Day 182: The Signs of Bread and Wine (1333-1340)

• It’s Day 182!!

• THE EUCHARIST IN THE ECONOMY OF SALVATION

• THE SIGNS OF BREAD AND WINE

• Remember that term ECONOMY OF SALVATION is the way in which God has redeemed our lives and saved us

• The Eucharist has a very very important place in the story of God’s salvation, the way in which God has saved the world

• We are going to look through all the way back to the beginning of the Jewish people

• What are the ways in which the Eucharist was PREFIGURED?

• What is the way that Jesus gave us the Eucharist?

• What is the way that has been lived out in the life of the Church? 

• Let’s pray!!

Prayer by Fr. Mike: “Father in Heaven, we give you praise and glory. We thank you so much. Thank you for the gift of your Son, Jesus Christ, the Incarnate Word, 2,000 years ago given to us. Eternally begotten of the Father, yet entering into time two millennia ago. We also thank you, that you, Lord, Father in Heaven, continue to send Jesus into our lives. You continue to give us the body, blood, soul, and divinity of your Son at every Mass. Lod God, we thank you, and we can never thank you enough. We praise you, and we can never praise you enough. We worship you, and we can never worship you the way you deserve. But we try. Jesus, you have asked us to do this in memory of you for the glory of the Father in the Power of the Holy Spirit. Help us every time we approach the Mass. Help us to always approach with hearts that have been transformed by your grace, transformed by your Holy Spirit, and are able to worship you the way you deserve to be worshiped and loved. In Jesus’ name we pray. Amen”

• So there we have it!!

• In the signs of of bread and wine, go all the way back to the fruit of the Earth

• Here is the gift of bread and wine that is given to us from the Lord

• We remember this fact every time we celebrate the Mass

• Here is the bread, the fruit of the Earth

• Here is the wine, the fruit of the vine

• A gift of the Creator

• It also goes all the way back to Genesis

• We have the great King-Priest Melchizedek

• Remember Abraham who was still called Abram at this time

• He comes back from the defeat of the Kings and he meets Melchizedek who is the King of Salem which is the King of Peace

• Salem will ultimately be Jerusalem

• Melchizedek goes to Mount Moriah where Jerusalem is

• On top of this mountain he offers up a sacrifice on behalf of Abram

• A sacrifice of BREAD AND WINE

• He blesses Abram and Abram gives him a tenth of everything

• Melchizedek is a King-Priest

• Not every king is a priest and not every priest is a king

• This is a UNIQUE ROLE

• Melchizedek is the very first one we see in the entire Bible

• Think about the FORESHADOWING we see here

• Jesus Christ is the King of Kings

• Jesus Christ is the Great High Priest who is King AND Priest

• What does He do?

• On Holy Thursday He offers up a sacrifice of Himself under the APPEARANCE of bread and wine

• The next day, on Good Friday, He offers Himself up on the Cross

• Where?

• ON MOUNT MORIAH!!

• Right at Golgotha

• This mountain range where Jerusalem is built

• IT IS INCREDIBLE!!

• This connection between the King-Priest Melchizedek who offers bread and wine on top of the mountain and Jesus Christ, our King and Priest who offers Himself on Golgotha on top of the mountain

• ALSO BREAD AND WINE!!

• IT IS JUST AMAZING!!

• Paragraph 1334 says, “In the Old Covenant bread and wine were offered in sacrifice among the first fruits of the earth as a sign of grateful acknowledgment of the Creator. But they also received a new significance in the context of the Exodus: the unleavened bread that Israel eats every year at Passover commemorates the haste of the departure that liberated them from Egypt; the remembrance of the manna in the desert will always recall to Israel that it lives by the bread of the Word of God…”

• Ultimately, this gets fulfilled in Jesus 

• Even before that, Jesus is hinting at this THE WHOLE TIME

• His multiplication of the loaves

• How many times does Jesus do that?

• At least twice that we know of

• What does Jesus do?

• He says the blessing

• He breaks the bread and distributes the loves through His disciples to feed the multitude

• Remember how Jesus turns to the Apostles and says, “You give them something to eat.”

• And they say, “We have nothing.”

• So what happens?

• They give their gifts to Jesus

• The bread

• They give the fish to Jesus

• He takes the bread, blesses it, breaks it, and then gives it to the Apostles to give to the people

• We have this idea in seminal form that Jesus gives us Himself and feeds us

• Jesus feeds us THROUGH THE MINISTRY OF THE PRIESTS

• These Apostles are going to ultimately be ordained priests at the Last Supper

• They are commissioned as priests at the Last Supper when Jesus says, “Do this in memory of me.”

• IT IS SO IMPORTANT FOR US TO REALIZE THIS!!

• Here is how God wants to work

• Yes, Jesus is the one mediator between God and man

• He is the only one who can mediate salvation

• BUT…

• We all PARTICIPATE IN MEDIATION, right?

• If you have ever shared the Gospel with anybody, you have MEDIATED the words of the Gospel

• If you have ever helped anybody, you have MEDIATED God’s grace in a certain way

• This is part of it

• This is how Jesus instituted this priesthood by calling these men and saying, “Ok, I’m going to give to you what you cannot give on your own. And you are going to take what I have given you and give it to the world.”

