with God and he wanted to spread the good news of Jesus Christ everywhere in the world he became a missionary and he ended up on an island he was stranded he was shipwrecked and it was winter and it was cold so some of the people of that island saw this missionary they didn't know who he was so they were a little weary but they helped him so they started a fire to warm to help him get warmed up and the missionary to keep the fire going he got some wood and he started to put the wood on the fire to keep the fire to keep warm and eventually as he was putting the wood on the fire a poisonous snake a Viper comes out of nowhere and grasped his hand or his arm and the people of this island saw this and they were thinking to themselves this man is a murderer how could some random person get shipwrecked on our Island and all of a sudden the most poisonous snake comes and bites his hand and they were well aware that he didn't have long to live because of the poison going through his system his blood so the missionary with the snake now on his armor his hand he wrestles with it he eventually takes it off the snake and he throws it into the fire then he sits down and he continues to warm himself as if nothing really happened so the people of that island were thinking oh he he's going to die give him maybe five ten minutes he's going to die but eventually 10 15 30 minutes pass a whole hour and he's there just warming himself up and then they tell themselves he's a god so they start to worship this missionary as if he's God of course the missionary tells them about Jesus Christ tells them about the church and so forth and what was the result the whole island became Catholic everyone was converted because of the witness of this missionary know most of you if not all of you know who this missionary was Saint Paul probably the greatest missionary by Island was the island of Malta Malta is probably the most Catholic country in the world today at least by name in their government constitutions the church is within their constitutions that's how Catholic they are but it was because of the missionary efforts of st. Paul although he was bitten by this snake this Viper he stayed alive especially to spread the faith of Jesus Christ to the people of Malta now why do I tell you a story like that especially in the context of this mass with these readings obviously it's always good to know about stories of the Bible especially in the early church but the reason why I tell you that is to highlight how God uses certain instruments to do his will now specifically in this case sinners who experienced forgiveness and then became zealous for the church so we know that st. Paul was a sinner he persecuted Christians he actually put a lot of Christians in jail in prison not only that he was consenting to physically harming Catholics if you read the Acts of the Apostles you know that Saul Saul of Tarsus consented to st. Stephen's death they threw his cloak at the saw at the feet of Saul so Saul was even consenting to people's physical death in the early church yet because of God's forgiveness because of God's mercy he became the greatest missionary of the Catholic Church you can see other Saints st. Peter who denied our Lord three times he became not only the first pope but he also was crucified upside down in Rome Saint Mary Magdalene who had seven demons cast out of her obviously that didn't happen by accident and yet she was the first one to see Jesus risen from the dead we have other saints like saint augustine who was a heretic who was a pagan who lived with the mistress after he experienced the mercy and forgiveness of God he not only left living with his mistress he founded religious communities that take a vow of chastity he not only stopped being a heretic he's a doctor of the Catholic Church probably the greatest theologian was st. Thomas Aquinas in the history of the church so again we have these sinners who experienced forgiveness and then became zealous became champions of our faith one blessed I like to mention blessed Bartolo Longo was a Satan anok priest I mean how bad can you get and then now he's on his way to canonization as a beatified person God willing will become a saint soon so I tell you these examples to highlight especially the gospel we have Zacchaeus Zacchaeus in Jericho and he's short when I was pondering on how short he was I'm thinking maybe for 11 it's hard to say anyways Jesus was passing by and because he was so short he wanted to get a glimpse of him he wanted to see our Lord so what did he do in front of the crowd this short man maybe again maybe below 5 feet he climbs this sycamore tree now there was no there's no clubhouse on this tree there's no ladder coming down so he probably fell if I were to take a guess maybe two or three times to climb the sycamore tree people would have probably laughed at him they probably wondered what he was doing and not only that he was a chief tax collector he was a very rich and wealthy man and people didn't like him because he extorted their money the Romans the Romans depended on these local people to collect the money so they would usually collect more money than they needed so they didn't like him so this short man who's trying to climb this tree I'm sure struggled to see Jesus passed by but we know what happens Jesus says as IKS come down I need to come into your house and he received him with joy and then we know what's the case said I will give half of my possessions to the poor and if I took any money from anyone I will give four times more so in other words he experiences God's love he experiences his mercy and then he makes duration he makes atonement and satisfaction for his sins and not only that he goes beyond that in charity he pays back more than what he took from other people so what I'm trying to get out here is this love covers a multitude of sins this is something that we should apply to our life love covers many sins or even grave sins this is how we honor Jesus especially under his title as Savior you know many times we think as Jesus as son of God he is a son of Mary he is as the Alpha the Omega the beginning and the end the first and the last he is but he's also savior from our sins the last time I checked the primary reason he said I have not come to call the righteous but sinners so this is something that we have to apply to our lives especially as Catholics on our way to heaven love covers a multitude of our sins so there are many Saints that have the highest level of heavens so to speak and they were the greatest sinners because they depended on the mercy of God so a scripture passage Luke 7 47 it states your sins which are many are forgiven for you have loved much but he who is forgiven little loves little so if we don't grasp the mercy of God if we don't have a concept or an understanding we're going to love little it doesn't affect us but in reality every sin took Jesus to the cross whether a venial or mortal sin we took Jesus to the cross and we should be thankful for all that he endured for our sake this is grasping and understanding forgiveness and mercy in our lives that's why he who is forgiven little loves little people that don't understand especially the grace of God applied to our sins they don't really care they're not out there thanking God and saying His mercy endures forever they have an on sensitivity to sin they may go to confession but it's usually maybe during Advent or Lent maybe every six to eight months they don't have a a real sensitivity to sin so