“Jesus remains forever” 

That’s what our second reading said from the letter to the Hebrews… 

Jesus remains forever. 

He “has a priesthood that does not pass away.”

I think this is the message the Lord wants us all to hear right now: 

Jesus remains forever. He is the same yesterday, today, and forever. Nothing will ever change the fact that Jesus is Lord. 

This is where all our stability comes from. 

This is our firm foundation:

Jesus is alive.

Jesus is King.

Jesus is Lord.

Jesus remains forever.

It’s a very very simple message, but it’s always the simple messages that sort of get lost in the shuffle when things start to get confusing…

And I’ll be honest with you: 

With the election looming so close now, and with so much tension already in the air… there is very obviously the potential for all sorts of instability and confusion in the coming days and weeks.

So… in response… I sensed the Holy Spirit gently urging me to keep this homily very simple and straight forward this week:

Jesus is Lord.

He has a priesthood that does not pass away… Heaven and earth will pass away, but His words never will. The United States will eventually pass away. The American dream will pass away. Democracy will ultimately pass away…Nothing in this fallen world is going to last forever…

But Jesus’ priesthood will never pass away!

Jesus died once-for-all for sin, and then he rose from the grave victorious once-and-for-all.

It’s a done deal.

And now… Jesus remains forever!

So if you are struggling with stress, with fear, with anxiety… if you’re losing any sleep over the fate of the world. If you’re losing hope. If you are worried about the direction of your family, your kids, your Church, your country, your soul… 

Then I encourage you… to just focus…. and fix your heart… your soul… your mind…and your strength on this basic, unchanging truth… this joyful declaration that is so strong that you can build your entire life on it: 

Jesus remains forever.

You are safe in Him.

As our beautiful psalm put it:  “My God, my rock of refuge, my shield, the horn of my salvation, my stronghold! Praised be the LORD, I exclaim, and I am safe from my enemies!!! I love you, Lord, my strength…”

I love you Lord!

Let’s just pray those words out loud together:

“I love you Lord.”

…We can never say it enough, can we?

One of the scribes came to Jesus and asked him,

“Which is the first of all the commandments?”

Jesus replied:

“The first is this:

Hear, O Israel!

The Lord our God is Lord alone!

You shall love the Lord your God with all your heart,

with all your soul,

with all your mind,

and with all your strength.”

Jesus quotes the Shema prayer — the same words we heard in the first reading today from the book of Deuteronomy.

The Shema prayer forms the bedrock for the Jewish imagination. It’s the most sacred, most cherished foundation. It’s the simplest distillation we find in the Old Testament of what it meant to follow the Living God. It is posted on the doors of family homes. It’s what faithful Jews pray on their death beds. Apparently many recited these words as they marched off to the gas chambers during the Holocaust:

“Hear, O Israel! The LORD is our God, the LORD alone!  Therefore, you shall love the LORD, your God, with all your heart, and with all your soul, and with all your strength.”

These words are also recited at the climax of the liturgy on Yom Kippur, the great Day of Atonement — the holiest day of the Jewish liturgical year. In the Bible, Yom Kippur is prescribed as the one day of the year when Aaron the High Priest would enter into the Holy of Holies — the innermost room of the Tabernacle, the Tent of Meetings — to offer sacrifice on behalf of the entire people of God and sprinkle the blood of a bull upon the Ark of the Covenant itself. 

Aaron would then emerge from the Holy of Holies, and in a special annual ritual, he would then place the burden of all the sins of the people upon the head of a pre-selected goat. He then sent that goat — the “scapegoat” — off into desert, thus carrying all the iniquities of the people along with it.

But this ritual happened every year — year in and year out. It needed to be repeated over and over and over. More and more death… more and more blood needed to be sprinkled… another scapegoat had to be selected year after year… Generation after generation of levitical priests were raised and trained to offer these same repeat-sacrifices over and over…

Why?

Our second reading from the Letter to the Hebrews answers that for us:

“The levitical priests were many because they were prevented by death from remaining in office.”

…It’s as simple as that!

Every priest — no matter how good or how holy he was… eventually got old and died. And so over the centuries, they needed more and more priests…more and more sacrifices.

But Jesus is different, isn’t he? 

He is a priest unlike any other that came before. 

Jesus is the same Yesterday, Today, and Forever…and because he has an indestructible life… “because he remains forever… he has a priesthood that does not pass away.”

This is so key.

Jesus died ONCE and for ALL… and then He rose from the dead never to die again!

His priesthood is, therefore, perfectly sufficient. His priestly act of sacrifice does not need to be repeated — indeed, it CANNOT BE REPEATED…

The Cross was all-encompassing!

It paid for and covered ALL of our sins.

So we don’t have to offer sacrifices year in and year out anymore! The day of PERFECT and DEFINITIVE atonement — the fulfillment of Yom Kippur — has already taken place on Calvary. 

The infinite gap between God and man that sin first created was finally and perfectly BRIDGED by Jesus — the ULTIMATE scapegoat. Death itself was finally put to death!!!

And so now the Sacrifice that we offer — this Holy Sacrifice of the Mass — is not a repetition… but rather it is a RE-presentation of the ONCE-FOR-ALL sacrifice of Jesus.

At every single Mass, Jesus remains forever.

He is both Priest and Victim: He is the one who offers the Sacrifice, and He is the Sacrifice offered.

In every Mass, Jesus loves God perfectly, and He loves us …His neighbors… perfectly. He fulfills the two greatest commandments in one perfect divine sacrifice!!!

What a profound mystery that we get to enter into every single Sunday… every single day!!!

“For as often as you eat this bread and drink the cup, you proclaim the death of the Lord until he comes.”

Jesus remains forever.

You are safe in Him.

Take a deep breath and let that simple message get down into your bones…

Hear it.

Believe it.

Never forget it.

Stake your life on it.

Jesus remains forever.