For your name to become known in heaven you have to put in your mind that you are Christ’s Disciple, and you have to put heaven as your number one priority.
To enter heaven, we have to go through 3 stops in our lives. First of all, in the old testament we were not allowed to enter heaven. It was closed off to everyone even the saints at the time. Throughout the lives of the saints they loved to walk with God and did what pleased him. So he would give them according to their deeds, but when the moment of death came they would be terrified. They know that after they die they would descend to hell, but through the cross of Christ he opened for us this door. Now instead of death being a terrifying thing in a person’s life, it has become a desire for all the good and holy people. The person that has his eyes set on heaven will find himself always craving to go and he thinks of all the people that have departed to heaven wishing he was one of them.
First stop of ”I want to go to heaven”:
“anyone who loves his father or mother more than me is not worthy of me; anyone who loves his son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me”-Matthew 10:37
If anyone comes to me and does not hate his father and mother, his wife and children, his brother and sisters yes, even his own life he cannot be my disciple. -Luke 14:26
Number one Is Love! If you want to enter Heaven, let your love for God be number one. Your love for God has to come first before all of the other people mentioned in the versus above. Also because of your love for God you love your parents, brothers, sisters, wife, children and also yourself. Christ always likes for us to cover all our love for others with his love. That’s why when the disciples came to him and told him your mother and your brothers are outside waiting to see you he didn’t leave the gathering to go see them. Instead he responded to them saying “My mother and brothers are those who hear God’s words and put it into practice”. -Luke 8:21
We need to learn that love is the best way to get into Heaven…
Second Stop “Taking up your cross and following Jesus”:
“And anyone who does not carry his cross and follow me cannot be my disciple”. -Luke 14:27
Why the cross?
The cross was a way to discipline the Jews used by the romans. They would make them carry the cross that they would be crucified on (Just like they did with Jesus Christ). This would be seen by many and spread fear in all the Jews.
God said to enter heaven you also must bear your cross… how?
It could be an illness, or maybe you have a difficult person in your life. Maybe it’s a problem that has no solution. Whatever your cross may be you have to bear it. Thank God for the cross he gave you because there are others out here who are not able to bear their cross. To be able to live a life of holiness you have to pay the price, nothing is for free.
I would like to tell you a short story that happened…
There was a married couple who were in an argument. This argument kept getting bigger and was very hard to resolve. The problem was handed to the Magles El Ekelriki but still they could not solve it. It was then handed to the priests of that country. The couple went in together into the Bishop’s office. The wife was wreaking a chapel veil on her head while she entered. The Bishop sat with the couple for about 2 hours trying to solve the problem but it still wasn’t solved. The husband because of his anger and frustration he would hit her a lot. The Bishop told him that what he was doing was very wrong and he shouldn’t treat her like that. The husband got very frustrated at this and picked up a chair to hit his wife with in front of The Bishop When he was near to hitting his wife with the chair, she took off her head cover and asked the Bishop
“do you know why I’m wearing a head cover right now?”.
He asked her “Why Daughter?”
She answered and said “the chair that I’m about to be hit with is number 6, before it was only five marks on my head because there were 5 other chairs before this one. I’m thankful to be bearing this cross because I want to enter heaven together with him and our children.”
When the man saw what she was doing, how she put her head down to receive the hit with the sixth chair, he fell to her feet and promised in front of God to be a Servant to her from now on.
Truly his wife would say he fulfilled his promise the rest of his life until he departed to heaven.
Third stop “Payment ”:
Of course no matter what we do we won’t be able to repay Christ for what he did for us. We can’t say I submit myself to God to repay him for what he did. The blood of Christ is more valuable than everything and everyone in the world combined.
What do we mean by payment… for example if you are building a sky scraper and you didn’t do the calculations to find out how much it’s going to cost… What did Jesus say will happen?
He said people will pass and see that you didn’t have enough money to continue constructions and they will surly laugh at you.
Another example: if a King was about to go to war doesn’t he first need to sit down and calculate if he will be able to gain victory with the 10,000 he has over the 20,000 he is going against? Will he be able to or should he try to make peace?
The first example was the sky scraper. God wants us to plan so that we may be able to keep getting higher and higher in our spiritual life without running out blocks to keep building. Someone might ask why did Jesus say sky scraper instead of saying a 5 or 6 floor building. The answer to this is simple, it’s because the higher you build your sky scraper the easier it will be for you to see and detect the trickeries of the devil under you. This is the reason the saints know how the Devil thinks and how they know what he’s thinking before he thinks it.
