Advent Daily: The Shocking Cost of Sin: Trading Heaven for Nothing? (Ken & Janelle)

Welcome back to Advent Daily! Today is Monday of the First Week of Advent, and we continue exploring St. Alphonsus Liguori's powerful reflections on sin, grace, and Divine friendship. How seriously do we take sin? Is it a minor infraction, or does it cost us infinitely more than we realize?

Transcript

Welcome back to Advent daily today is Monday of the first week of Advent and we could continue exploring St Alan's daily sermons for Advent hey did you hear about the guy who got a $1.4 million speeding ticket true story his name is Connor kto and he was going through a 55 mph Zone going 90 he got pulled over got a speeding ticket and it showed that he got a $1.4 million fine he assumed that this was a clerical error so he called in and uh lady on the phone's like no that's not an error but you have two choices number one you can come either you pay your ticket $1.4 million or number two you show up in court see the point of giving the high fine was to get all the high speeders in court so when he went to court they reduced the fine from 1.4 million to $1,000 now when I heard this story I thought is that sort of like our life but in Reverse we consider our sin towards God as though these are little minor infractions perhaps equivalent to a, fine when in reality it might be costing us our soul this is at least in the mind of St alonsus who takes sin very seriously when The Sinner deliberate Ates whether he shall give or refuse his consent to sin he takes the balance into his hands to decide which is of greater value the favor of God or some passion some worldly interest or pleasure when he yields to Temptation what does he do he decides that some wretched gratification is more desirable than the favor of God thus it is that he dishonors God declaring by his consent that that a miserable pleasure is preferable to the Divine friendship I wish we could see you know the reality of this you know what our sin looks like versus like what we're giving up when we choose to sin because it's like we're we're trading Jewels for you know animal excrement really but yet at the same time it's like I I can't even like I don't think about that when I'm choosing to sin I I thought about a different analogy okay go for it what's your analog analogy of like the foolishness of a king who has a kingdom and trades his whole Kingdom in for a pig because he wants bacon or a guy who owns a Lamborghini and trades it in for a scooter because it's easier to park these these would be foolish trades but in the mind of St alonsus people have thrown away infinitely more in exchange for much less what is that throwing away the kingdom of of God in exchange for our temporary finite pleasure of serious sin but we don't live our life this way it seems like most of the world is blind to this reality of the seriousness of sin do you ever get the sense that you feel like you're a little bit alone in this worldview that you're the crazy one that you're the foolish one and the the rest of the world is on that right path because the messages of the world keep on coming to you it's like oh that that life of faith is so archaic it's devoid of reason it's even devoid of compassion and love because how dare you judge another person and say how they're living their life is sinful how dare you do that you're judgmental you lack love you're stuck in stone ages we have to progress to progress but you're stuck you know if you it does get tired hearing doesn't it hearing these message over and over again but the more that you hear something the sometimes you start to believe it and so we what we have to remember is that those who live a life of Faith are not the foolish ones St alonsus speaks to this worldlings now regard as fools the Saints who led mortified and humble lives but then they shall confess their own Folly and and say we fools esteemed their life Madness and their end without honor behold how they are numbered among the children of God and their lot is among the saints you have a thought well I was just going to kind of reiterate what you were just saying how I I find even as our kids are getting older I can just feel like the pressures to let them do certain things that I would just I'm I question you know maybe listening to certain music or watching certain shows or attending certain events and sometimes it doesn't always make sense to them or to people around us and and I think we can assume that maybe people are are you know thinking one way about us but I think it's important to just remain always faithful to what God is calling us to and to to not be burdened or worried about what other people think about us because um honestly it's truly about being faithful and not pleasing the masses and the life of faith is foolishness to those who are perishing and in the eyes of the world it is a foolish life if you believe in heaven if you believe in hell if you believe in God if you believe in absolute truths the world says no the truth is whatever I think it is it's a relative thing yeah so you have to have an open mind about things right so open that your brains fall out now the mind is designed to not be so open that it just falls out of common sense it's designed to grasp onto Eternal truths and to onto truths objective truths and so there is without a doubt and you probably