• At the same time, what we have been talking about in the Eucharist is that this bread and wine TRULY BECOME THE BODY AND BLOOD, SOUL AND DIVINITY OF JESUS CHRIST

• This surpasses all understanding and expectation

• This is a stumbling block

• Paragraph 1336 says, “The first announcement of the Eucharist divided the disciples, just as the announcement of the Passion scandalized them: ‘This is a hard saying; who can listen to it?’”

• Jesus has said, “The bread that I will give for you is my flesh for the life of the world.”

• Before this, He says, “I have bread to give you. That if you eat, you will never die.”

• WE WANT THIS BREAD!!

• “I am the bread of life.”

• Wait, what?

• And then He says, “The bread that I will give is my flesh for the life of the world.”

• They argue and say this saying is hard

• Who can understand? 

• Who can accept it?

• Who can listen to it?

• MANY MANY DISCIPLES LEFT HIM THAT DAY 

• This is John Ch 6

• Many of His disciples return to their former way of life and no longer accompanied Him

• THIS IS A MOMENT OF TRUTH

• Jesus lets them go

• IN FACT…

• After all of these disciples walk away from Jesus and this teaching of the Eucharist…

• This is the ONLY TIME any of Jesus’ disciples have abandoned Him because of one of His teachings

• There are people who rejected Him for other reasons and never followed Him because of His teachings

• BUT…

• This is the ONLY TIME we have a disciple ABANDONING Jesus over one of His teachings

• THE TEACHING IS ON THE EUCHARIST!!

• Rather than arguing and begging them to come back, He looks at the Twelve and says, “Will you also go away?”

• WILL YOU ALSO GO AWAY?

• THIS IS SO KEY!!

• Paragraph 1336 says, “...to receive in faith the gift of his Eucharist is to receive the Lord himself.”

• The opposite is also true

• To REJECT the gift of Christ’s Eucharist is to REJECT THE LORD HIMSELF

• To WALK AWAY from the Eucharist is to WALK AWAY FROM THE LORD HIMSELF

• Because this is the GIFT OF HIS LOVE

• IN FACT…

• THE INSTITUTION OF THE EUCHARIST

• Paragraph 1337 says, “The Lord, having loved those who were his own, loved them to the end. Knowing that the hour had come to leave this world and return to the Father, in the course of a meal he washed their feet and gave them the commandment of love. In order to leave them a pledge of this love, in order never to depart from his own and to make them sharers in his Passover, he instituted the Eucharist as the memorial of his death and Resurrection, and commanded his apostles to celebrate it until his return…”

• THIS IS THE GIFT OF LOVE!!

• Think of how INDIFFERENT we are

• So much of our lives many of us didn’t like going to Mass

• Some of us HATED going to Mass

• Some of us were so bored by what was going on

• WE HAD NO IDEA!!

• Fr. Mike is telling a story about Christopher West so let’s listen…

• Does his story make sense?

• This is the Lord having loved those who are His own and He loved them to the end

• The Synoptic Gospels and 1 Corinthians all have the account of the institution of the Eucharist

• St. John is the only Gospel that doesn’t include the institution of the Eucharist at the Last Supper

• That’s because we have John Ch 6 which is the INCREDIBLE TEACHING OF JESUS at the synagogue in Capernaum where He makes it absolutely clear what Jesus means when he says THIS IS MY BODY

• Spoiler alert…HE MEANS THIS IS HIS BODY

• THAT IS IT!!

• What does He mean when He says THIS IS MY BODY, THIS IS MY BLOOD?

• He means THIS IS MY BODY AND THIS IS MY BLOOD

• WHICH IS JUST INCREDIBLE!!

• Paragraph 1340 says, “By celebrating the Last Supper with his apostles in the course of the Passover meal, Jesus gave the Jewish Passover its definitive meaning.”

• THE EUCHARIST IS THE FULFILLMENT

• The Eucharist is the fulfillment of this massive story of God delivering His people from death and from slavery and giving them life and freedom

• The whole thing fulfills this and gives it its definitive meaning

• Every time we celebrate the Eucharist, we celebrate the new Passover of our Lord

• We are celebrating the New Covenant

• Remember what Jesus says, “This is the New Covenant in my blood. The blood of the new and eternal Covenant.”

• We say this at EVERY SINGLE MASS

• Every time we go to Mass, it anticipates the final Passover of the Church in the glory of the kingdom

• The Saints and Angels already experience this right now

• BUT…

• You and I get a foretaste of that at every single Mass

• We get a taste of the love God has for us at every single Mass

• IT IS SUCH A GIFT!!

• GET TO MASS AS SOON AS YOU CAN!!

• We have the opportunity not only to get there and to be present

• We also get to hear the voice of the Lord giving us the gift of Himself

• THIS IS MY BODY GIVEN FOR YOU

• THIS IS MY BLOOD POURED OUT FOR YOU

• God loves YOU so much

• GOD LOVES YOU SO MUCH!!

• God wants you to know this

• With all your weaknesses…

• With all your failures…

• In your littleness…

• In your victories…

• In your strength…

• In your importance…

• GOD LOVES YOU!!

• I HOPE THAT YOU KNOW THAT!!

• Fr. Mike is praying FOR YOU!!

• Please pray for Fr. Mike and for each other!!

• I cannot WAIT to see you tomorrow!!