long as the temptation lasts. Happy the man who will continue to act in this manner, and shall he found so doing when Jesus Christ shall come to judge him. “Blessed is that servant, whom, when his Lord shall come, he shall find so doing." (Matt. xxiv. 46.)
SERMON XXII. FIRST SUNDAY AFTER EASTER.
ON AVOIDING THE OCCASIONS OF SIN.
"When the doors were shut, where His disciples were gathered together for fear of the Jews, Jesus came and stood in the midst." John xx. 19.
WE find in this day’s gospel that after his resurrection Jesus Christ entered, though the doors were closed, into the house in which the apostles were assembled, and stood in the midst of them. St. Thomas says, that the mystic meaning of this miracle is, that the Lord does not enter into our souls unless we keep the door of the senses shut. "Mistice per hoc datur intelligi, quod Christus nobit apparet quando fores, id est sensus sunt clausi." If, then, we wish Jesus Christ to dwell within us, we must keep the doors of our senses closed against dangerous occasions, otherwise the devil will make us his slaves. I will show Today the great danger of perdition to which they who do not avoid the occasions of sin expose themselves.
1. We read in the Scriptures that Christ and Lazarus arose from the dead. Christ rose to die no more "Christ rising from the dead, dieth no more”(Rom. vi. 9); but Lazarus arose and died again. The Abbot Guerric remarks that Christ arose free and unbound; "but Lazarus came forth bound feet and hands." (John xi. 44.) Miserable the man, adds this author, who rises from sin bound by any dangerous occasion: he will die again by losing the divine grace. He, then, who wishes to save his soul, must not only abandon sin, but also the occasions of sin: that is, he must renounce such an intimacy, such a house; he must renounce those wicked companions, and all similar occasions that incite him to sin.
