4 Last Things

(Forewarned is forearmed)

When a man puts things under consideration he ought always to consider where it eventually leads to. A Latin adage has a point to guide us to when it states: Finis est super omnia (the aim and objective is always foremost in consideration).

Should it be money, as the world does? Of course not! God’s word warns us: “The love of money is the root of all evils” (1 Tim. 6:10). That is what happens many times when people aimlessly move in our world, not for the good of humanity, but just because they want to make more money. They don’t care whether their pursuits are right or wrong, because what’s important for them is their ambition for more and more money. Jesus already warned us: “No one can be the slave of two masters…You cannot be the slave of both God and of money” (Mt. 6:24). St. James in his letter to the Christian people had this to say: “Don’t you realize that making the world your friend is making God your enemy? Anyone who chooses the world for his friend turns himself into God’s enemy.”(Jas.4:4). When your structure is enslaved to money, that will tend towards its own nemesis, i.e. self-destruction.

You look at world reality. The four last things no man can escape: Death, Judgment, Hell, and Heaven. The last two to which Jesus refers as the very last you can find in the gospel of Matthew chapter 25, verses 31 to 46. Jesus tells us they refer to man’s eternal punishment in Hell or eternal bliss in Heaven, depending on his behavior here on earth. This is what Jesus talks about when He gives a word of warning to people who tirelessly enslave themselves to the passing world. “What, then, will a man gain if he wins the whole world and ruins his life? What has a man to offer in exchange for his life?” (Mt. 16:26). “The Son of Man is going to come in the glory of his Father with his angels, and, when he does, he will reward each one according to his behavior” (Mt. 6:27).

Consider what one business analyst once said, Robert Townsend, a follower of Peter Drucker, who wrote the bestseller: “Up the Organization.” He has some practical angles, even if he speaks in the purely business field. “Money, like prestige, if sought directly, is almost never gained. It must come as a byproduct of a worthwhile objective or result which is sought and achieved for its own sake.” If that principle is essential in the monetary world, how much more in the matter of the eternal salvation of our souls. “Seek ye first the kingdom of God and His justice and all other things will be given you as well” (Mt. 6:33).

Why did Jesus have to suffer so much? Answer: to save us from everlasting death: the eternal fires of hell, and to bring us new life by His grace and enjoy everlasting happiness because of a life of true conversion and humility. To the proud and unrepentant, St. Paul who was once a Church persecutor but converted and became an ardent apostle of Jesus Christ has this rigid warning in his epistle to the Hebrews: “It is a dreadful thing to fall into the hands of the living God” (Heb. 10:31).