September 12, 2004: God Left the Lights On For You

The Twenty-Fourth Sunday in Ordinary Time



I want to start today by asking you to imagine a hypothetical situation; at least I hope and pray it’s hypothetical for you! Imagine that someone close to you betrayed you big time — really stabbed you in the back. Maybe it’s a wife who cheated, or a so-called best friend who blabbed some big secret to someone else, or a brother who turned you into the IRS… something along those lines. My question to you is this: what would it take to forgive this person so completely that not even the slightest trace or memory of the hurt and betrayal remains?

I think I’d be safe in saying that there’s not one of us here today who could do that with human power alone. With our sinful human nature, we tend to hold onto painful memories and experiences.

But God, on the other hand, does just that: He is willing and eager to forget all the terrible things we’ve ever done to Him, to others, and to ourselves… and I mean really forget them — as if they never occurred. This kind of forgiveness is so unlike our own, that I think most of us don’t even begin to understand what God’s mercy is like.

Jesus spent His earthly ministry trying to convince people of this — and a lot of the time, it was like talking to a doorpost. Folks just didn’t get it.

In today’s Gospel, we listen in as the Lord uses a couple of amazing examples to illustrate for us what God’s mercy is like. We hear that God will track and hunt down a single lost sheep from his sizeable flock until He finds it. Then we learn that God will turn the house upside down searching for a single coin from his vast treasure until He retrieves it. How many sheep does God have? Yet He still cares about the missing one. How much wealth does God have? Yet He won’t give up on one tiny coin.

Until He finds it. Until He retrieves it. Do you hear this incredible promise? God will never, ever, ever give up on you or any of His children as long as they walk this earth. We may push Him away — at times violently — but He is so patient with us, as St. Paul says today. In His pursuit of the lost sheep or lost coin, God will wait and keep trying.

Sometimes you hear about some fellow in love who gets rejected. In an attempt to win back the one he loves, he may humiliate himself and stoop to any depth to prove his love and reconquer her heart. No personal sacrifice is too great, and no embarrassment too difficult to bear, because of his persistent love.

God is exactly like that, too — even more so, in fact! We may have rejected Him by using our free will so stupidly, but the Lord eagerly tries every approach to win us back to Himself.

In the Old Testament days, God’s special people, the Jews, were headstrong and out of control. Despite God’s love and blessings, the children of Israel often responded like spoiled brats. Look at the event that the Book of Exodus describes today. God commanded Moses to go back down Mount Sinai, because the people had built themselves a golden calf idol to worship — the ultimate act of unfaithfulness and betrayal to God. The Lord said to Moses, “I am going to destroy this people and start over!”

Do you think God would really have carried out His threat? We’ll never know, of course, but it makes you wonder whether God was acting like any parent who sometimes uses threats to give kids a jolt and bring them back into line.

That time, Moses interceded for his people, and God backed off on his threats. But over the centuries, God’s chosen people continued to fall again and again. With unimaginable patience and mercy, God put up with it all, biding His time.

And when the time was full, as Scripture puts it, God sent His Son to the world as the culmination of His plan to draw us back. Through His suffering and death, Christ won for us an absolute guarantee of forgiveness for anything and everything we’ve done… IF only we ask for it. Can you imagine? The slate wiped clean! That sounds too good to be true, but it isn’t. They don’t call this the “Good News” for nothing!

Well, how do we ask for God’s mercy? We’re still a stiff-necked people so set in our sinful ways! Look what St. Paul says today: “I was once a blasphemer, a persecutor, a man filled with arrogance…”

We have to make the same kind of admission! We have to sit down in front of the Lord — someplace where it’s quiet and there’s no TV or radio blaring, no people trying to have a conversation — and examine our life and our conscience to see the sinful and offensive things we have done or failed to do. And we need to bring them before God with remorse and courage and say, like St. Paul: “Lord, I am so sorry, because I was once a …..” — you have to fill in the blank. And no matter how wicked you once were, God will forgive you. Just bring it all to confession.

The longer we let things pile up on our soul, the heavier the burden becomes and the more likely we are to despair of God’s mercy. We think, “Oh, God would never forgive me for everything I’ve done!” It reminds me of an old story you may have heard.

There was a teenager who was always having terrible fights with his parents over the usual things that parents and teenagers squabble about. Well, the arguments escalated and finally the boy walked out… ran away. For weeks he hitchhiked around, doing odd jobs here and there to earn a few bucks or a meal, sleeping wherever he could. He finally wound up in the city in some fleabag hotel. And that’s where the reality hit him of what he gave up. Like the prodigal son, he decided that he would swallow his pride and ask to come home — even though he feared that his parents wouldn’t have him back.

So he wrote his parents a letter, telling them that he wanted to come home. But very bravely he added that if they wouldn’t have him, he would understand. He wrote that he would be coming through on Tuesday night. He told them if they wanted him to come back home, they should leave the front porch light on as a signal. On the other hand, if they left the light off, he would just keep on going and never bother them again. Fighting back a tear, he dropped the letter in the mail.

On Tuesday, he hitchhiked back to his home town. He asked the fellow who was giving him a ride if he’d mind driving past a certain address, and the driver agreed. As they approached his street, the boy had to turn away; he couldn’t look. He said to the driver, “Please, do something for me. When we pass the blue house on the right, number 318, just tell me if there’s a light on on the porch.”

As the car approached, the driver said, “You better look at this.” But the teenager said, “Please just tell me.”

“No, you better look yourself,” said the driver. And when the boy turned, he saw a sight he never expected. Not only was the front porch light on, but there were bright lights burning in every single window of the house! With tears streaming down his face, he ran up the steps, assured of the love he now wanted so desperately.

That feeling of relief, of ecstatic joy and peace… you can have that, too! That’s the merciful love God offers you today. Open up your heart to Him. Go to confession and let out all the old poison. It will be easy to find your way. You see, God left all the lights on for you.




Today’s Readings:
Exodus 32, 7–14
Psalm 51
1 Timothy 1, 12–17
Luke 5, 1–32