Treasure in Heaven
by Fred Schaeffer, OFS

"Do not store up for yourselves treasures on earth, where moth and decay destroy, and thieves break in and steal. But store up treasures in heaven, where neither moth nor decay destroys, nor thieves break in and steal. For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be. (Mt. 6:19-21)

"For where your treasure is, there also will your heart be"

Some say "Making money, that's what life is all about." No, it is not. Life is all about pleasing God so that we will be able to be with Him for all eternity. That's our treasure in Heaven. In His great creation, God has given us a free will. We can do anything that this ‘will’ can come up with, but such a great gift as a free will, can only be used with awe of God. We need to be grateful for this great gift and use it with responsibility and respect of our Heavenly creator. So what are we doing with our lives?

Some fall in love and get married. Having this free will, we can do that, but have we really thought it out? Some people don't give enough thought to the responsibility of the married life. Men often think that the wife is someone to be ordered about, and their marriage becomes combative, until one of them gives up the fight. Ladies very often spend hard-earned money on beads and trinkets, and those marriages often fall apart, too. But what breaks up relationships isn't family combat or beads and trinkets, but the failure to respect one another. When two people cannot respectfully reason with one another, and achieve compromise, then their marriage will fail eventually. Where was God while your marriage fell apart. Oh yes, He was right there, but you were so involved with throwing about accusations, that you had no time to ask for His advice and consolation. If these words hit a raw nerve, it is not too late to repent and return to the ways of the Lord. Your treasure is not of this earth.

There are many people, whose lives do not turn to relationships and marriage. These are people who, for one reason or another (and sometimes no reason at all), remain single. They, too, have a responsibility toward God. Chastity is really for everyone, but one does not think of that, too often. Our Lord wants us to have a good time, but He does not condone sins that offend him. For some, the life of a single person, is a burden. It doesn't have to be. I've been single all my life. Basically, it began when I felt a vocation to priesthood and religious life. And, true to that goal, I spent some time in religious life, and perhaps as a result, I felt our Lord calling me to devote all the rest of the days of my life to Him and to our brothers and sisters who need Him more and more. We are the arms, feet, and voice of Jesus Christ. This is particularly true of people who follow our Lord closely. Their life is to live the Gospel and share the good News of Jesus Christ with their sisters and brothers. That's what Franciscans do, but also a load of other dedicated people.

Many people also spend a great deal of time in their professions, and I'm particularly thinking of health professionals, doctors and nurses who work many more hours a day than most of us. These people work hard to make all of us better. Then there are far too few religious sisters and brothers, who in their own charism, work to make this world a better world. They do so with prayer and contemplation. There are so many beautiful religious orders for men and women whose lifestyle is a bouquet of flowering roses for Our Lord. Most of us cannot understand their ways, but the "strictness" of the cloister is what keeps their thoughts and prayers channeled toward Heaven and that takes a lot of courage and love. Once I visited some sisters in Massachusetts, the Visitation Sisters of Tyringham. What a lovely community of people dedicated to prayer, adoration, contemplation, and living in a monastic community. This was while I was with the Monks of Adoration*, and we had been on an outing to nearby Stockbridge, where the devotion of Divine Mercy is continually celebrated by the Marians of the Immaculate Conception. Contemplative cloistered religious are a powerhouse of prayer. In that category we can also count the Poor Clares, such as the sisters of Mother Angelica in Alabama. So these people, through a life of penance, and yes, also suffering, have dedicated their lives to Our Lord. They know where their Treasure is.

Secular Franciscans and professed of other lay institutes also know where their Treasure is. Otherwise, most likely, they would not have been asked by the Holy Spirit to join their particular institute. This is a vocation, and vocations are discerned, to find, through prayer, if the call that one feels is from the Lord, or not. If it is from ourselves, and one discerns that God is not asking you to look into a group, then you shouldn't join. A lot of times, you might have a friend or acquaintance who is a Franciscan. And that person might think... My friend would really fit in here. It would be so nice to be able to share with him or her. What your friend then has to determine is a) is God calling me to do this, b) or, is it just my friend. You see, we don't join religious orders or lay institutes because someone else desires us to be there. Also, I've known people to say that they'll join and in time they'll get better at it. That's not how it's supposed to work. And if that's what you did, it will fail. Only you, the person who is discerning a vocation, can, with the help of God, determine what to do in life (and that goes for anything!) - If you know where your Treasure is, it will be a lot easier to discern a vocation. Secular Franciscans are people who, like their Seraphic Father St. Francis of Assisi, are all aglow with enthusiasm. St. Francis was that type of a person. Take a look at the Canticle of the Sun, and you will pick up on his enthusiasm and love for Jesus and Mary. A Franciscan is someone who loves his sisters and brothers (hint - that's EVERYONE without exception) and treats them as he/she would treat him/herself. And, if no material help is available (or affordable), the help is a gift of prayer.

If you know what your Treasure is in Heaven, live for others. Your treasure will increase exponentially.

Fred Schaeffer, OFS
August 19, 2020

* The Monks of Adoration was a contemplative Order of Catholic monks dedicated to Eucharistic adoration/reparation. I joined them in 1998 in Petersham, MA. The Order moved to Venice/Englewood, FL in 2001, and I left the Order in 2002. In 2007, the Order was terminated by the local Bishop, because of insufficient vocations.

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