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Thanks to granny for this post of hope...

QUICKLY! FILL YOUR LAMPS!

Mark Mallett

I RECENTLY met with a group of other Catholic leaders
and missionaries in Western Canada. During our first
night of prayer before the Blessed Sacrament, a couple
of us were suddenly overcome with a deep sense of
grief. The words came to my heart,

“The Holy Spirit is grieved over ingratitude for the
wounds of Jesus.”

Then a week or so later, a colleague of mine who was
not present with us wrote saying, “For a few days I
have had the sense that the Holy Spirit is brooding,
like brooding over creation, as if we are at some
turning point, or at the beginning of something big,
some shift in the way the Lord is doing things. Like
we now see through a glass darkly, but soon we will
see more clearly. Almost a heavyness, like the Spirit
has weight!”

Perhaps this sense of change on the horizon is why I
continue to hear in my heart the words, “Quickly! Fill
your lamps!” It’s from the story of the ten virgins
who go out to meet the bridegroom (Matt 25:1-13).

The ten virgins represent those who are baptized. Five
of the virgins (whom Jesus calls “wise”) bring oil for
their lamps; the other five bring no oil, and thus are
called “foolish.” Ah! Christ warns us: to be baptized
is not necessarily enough. It is not enough to say,
“Lord, Lord…” Jesus says, “Only the one who does the
will of my Father” will enter heaven (Matt 7:21).

James tells us, “What good is it, my brothers, if
someone says he has faith but does not have works?”
(2:14) “Amen, I say to you, whatever you did for one
of these least brothers of mine, you did for me.”
(Matt 25:40). Indeed, one who is baptized is born
again. But if he does not respond to this Grace—if he
returns to the deeds of darkness—he is like one who is
stillborn.

Thus, the oil in the lamps is L O V E.

But one might be tempted to despair at this moment:
“What if I have spent my life in sinfulness,
selfishness, and laziness? I have hardly any good
works! Is it too late to fill my lamp?”

Jesus answers this in another parable where a
landowner pays the same day’s wage to laborers who
started at dawn, and to those who began working at the
end of the day at 5 o’ clock. When the former
complained, the landowner said, “Are you envious
because I am generous?” (Matt 20:1-16)

The only time it is too late… is when it is too late:
when your lungs have ceased filling and your heart has
stopped pumping. Just before dying from crucifixion,
the repentant thief was told by Christ, “Today you
will be with me in paradise” (Lk 23:43). In another
parable, the tax collector who was “greedy, dishonest,
and adulterous…went home justified” because of his
confession: “O God, be merciful to me a sinner” (Lk
18:13). Salvation came to the house of Zacchaeus who
simply caught the glance of Jesus (Lk 19:2-9). And the
prodigal son was embraced by his father on the boy’s
way to ask forgiveness (Lk 15:11-32).

At the heart of each of these “last minute”
conversions is faith—not good works.

For by grace you have been saved through faith, and
this not from you; it is the gift of God; it is not
from works, so no one may boast. —Ephesians 2:8

But it is equally clear that this faith moved each
recipient to repentance; that is, they made a choice
to leave behind their old life and pursue the moral
life which following Christ implies. They were moved
by love. Their lamps were filled to overflowing with
the love which God had poured into them (Rom 5:5). And
thus, because “love covers a multitude of sins” (1 Pt
4:8), they were truly saved.

The generosity of God’s mercy is breathtaking.

But so is His justice. These examples, I believe,
refer more to pagans, and not the baptized. We who
have heard the Gospels, who have the Sacraments at our
fingertips, who have taste and seen that the Lord is
good… what is our excuse?

You have lost the love you had at first... Remember
then how you accepted and heard; keep it, and repent.
If you are not watchful, I will come like a thief, and
you will never know at what hour I will come upon you.
—Rev 2:2:4, 3:3

To us especially the words of James applies: “a person
is justified by works and not by faith alone” (2:24).

I know your works; I know that you are neither cold
nor hot... So, because you are lukewarm... I will spit
you out of my mouth." —Rev. 3:15-16

Faith without works is dead. —Ja 2:26

Jesus follows this warning in Revelations saying, “For
you say, “I am rich and affluent and have no need of
anything” (3:17). In the parable of the virgins, it
says they all fell asleep. Could this be, perhaps, the
sleep that affluence and riches have brought upon the
European and Western churches in particular? “Realize
how far you have fallen”! (2:5)

In the parable of the virgins, midnight did not
signify the immediate coming of Christ; there was
still a short period of delay. I believe this may be
the period which we are entering (however long that
period lasts). What is clear, is that those “virgins”
who prepared for the trial beforehand, were the ones
who made it to the wedding feast.

Hear again the words of John Paul II:

“Be not afraid! Open wide your hearts to Jesus
Christ!”

NOW is the time to get on our knees, to empty our
hearts of all sin, and let them be filled again with
the love of God—giving that love to our neighbour…
that our lamps will not be found empty.

For the clock may be about to strike midnight.

Oh, that today you would hear his voice, 'Harden not
your hearts... —Heb 3:7