this is what God is asking of us especially to think and ponder when we were thinking about something like Zacchaeus and his situation now with this in mind what I want to especially highlight is the art of profiting from our faults I know it may sound a little complicated but it's really not complicated at all as Christians Romans 8:28 in everything God works for the good with those who love him in everything even sin now we have to have the attitude again every sin took Jesus to the cross we need to avoid the near occasion of sin we have to realize that we haven't struggled against sin yet to the point of shedding our blood this is the attitude that we have but if we commit sin by weakness or by imprudence by ignorant by forgetfulness God permitted us to commit this so we can be holier so we could advance in the spiritual life this is the way that Providence works that's how it worked for Zacchaeus that's how it worked for Saint Paul st. Peter God only permits or allows moral evil so we can grow and be holier in the spiritual life it's a concept we can't necessarily grasp completely but we know out of Providence that's how he works so again we have to hate sin but if we commit it God allowed it for one reason or another now if I may I'm going to use an analogy this analogy is imperfect and some of the words I'm going to use it may not even be appropriate for this homily but we have to consider sin like manure sin is like cow poop or like horse poop avoid it it stinks you don't want to step on it you don't want to smell it you want to do it you don't want to have anything to do with cow poop with manure but if it's present one way or another again like sin permissible sin then doesn't manure provide good soil does it not fertilize plants or they can grow does it not help produce fruit that's sin so again avoid it don't smell it don't get near it but if for some reason or another out of weakness out of imprudence out of ignorance out of omission God permitted this sin so we can produce fruit especially humility especially trust the virtue of hope all of these things if we could profit from our faults if we could apply it to our spiritual lives we be great Saints that is the message of today's gospel how's the case this day salvation was given to the case in terms of the gospel this is what God has in store for us so again I'm not telling you to purposely commit sin avoid it like cow poop avoid it but yet if it happens use it to your advantage you know if you if if you really think about it there was no sin we would be out of a job we wouldn't be preaching missions you wouldn't be here preaching about this so again we need to realize that Jesus is Savior many times we don't realize that we don't really grasp or understand it but he's a savior for our sins now we especially give this advice to those who have addictions those who may have addictions to sexual impurity maybe with their self or alcoholics their continued to drink and drink maybe those who are gossips we have these weaknesses that we pray leaves us we don't want it we pray and we ask especially Jesus in the Eucharist for him to take it away but if he allows it if he permits it to happen it's better for us and if it's good for God if it's good for us to be applied in terms of our spiritual life we need to accept it but you know someone like Judas who gave Jesus up for thirty pieces of silver he could have repented he could have relied on God's mercy he could have been forgiven but he despaired and then he ended up hanging himself on the tree this is not what Jesus wants so again we need to realize how to profit from our faults Luke 15:7 I tell you in just the same way there will be more joy in heaven over one sinner who repents than over ninety-nine righteous people who have no need of repentance I don't know if you've ever applied this passage to yourself we usually apply it to people that haven't been to church and maybe 30 or 40 years this happens when we have an examination of conscience every night and asks for forgiveness all of heaven rejoices when we go to God for mercy again Luke 15:10 in just the same way I tell you there will be rejoicing among the angels of God over one sinner who repents you know I recommend reading this book I gave it to the missionaries here in the fathers of mercy how to profit from your faults by Jay dissing a priest a religious priests I highly recommend if you can read that book how to profit from your faults but I want to quote a passage from that book the author states as God he prefers innocence we want to be as innocent as possible but Christians rejoice for as a merciful Savior he has come in search of the guilty he lives only for sinners because it is for sinners that he has been sent his vocation is to be the Savior st. Francis de sel says he is the god of those who are miserable each time we offer him a fault to be forgiven we offer him the title as Savior venerable mother shippou de Sales has stated so if you haven't applied to your life frequent confession I recommend once a month you will grow if you do that in God's mercy you will grow in his humility again have an examination of conscience every night the more we rely on his mercy the more we understand and the in grasp the concept of forgiveness the more we will love you know one of my favorite stories of an early church saint his name was genesis of rome genesis was a comedian and he was an actor and he hated Christianity and at that time there was an emperor that persecuted the church his name was Diocletian he killed a lot of Christians and Diocletian invited Genesius to put up and act a play to ridicule the Catholic faith specifically the sacraments so Genesis was there and he was making fun of the sacrament of baptism he was mocking us Catholics and everyone was laughing the king or the Emperor was laughing Diocletian was having a blast because he was making fun of our church and all of a sudden two angels appear to Genesis and they show him a book of his sins and what it did to Jesus Christ how it sent our Lord to the cross and Jesus gave him an opportunity to repent he gave him an opportunity for conversion and thanks be to God he said yes to that grace this is all while he was acting and ridiculing the faith on stage and he was there he was idle he couldn't move and people still thought that he was acting and this actor priest an actor Exorcist they wanted to mock baptism but he said no do it say the words of baptism by pouring water over me and eventually they did and he had a huge conversion on the spot and he said I'm not joking around anymore he told Diocletian I am a Christian I am a Catholic and I'll do whatever it takes to witness to this faith but Diocletian said if you do this I will kill you are you serious and he said yes so they took Genesis they tortured him and eventually they cut off his head and if you're not aware of it Saint Genesis his feast day is on August 25th and he is the patron saint of actors comedians and clowns a wonderful story as is the case as st. Paul as st. Peter all converted and relied on God's mercy especially for us to understand forgiveness in our lives hopefully we realize that God only permits sin so we can be holier and know where sin abounds grace abounds all the more [Music]

Channel: Fathers of Mercy

Views: 2,928

Keywords: Fathers of Mercy, Joseph Aytona, Zacchaeus, where sin abounds grace abounds all the more, mercy, forgiveness, compassion

Id: Fx32IGzVSl0

Length: 24min 3sec (1443 seconds)

Published: Mon Nov 04 2019