[stephenkhoo]

ARE YOU READY TO DIE AND DIE IN PEACE?
SCRIPTURE READINGS: ISA 38:1-6. 21-22. 7-8; MT 12:1-8
http://www.universalis.com/20140718/mass.htm

We can imagine how Hezekiah must have felt when confronted with the prophecy of Isaiah, “Put your affairs in order, for you are going to die, you will not live.” What if these words of the Lord were addressed to you? How would you feel? Would you be shaken and frightened at the prospect of departing from this world and leaving your loved ones, including your wealth? But why should be you be anxious and fearful of death?

Perhaps, because you did not live a good life and your conscience is not clear. As you recollect the history of your life, you may realize that you have lived a sinful, dishonest, immoral and irreligious life, doing all the shameful and despicable things one can think of. Having lived such a selfish and self-centered life, our conscience will condemn us. Our pride will hold us back from meeting God because of the shame in us, especially when we confront our true self and motivations so clearly at death. If not for our pride, we will fear God’s wrath and punishments for our offences.

But suppose you are a good and upright person like Hezekiah, who was truly a good King, why should you be worried about coming before the Judgment Seat of the Lord? With a clear conscience, one should not be too worried about being condemned by the Lord or being punished for our failings.

At least in the case of Hezekiah, we can understand his fears, since the idea of resurrection was in its embryonic theological development during his time. The Israelites believed that upon death, they would be banished to live a shadowy existence, be cut off from God and from others. Death in Sheol was a place of non-communication. That being the concept of death, we can appreciate his fear even if he had lived a righteous life.

But what about us? What reasons do we have to fear death and judgement if we had lived a good life? The truth is that we might fall into legalism like the scribes and Pharisees in today’s gospel. They were so fearful of breaking the laws that they were meticulously obsessed with fulfilling the laws to its letter. Their idea of God was that unless you lived the laws perfectly, God would punish us accordingly. Salvation was through the laws and the merits earned.

When we are legalistic, we become obsessed with the exact fulfillment of the laws of the Church and the gospel. We become overly anxious, scrupulous and always never happy with ourselves. We suffer from SOCD, that is, spiritual obsessive compulsive disorder! We are nervous about whether we have followed exactly the rubrics for the celebration of the sacraments, especially Confession, or in our recitation of liturgical and devotional prayers, etc. So even if we have fulfilled the laws, we are never at peace because we would then say to ourselves that we did not do them perfectly. Or we might say to ourselves that we did not give ourselves fully to whatever we did in prayer, work or in services. The fact remains that whatever we do in word or deed, we can never give full attention, and our intentions are never always pure and unconditional.

As a consequence, we feel that when we meet God at judgment, He will punish us and take into account all our shortcomings and sins, not only of commission but omission. He will examine us according to the strict juridical demands of the laws and mete out to us the necessary penalty that will cause us to suffer in hell or purgatory. With such a concept of an avenging God, we can never love ourselves or Him, for we live in fear of Him and we do everything more to escape punishment rather than out of love. This was the religious mentality of the Jews that Jesus condemned in the gospel. They placed the observance of the laws before mercy and sacrifice. It was necessary for Jesus to remind them that “if you had understood the meaning of the words: What I want is mercy, not sacrifice, you would not have condemned the blameless.” Because if we think that God condemns us, we will end up condemning ourselves as well, and unable to forgive ourselves for our mistakes and negligence. So long as we cannot forgive ourselves, we will hinder God’s love from reaching out to us.

As Christians we should have no reason to be fearful of death or of meeting the Lord at the end of our lives. We should be looking forward to meet the Lord with joy, like St Paul. The gospel reminds us that Jesus is the Lord of the Sabbath. He does not judge us by the laws. He Himself defended His disciples when they broke the Sabbath laws out of need and hunger. The Lord understands our struggles. He does not condemn us. He wants to love us and we to love Him. He is our advocate before the Father whenever we sin. He comes to take away our sins by assuring us of His Father’s love and mercy.

Furthermore, we know that death is not a total loss of communication. We believe in the immortality of the soul and the communion of saints. We also believe in the resurrection of the body on the last day so that our communion with each other is perfected. So death is not the end of life or the cessation of union. On the contrary, in spirit, we are now more deeply in union with each other in Christ. So long as life and love continue, communication is present.

Finally, regardless of how many more days or years we are left with, does it mean then we do nothing; that we continue to live our sinful life since all will be forgiven when we die? This would be presumptuous. If we are sincere about the love of God and His mercy, we must cooperate with His grace.

We must not take Him for granted because a day will come when we have to give an account of ourselves. Not that God will punish us but our sins will separate us from Him. We will be too proud to ask for forgiveness, unlike Hezekiah who “shed many tears” imploring the Lord for mercy. We would be so deep in sin that we cannot feel for Him or desire Him. Even now, when we are living in sin, we find ourselves unable to feel His presence and love even when we try to pray. In time to come, we give up praying all together and allow sin to consume us till we rot in misery in the consequences of our actions. But if we now seek to deepen our life with Him, we will be able to come to Him with confidence in His mercy when we die, knowing that in our imperfections, He will still accept us and love us.

Written by The Most Rev William Goh