Lesson from Fr. Paulus | Keeping Our Sights Set on Heaven

Dear brothers and sisters, how many times during this past week did you think about heaven? Most of us would probably say, not too many. And yet, that's where we're going. That's our destination, as St. Paul energetically reminds Timothy in today's Second Reading.

If we were on a family vacation, traveling to some beautiful mountain resort, or to the Grand Canyon, wouldn't it be strange if we never spoke or thought about where we were going while we were on our way? Yes, very strange.

And yet, often that's exactly what we do in relation to heaven. And that's extremely dangerous, because it makes us vulnerable to temptations. We more easily turn off the right road when we see an attractive billboard if we aren't thinking about our destination.

This is very much the context of St. Paul's advice to the young bishop, Timothy. Paul has just warned him about the dangers of money. In fact, the previous verses contain that famous phrase: "The desire for money is the root of all evil."

The desire for money can distract us from our destination. Money is a means for achieving worldly success, stability, and pleasure. But all of those things will pass away.

And so, St. Paul exhorts his friend to keep his sights set on heaven, to keep his destination in mind at all times. He encourages Timothy to "compete well for the faith" and "to keep the commandment without stain or reproach" until Christ comes again.

If the rich man in today's Gospel passage had followed Paul's advice, maybe he would have ended up in better shape. But instead, he forgot his destination.

He "received what was good during his lifetime", in Abraham's words. In other words, he let wealth and pleasures distract him from his true mission in life: to love God and neighbor.

St. Joan Schools King Charles

In the 1400s, St. Joan of Arc saved France from being conquered by England. She was just a teenager when God entrusted her with this task. St. Catherine, St. Michael the Archangel, and other saints were sent by God to guide and encourage her. When she prayed, she would hear these saints speaking to her in her heart.

She referred them as "her voices". Finally, she obtained an audience with the rightful King of France, Charles, who had not yet even had a chance to be crowned - that's how badly the war was going.

During this interview she explained her mission, and "her voices". The King didn't believe her at first, but eventually she mentioned some things that only he would know, and she said that her voices had told her about them.

As the King began to believe that she really was sent from God, he became irritated. He told her that if God wanted to save France, he should send the voices to him, the King, not to a mere subject, an ignorant peasant girl.

St. Joan answered, "They do come to you; but you do not hear them. If you prayed from your heart and listened, you would hear the voices as well as I do."

The King wasn't in tune with God. He wasn't listening. He had lost sight of his true destination, and it took an unlettered peasant girl performing a few miracles to get him back on track.

Praying a Morning Offering

How can we do a better job at keeping our sights set on heaven? One simple way is to do what faithful Christians have done for centuries: start each day by offering our works, sufferings, and successes to God, and asking him for guidance.

This is traditionally called doing a "morning offering". It can take less than a minute. But it's a minute well-spent - just as a morning glance at the compass is a wise move for a ship's captain.

A sincere morning offering has two results. First, it gives the right orientation to our minds, our intellects. When you're on a journey, you begin each day by looking at the map, so that you know where to go.

The morning offering does that for our spiritual journey. It reminds us of our destination: communion with God, starting here on earth and lasting forever in heaven.

Second, a sincere morning offering strengthens the decision of our will to pursue that destination. Daily life is challenging. Following Christ has its difficulties. Unless we consciously renew our decision to stay faithful to him and follow him, our resolve will wither away.

Most of us probably learned a morning offering prayer when we were children. Maybe it's time to relearn it, or else to start really meaning it again. It's even something that can be done as a family because the family that prays together stays together.

When we roll out of bed each morning, Jesus is already thinking of us and watching over us with an intense, personal love. Returning the favor by thinking of him is a sure way to build our friendship, even as it helps keep our sights set on our true destination.