Tuesday of the 31st Week of the Year

While it is important that we never be presumptuous about our salvation, it is equally important that we don’t experience undue anxiety about making it into the eternal banquet of heaven. And so although Jesus warns that none of those men who were invited will taste my dinner, their exclusion is based not so much on their sinfulness as on their rejection of the Lord’s invitation. And especially offensive were the lame excuses cited, and which betrayed their simple disinterest. After all, the purchased field would still have been there for examination after the dinner, the five yoke of oxen could likewise easily have been evaluated after the banquet, while the newly-wedded man could have brought his new bride with him to the feast. To those who earnestly desire eternal life and accept the Lord’s invitation it matters little whether they are spiritually poor, crippled, blind, or lame—heaven is not a reward for virtue but the unmerited gift of a Father’s infinite love. Therefore, we should be less concerned about our worthiness to enter the eternal banqueting hall and more concerned about the intensity of our desire to enter. For it is this desire that urgently and persistently knocks at the door of heaven and we have Jesus’ assurance that to the one who knocks, the door will be opened.