I Have Come to Bring a Sword
Matthew 10:34 I have come to bring a sword
Jesus instructed the Twelve as follows: ‘Do not suppose that I have come to bring peace to the earth: it is not peace I have come to bring, but a sword. For I have come to set a man against his father, a daughter against her mother, a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law. A man’s enemies will be those of his own household.
‘Anyone who prefers father or mother to me is not worthy of me. Anyone who prefers son or daughter to me is not worthy of me. Anyone who does not take his cross and follow in my footsteps is not worthy of me. Anyone who finds his life will lose it; anyone who loses his life for my sake will find it.
A sword makes a cut. To be incisive is to make a clear-cut decision.
We must be incisive and decisive, choose God above all things. Cut sin away.
Heaven is not the default setting for humans. We tend to default to sin. Pride, envy, spiritual indifference, anger, greed, gluttony, lust, gossip, resentment, unforgiveness, dishonesty…all of which if we allow them to become habits, vices, which make us vicious and will lead us to hell. This is precisely what Our Lady told us at Fatima on this day in 1917.
In the end there are only two destinations: heaven or hell. God cannot choose for us. We must choose and we make our choice by wanting God above all things by making our thoughts, words and actions match that choice.
Humans default to Heaven
Many have the false idea all humans default to Heaven, except for a few like Hitler and Stalin. On this day, July 13, 1917, Mary gave the three visionaries of Fatima, Lucia, Jacinta and Francesco, 10, 8, 6, a vision of Hell:
As Our Lady spoke these last words, she opened her hands once more, as she had done during the two previous months. The rays of light seemed to penetrate the earth, and we saw as it were a sea of fire. Plunged in this fire were demons and souls in human form, like transparent burning embers, all blackened or burnished bronze, floating about in the conflagration, now raised into the air by the flames that issued from within themselves together with great clouds of smoke now falling back on every side like sparks in huge fires, without weight or equilibrium, amid shrieks and groans of pain and despair, which horrified us and made us tremble with fear…The demons could be distinguished by their terrifying and repellent likeness to frightful and unknown animals, black and transparent like burning coals. Terrified and as if to plead for help, we looked up at Our Lady, who said to us, so kindly and so sadly: You have seen hell where the souls of poor sinners go. To save them, (to save people from going to hell) God wishes to establish in the world devotion to my Immaculate Heart. If what I say to you is done, many souls will be saved and there will be peace.
Pray the Rosary daily; make Sacrifices for the conversion of sinners; Make the Five First Saturday devotions and Consecrate oneself to the Immaculate Heart of Mary
August 19, 1917
“Pray, pray very much, and make sacrifices for sinners; for many souls go to hell, because there are none to sacrifice themselves and pray for them.”
The children took Our Lady’s revelations and requests to heart. Lucia recounted that soon after Jacinta didn’t want to play one day. She told Lucia, “That Lady told us to say the Rosary and to make sacrifices for the conversion of sinners…”
Francisco said a good sacrifice would be going without lunch. Next, Jacinta asked about how long hell lasts, and heaven. Lucia said the idea of eternity made the biggest impression on Jacinta. Thinking about sinners and hell, Jacinta said, “Poor sinners! We have to pray and make many sacrifices for them!” Then she went on: “How good that Lady is! She has already promised to take us to Heaven!”
Lucia described how Jacinta took this matter of making sacrifices for the conversion of sinners so seriously “she never let a single opportunity escape her.”
Along with the Rosary is sacrifice
In A Pathway Under the Gaze of Mary, we learn Sister Lucia wrote to the Bishop of Leiria what the Lord told her. “This is now the penance that our good Lord asks: The sacrifice that all people have to impose on themselves is to lead a life of righteousness in the observance of His moral Law, and to do this to make clear the way for souls, because many judge the meaning of the word penance in great austerity, they do not feel the strength and pleasure to do it and get discouraged in a life of weakness and sin.”
The Lord told her: The sacrifice of each one required is the fulfillment of their own duty and observance of My moral Law; it is Penance that is now demanded and asked.”
She reminded of the sacrifice prayer taught by Our Lady at Fatima.
‘Sacrifice yourselves for sinners, and say many times, especially when you make a sacrifice: O Jesus, it is for love of You, for the conversion of sinners, and in reparation for the sins committed against the Immaculate Heart of Mary.’
And we can also add the Morning Offering that offers up all we do and go through for the day.
St. Thérèse of Lisieux shows that little sacrifices have a great impact — little sacrifices in our daily duties. These simple acts, like being charitable to a rude person, or taking care of a sick child, will bear fruit in graces for others and ourselves.