get the sense of it that living a life of Faith to many seems foolish I I want to speak to that because some of you are in situations where you're in the minority you do not have a good faith environment your family may think you're a little bit off The Rocker because you're on those rosary beads and fasting your family members might think well why why do we have to go to Christmas mass of all things it kind of gets into the way of opening those gifts up on Christmas Day MH or why are you going out of your way to attend Sunday mass be even if your kids are in a tournament or something like oh Mom wants me to go to mass with her I guess I'll have to do that and you're in those positions where you feel like you're in the minority I'm just going to tell you there's a day coming well everyone will know the truth and we have to do what we can to convince people and win people to Jesus Christ right now just be faithful but if you ever feel like life's unfair and there'll never be that day when people will know the truth no the time is coming where everyone will know the truth in all its Clarity and fullness and everyone will know including ourselves how we responded to that generously or did we reject it there will be no question the greatest punishment of sin for those who live in enity with God is to lose the fear and remembrance of the Divine judgment so this actually reminded me of something that happened when I was about 17 years old I remember having this conversation with a family member and they were talking about um somebody that was really close to them who said that they didn't believe in Catholicism because they didn't want to be left feeling guilty all the time and so basically Catholicism equated guilt and I remember kind of relating with that message you know as a 17-year-old girl just being like yeah I don't want to feel guilty either but at the same time it was like that's how the Lord convicts our heart and sometimes you know maybe we begin feeling you know ashamed of our sin and stuff that's a good starting point and then eventually like as the years have gone on it's like now I feel horrible about the ways that I've offended God because I love him so much and I think that's where God wants to lead us is where we don't want to offend him because we love him yeah the greatest punishment for sin is the those uh who lose the fear of God and lose remembrance of his judgment that that's a that's a judgment that we can start experiencing now and why is that a judgment well if you don't feel bad for sin how can you repent of it Contrition you have to become aware of the offense uh we and we have to be careful that we don't reduce Contrition simply to an emotion um because it's also when we when we sore for sin it's an act of the will and our emotions go up and down but to lose all sense of that that's that's terrible that's a real terrible thing because if you have no sense of sin then you have nothing to confess and then you have no need of a savior I mean you have no sin you have no need of a savior that's that's pretty simple now all of this is not to cause great fear in us but to move us to something greater and that is a Divine friendship and a great friendship way the one who loves us the most that's where St alonsus wants to move us with these Reflections continue continue says the Apostle to live obstinately in sin but in proportion to your obstinacy you shall have accumulated for the day of judgment a treasure of wrath of God but according to thy hardness and impenitent heart thou Treasures up to thyself wrath against the day of Wrath sounds like a mouth say what are you going to say to that s alons is here now making a point that they think is important it's more than just you're in or you're out you're on the left side or the right you're in heaven or you're in Hell he's saying it's more than that the sinner lays up Treasures of Wrath in other words there's an accumulation of Wrath that we can place upon ourselves by our Disobedience and rejection to God and we suffer differ l in Hell according to how we rejected God now other Saints will say that as St Al St Katherine of Sienna for example gets deep into that may that'll be maybe another video but just for our sake today to understand it's it's more than just in or out and it also goes for for heaven that we experience Heaven according to the degree of Merit that we lived our life here on Earth and so we experienced the glory of God to differently and that's just isn't it just that the Blessed Virgin Mary experienced the glory of God differently than Ken and Janelle or at least Canen you know oh that's right and just she who is conceived without sin who is the mother of God who brought forth the savior of the world it's just right and just that she gets the crown Queen of Heaven there's only one Queen of Heaven the point is we experience the glory of God to different degrees in St fosses to his point we can treasure up wrath as well in hell and that we experience that differently as well for those who are lost you can end us with a prayer yeah let's end with a prayer I Repent of all with my whole heart not so much on account of Hell which I have deserved as because I have offended thy infinite goodness I hope for pardon from thee through the merits of Jesus Christ and I hope also to obtain together with with thy pardon the grace of loving thee [Music]