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YES, YOU ARE YOUR BROTHER'S KEEPER!
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit! Glory to Jesus Christ! Glory forever!
Cain's infamous question, "Am I my brother's keeper?" has echoed down through the centuries, mulled over by philosophers, distorted by politicians, and twisted into silly jokes by comedians. Did Cain actually think he could pull the wool over God's eyes and convince Him that he didn't know what happened to his brother whom he had just killed? Do we think that the Lord in heaven doesn't know what's happening when we neglect the elderly, sick and disabled by sending them off to nursing homes to forget about them? We secretly know in our hearts what will likely happen: they will die by benign neglect or by "palliative care" - be put to sleep. God knows too!
In St. Matthew's genealogy of Jesus, we read - "Uzziah became the father of Jotham. Jotham became the father of Ahaz. Ahaz became the father of Hezekiah. Hezekiah became the father of Manasseh. Manasseh became the father of Amon. Amon became the father of Josiah" (Matthew 1:9-10). This was the royal line of Israel, descended from King David. Not many of them were good kings, most "did evil in the sight of the Lord." But sandwiched right between two evil kings, Ahaz and Manasseh, we find Hezekiah: chapters 18-20 of 2 Kings tells the story -
"He did right in the eyes of the Lord according to all that David his ancestor had done. He removed the high places, and he smashed the stone pillars; he cut down the poles of Asherah worship and demolished the bronze serpent which Moses had made, for up to those days the Israelites were offering incense to it and called it Nehushtan. He trusted in the Lord the God of Israel; there was no one like him, before or after, among all the kings of Judah" (2 Kings 18:3-5).
During his reign, Hezekiah "drained the swamp" - he got rid of the idolatry, the temple prostitution (Asherah worship), even did away with Moses' bronze serpent that had been distorted into a fetish and the Jews had begun to worship it. He cleaned up the country of Judah. But he failed in one huge area: raising his son Manasseh, who did not follow in his father's footsteps. Instead, Manasseh "did evil in the sight of the Lord" worse than most previous evil kings, re-introducing idolatry, demon worship, and child sacrifice. What went wrong?
Remember back before King David there was a prophet named Samuel. He had a mother, like all of us have. But she wasn't just an ordinary mother: she was special! Her name was Hannah. In chapters 1-2 of the book 1 Samuel, we read how she had been barren, a shameful thing for an Israelite woman. One day, she and her husband went to Eli the priest, and she wept about not being able to have children: "She vowed a vow, and said, the Lord of hosts, if you will indeed look on the affliction of your handmaid, and remember me, and not forget your handmaid, but will give to your handmaid a boy, then I will give him to the Lord all the days of his life, and no razor shall come on his head" (1 Samuel 1:11). What happened here was that she consecrated (or sanctified) her future baby boy, Samuel, to the Lord. She was like the "Virtuous Woman" that Solomon described in Proverbs 31:10-31. Her children would grow up to call her "blessed."
This is the one huge area where not only kings, but also ordinary fathers and mothers are lacking: they don't consecrate or sanctify their children to the Lord like Hannah did. Instead, they want to ensure that their children have a "good life" including the ability to choose whatever they want to do in terms of learning music or sports, choose whatever playmates they want to have, choose whatever courses to study in high school and university. Whatever. That's the American way, freedom of choice, do whatever you want. But by now, this has degenerated into choosing sexual depravity, much like life under the evil kings of Israel and Judah.
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We as parents are our brothers' and sisters' and children's keepers. We are responsible for each other and especially for the upcoming generations, our children and grandchildren. In this present time of pandemic and economic distress, we are especially responsible for each other. Like Hannah, we must sanctify and consecrate our families to the Lord. This means that we must take time to watch out for, care for, encourage, and support each other, especially to pray for and train our children to love the Lord and follow His commandments. In today's world, this means we wear face masks and gloves when grocery shopping or other activities with larger groups of people, we wash our hands, disinfect doorknobs and other surfaces, etc. - all of this not just for ourselves, but also for others around us. We don't want them to get deathly sick, and we don't want them to get us deathly sick. But it also means we don't want them to "be unequally yoked" (2 Corinthians 6:14) with an unbelieving or unfaithful spouse, which often leads to problems: remember King Solomon and his pagan wives.
