"Get Real": A Reflection on the Second Reading for November 11th, 2018: Thirty-Second Sunday in Ordinary Time

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Hebrews 9:24-28

24 For Christ has entered, not into a sanctuary made with hands, a copy of the true one, but into heaven itself, now to appear in the presence of God on our behalf. 25 Nor was it to offer himself repeatedly, as the high priest enters the Holy Place yearly with blood not his own; 26 for then he would have had to suffer repeatedly since the foundation of the world. But as it is, he has appeared once for all at the end of the age to put away sin by the sacrifice of himself. 27 And just as it is appointed for men to die once, and after that comes judgment, 28 so Christ, having been offered once to bear the sins of many, will appear a second time, not to deal with sin but to save those who are eagerly waiting for him.

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When Christ ascended to heaven, He went back to reality. This is essentially the message of this passage and many others in the word of God. Eternal life with God is reality because it lives forever; it doesn’t simply exist. We build churches and synagogues and they are holy only partially, and can never be anything more. Now we see in a mirror, dimly (1Corinthians 13).  God can never be fully comprehended. He is a mystery and beyond human understanding. Even the brainiacs among us can never fully explain the Trinity… The Father, The Son, and The Holy Spirit. Not in this life. He is beyond time and space and intelligence, even imagination. He is REAL and our hope as Christians is to “get real”.

"He is REAL and our hope as Christians is to “get real”."

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I’ve been thinking lately of confluence. One of the meanings found in the dictionary is this: an act or process of merging. When I begin to feel anxious about the future, I imagine this wide and immense merging of the spiritual and the physical, this confluence. In my mind I see something like the night sky, vast and endless. I don’t see anyone or anything but I “know” inside this endless reality is my future, and it is guided and supported by the almighty God, the great I AM. I call it “heart knowledge”, and it brings peace.

This Sunday is Remembrance Day, the day we set aside to honour those who gave their lives in war. It is also a time to remind ourselves that we are all going to die, and just as soldiers prepare for battle, so we too prepare for the reality of heaven by putting on the armour of God; loving Him, seeking forgiveness and giving forgiveness, embracing the cross and living the Gospel so that our light shines in the darkness. Death is not frightening. Where my Saviour is, there is hope, and hope does not disappoint. ​

​Judy Savoy

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