As our Gospel today clearly demonstrates, Jesus was and is\nthe real thing- God himself. Jesus\nhealed the sick, cast out unclean spirits, and worked miracles no other earthly\nman could do. And Jesus drew crowds from\nall over the area because of the authority and truth of his message. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But Jesus\u2019 earthly ministry ended in the self-sacrifice of the\nperfect God made man on the cross on behalf of all of us. It was a sacrifice that atoned for all of our\nsins and earned salvation for all of us. \nThe proof of our salvation was his Resurrection and his promise of\neverlasting life to all who believe in him as passed on by the witnesses to his\nResurrection.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Paul\u2019s message to the Hebrews this morning was all about the\nsalvation process. It is a lesson all of\nus should heed as well. Paul talks about\nit in terms of priesthood. But in Paul\u2019s\ndays, priests attained their priesthood by birth. According to their law, only those who were\ndescendants of the Levite tribe could be priests. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
They offered animal sacrifices year after year in atonement\nfor their sins on the day of atonement. But\nthese sacrifices were made by imperfect people- people who died and had to be\nreplaced. And these animal sacrifices obviously\ncould never properly atone for their sins and those of the people before\nalmighty God. They were just a gesture\nof humility and sincere intent to be contrite; they were a remembrance according\nto the law; they were not a messianic or saving event. And in fact, the Jews are still looking today\nfor their Messiah. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Paul then points out that Jesus Christ acted as our priest,\nthe perfect priest. Jesus, who was and\nis sinless, lives forever and his sacrifice was and is acceptable to the\nFather. Just like Melchizidek, Jesus is a\npriest, a prophet, and a king. He does\nnot have any of the shortcomings of previous priests. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Now Jesus Christ wanted us to participate in the salvation\nhe earned for us by providing us with persons who could act as a high priest\nfor him. And so, he handed on to his\napostles the priesthood at the Last Supper. \nWe provide bread and wine, fruit of the vine and work of our human hands\nat each Mass. They symbolize our willing\nparticipation in the Mass, our willingness to sacrifice ourselves. Every time one of our priests offers that\nbread and wine and consecrates it as Jesus did, then Jesus self-Sacrifice is\nmemorialized and is offered again to his Father on our behalf. Jesus told us to do precisely that- in memory\nof him. We are present as witnesses to\nthat event at each Mass and we partake of the body and blood of Christ to\nvalidate our belief. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
That is what is so important about our Mass. It is not just a forum for worshipping God; an\nevent held in a special place where God\u2019s word is proclaimed and affirmed and\nwhere the congregation says to God that they believe in him and praise him. Of course, the Mass is all of that too. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
But rather, the Mass is a continuation of the salvation\nevent itself. Because just as Jesus promised,\nthe bread and wine become His real body and blood. So, the Sacrifice of the Mass is our way of\nparticipating in the original offering to the Father. <\/p>\n\n\n\n
Yes, Jesus Christ is the real thing. And so is the Mass and the Eucharist\nconsecrated by our Priest. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
St. Francis de Sales Thursday of the Second Week in Ordinary Time Heb 7: 25b \u2013 8:6; Mark 3:7-12 Deacon Larry Brockman As our Gospel today clearly demonstrates, Jesus was and is the real thing- God himself. Jesus healed the sick, cast out unclean spirits, and worked miracles no other earthly man could do. And […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[5],"tags":[560,559],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1088"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1088"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1088\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1091,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1088\/revisions\/1091"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1088"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1088"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.deaconlarry.org\/blog\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1088"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}