Sunday, March 20, 2016

When is Home Not A Home?

The vast majority of us are going to end up in a room that is eighty four inches long, twenty eight inches wide and twenty three inches high. These are the dimensions of a standard casket. It will be the home for our bodily remains. When you think of it, that is not much space. The grave we will be placed into will be about six feet deep and three feet across, that is a total of eighteen square feet of mother earth. Inside of the casket we will return to the basic elements that made up our body and eventually they will leach back into the ground. That is a sad ending for us if that was all there was to it. But as we know, there is more, much, much, more.

Nothing that we have here on earth can come with us to heaven. All of the things we worked so hard for here will be taken by someone else. Our land, our home, our books and other possessions will belong to another. 

This world with all of its beauty, with all of its wonder is not the place we are meant to be. The place we are meant for is a place that even if we let our imaginations run wild we cannot really see what the reality of it is. That place of course is heaven, the place where the Lord God dwells along with the angels and saints. 

Our hearts know this. Even people who worship pagan deities know this. Siddhartha begins life experiencing all good things and soon the sweetness turns to bitterness and he looks for fulfillment elsewhere. Famous saints learn this, some the hard way too. St. Francis of Assisi spent his youth enjoying wine women and song. He tries to become a soldier and realizes that this is not as satisfying as he thought it was going to be. Eventually he embraces poverty and he does so as a man embraces a wife and he was faithful to her his whole life. He found satisfaction in serving God and relying on God for all things. 

Surely we must use the things of this earth. We need the basics, food, drink, shelter, companionship for example. Beyond these basic needs do we have to strive for ever more luxuries land and gadgets?  I am not saying that they are evil in themselves, but they can never be ours permanently because one day we will die and we cannot carry the things of this world with us.  

Maybe we should concentrate more on our relationship with God and His kingdom first and then on relationships with our family and friends. These things will come with us. When we get to heaven our relationships will be restored, we will recognize our mother, father, sister, brother, uncles, aunts, grandparents, everyone we ever knew and they will recognize us. I cannot describe what heaven will be like. The only thing I know about it is that no matter how great I think it will be, it will be infinitely better. Is anything on earth worth loosing heaven for? 

  


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