There was a monastery that had about 90 monks and all of them were saints. They spent their time praying and praising God. The devil was angered by them and wanted to plot a scheme to turn them away from God. The Devil set up a meeting for the demons to meet together and discus how to stop the priests from praising God all the time. During the meeting one of the Demons said “leave it to me, I will scare them with some lions and terrifying noises in the wind that will surly scare them off”. The leader replied saying “we’ve tried it before many times and it didn’t work, the monks did the sign of the cross and burned off a third of our army. Another devil said “since they are monks lets fill their heart with lust”. The leader also told him” we’ve tried it before and they burned the rest of the army”. Then a younger one stood up and told the leader to let him handle it. When asked what he’s going to do he replied saying “just watch”. The little devil went to the monetary disguised as a humble young boy seeking to become a monk. The monk at the door told him that there will be a long period of testes that he will have to pass first. The devil replied saying “do whatever pleases you”.
He passed all the tests. If someone was to curse at him he would stay quiet, if someone hit him he would keep quiet, and if someone disrespects him he would let it pass. The Monks became very confused about the situation.
Every Sunday there would be a meeting for all the monks come together and talk about their spiritual life the past week. Every week it would be someone’s turn to give a sermon. One time he was complementing the Monks and telling them how spiritual they are. Then they told him why don’t you give the sermon next week? He froze and started to panic. what am I going to talk about? he taught to himself. So he replied to the Monks saying “I can’t do it I’m the least of you all I’m not worthy” but the Monks insisted. When the day came to preach he just talked about their spiritual life saying “it’s full of Praise, prayer, and reading the Holy Gospel, you guys are really lucky” and that’s where he ended. After this he asked “why not spread your holiness to the rest of the world?” the Monks asked how this was possible. the devil insisted on going out in to the world and serving. The Monks said to him there are already Father priests that serve in the world. The devil replied saying “but they are not at the same level of spirituality. Let’s all go into the world, get married, and serve God their”. The Monks started to become convinced with his ideas so they went immediately to the leader of the monastery to ask him.
The Leader of the Monastery (the Bishop) was a very high skyscraper. Meaning his spiritual level is very high and he can detect that the tricks of the devil. He went out into the desert to pray and tell God that Monastery is in trouble, “who is he that came and brought these ideas to the Monks? Lord please do something”. He spent about three hours in the desert praying and after he was exhausted so he stayed to relax for a bit. While he was sitting by a bush he heard cheering behind it. He looked over and saw the meeting the Devils were having. God permitted for him to see them but for them not to be able to see him. He heard them saying “great job, you did it, only a couple more days and the monks will leave and stop destroying our army and annoying us with their praises”. He saw that all that was being said to the young devil that was deceiving the Monks. The leader of the monastery said to himself “now that I know it’s you than there is no other solution than the spirt of God to deal with you personally”.
“For our fight is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms”. -Ephesians 6:12
The upcoming Sunday, the Leader of the Monastery came and said I will be choosing who will be serving in the alter. He chose a couple of strong Monks and among them the little boy who was deceiving them. The boy refused saying “I cannot go in there” but the Leader responded and told him “we will not grant your requests if you don’t go inside”. So they brought him to the place of communion not actually inside the alter and the liturgy went on as usual until “The Epiclesis”. The Bishop stopped the liturgy and said “if the boy doesn’t come into the alter now I won’t continue the liturgy”. They asked why but he told them it had to be done. He said “weather he comes in dead or alive, by force or without, that’s not my problem. All that matters is that he enters the Alter while the Holy spirit is among us”. When the liturgy resumed and the Holy spirit came the boy started to yell, scream in furious voice. Than a terrible smell came out of the boy along with smoke and the devil was taken out.
They all thanked God for revealing to them the tricks of the Devil.
The second example was the king and his soldiers. If I have an army of 10,000, the number 10 and the king in front of me has 20,000, the number 20. The thousand represents Heaven. Than what does the 20 represent? The 10 represents the ten commandments. When the devil comes to war against me he will fight against me with the ten commandments using something called “Hits from the right”. He will make me see myself as a good person. So when I come to judge myself I say I’m good, I go to church, I pray, I read the bible, I’m better than him or her, and I’m a servant. The devil is trying to convince us that we are good people that we don’t need the blood of Christ and that we don’t need his forgiveness.
We should always evaluate ourselves… are we going higher or getting lower? Are we winning beneficiaries and losing sins or are we are gaining sins and losing beneficiaries?
We can’t just find the Priest at church and say it’s a good time to confess because I don’t know when I will see him again or if I will be busy to come. while waiting to confess we sit around with our friends busy talking to each other and when you go into confess you just say I curse, steel, lust and etc… that’s not confession that’s just sharing stories. Before confessing you need to sit yourself and evaluate yourself for a day, to see where you are in your spiritual life. This is what true confession is.
In conclusion to enter heaven there is 3 stops: Number one “I want to go to heaven” number two “taking up your cross and following Jesus” number three is “Payment”.