In Romans ch. 14, St. Paul writes about the question of eating meat that was offered to idols. He says that if we're strong in the faith, we understand that an idol isn't really anything and the meat is just meat, so you can eat it. But... and here's the big exception... if your weaker brother in the faith sees you eating idol-offered meat and he concludes that idol-worship is OK, then you have caused him to sin. And in verse 8, he writes - "Whether we eat or drink, whether we live or die, we are the Lord's." In today's world, we can apply it this way: if you're young, strong, and healthy, you might do just fine if you're exposed to the Wuhan Virus. But then if you carry the virus to someone who's elderly, weak, or unhealthy, they might get sick and die. If you sleep with your fiancee before you're married, you may be pure in your heart and forever faithful unto death, but at the same time, you might cause your weaker brother to fall into temptation and commit fornication with several women. So be careful about the example you set for others!
Then in the next chapter, he writes - "Now we who are strong ought to bear the weaknesses of the weak, and not to please ourselves. Let each one of us please his neighbor for that which is good, to be building him up" (verses 1-2). And in 2 Corinthians 5:15, St. Paul wrote that Christ "died for all, that those who live should no longer live for themselves, but for Him who for their sakes died and rose again." That's what consecration (or sanctification) is all about: not living for ourselves, but for Christ. Sanctification (the Latin root) is the same as holiness (the Greek root). It means to be set apart, to be separated or consecrated to the Lord. In 2 Corinthians 6:17-18, St. Paul writes - "'Come out from among them, and be separate,' says the Lord, 'Touch no unclean thing. I will receive you. I will be to you a Father. You will be to me sons and daughters,' says the Lord Almighty."
Again, St. Paul writes - "Pursue peace with all men, and holiness (sanctification), without which no man will see the Lord" (Hebrews 12:14). If we want our children to be holy, consecrated to the Lord, we must set an example by ourselves pursuing holiness. You might be thinking - "Oh, I can't be perfect, nobody can, so I might as well not try!" That's not what Paul wrote. He said to "Pursue... holiness", or to strive toward it, to try to reach it. True, almost nobody has attained perfect, complete holiness, but many strived and tried to reach out and grasp it. Don't ever think you've attained it, because that is spiritual pride.
In Phillipians 3:12-14, St. Paul writes - "Not that I have already obtained, or am already made perfect; but I press on, if it is so that I may take hold of that for which also I was taken hold of by Christ Jesus. Brothers, I don't regard myself as yet having taken hold, but one thing I do. Forgetting the things which are behind, and stretching forward to the things which are before, I press on toward the goal for the prize of the high calling of God in Christ Jesus." Those who think they've already attained perfect sanctification are only deceiving themselves: "The heart is deceitful above all things, and it is exceedingly corrupt: who can know it?" (Jeremiah 17:9).
Only the Lord knows our heart, we humans are very prone to deceiving ourselves. Only He has the foreknowledge about who will pursue holiness unto the end and will eventually see the Lord: "For whom He foreknew, He also predestined to be conformed to the image of His Son, that He might be the firstborn among many brothers" (Romans 8:29). We might be predestined, but we cannot know it because only God has foreknowledge. Only "the Lord knows those who are His, and let every one who names the name of the Lord depart from wickedness" (2 Timothy 2:19). What will He say to us in the Last Day? - "I never knew you. Depart from me, you who work iniquity"? (Matthew 7:23). Or will He say - "Come, blessed of My Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world"? (Matthew 25:34).
In the name of the Father and the Son and the Holy Spirit! Christ is among us! He is and ever shall be!
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