TEXT: The Holy Gospel According to St. Matthew 28:16-20

The place was on the east side of Jerusalem.  There was a mountain.  It was the Mount of Olives, where the olive oils were harvested in ancient times.  It was used for the anointing of kings ((I Sam 10:1; 2 Kings 9:3) and priests (Leviticus 8:30) and it was even an ingredient in certain sacrifices (Leviticus 2:4).  There on that mountain, Jesus would finally address his disciples.  The Anointed One was about to leave in order to send the anointing of the Holy Spirit.

It is good to belong to the Church that has so many symbols, the charisms, the anointing of oil.  We have the oil of catechumens, the oil of the sick.

It speaks often to my heart of the Mount of Olives, where Jesus departed from, in order that the Comforter might proceed from the Father and the Son, as promised.

May we see this better.  May we also bear our anointing from God as kings and priests of Jesus.  May those also with that special clerical role and anointing of the sacrament of holy orders bear their anointing in the fulness of the Spirit of God, and proclaiming Jesus, may there be many children brought Home to the glory of God and the Holy Church!

Let us hear Jesus.

16  Now the eleven disciples went to Galilee, to the mountain to which Jesus had directed them.

It is Jesus who always directs us to the place that we need to be in order to receive the Gift that he has to give.  It is always the Way of Jesus to do this for us.   We are not called to go anywhere or to do anything, except what Jesus calls us to... we are not our own.  We have been purchased with a price, the broken Body and Blood of Jesus Christ.  He was Anointed to do this for us.  He is the Messiah, the Christ, the Anointed One.

Yet, they went to the mountain where Jesus told them to go.  They obeyed with the obedience of faith.

17 And when they saw him they worshiped him; but some doubted.

Some doubted, but, all obeyed.  Thank God we are allowed to doubt, and, God uses these doubts to make us stronger.

18  And Jesus came and said to them, "All authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me.

ALL authority in heaven and on earth has been given to me?

The more literal translation of this passage from Greek may be rendered -- "And having come to (them) Jesus spoke to them saying, ‘(It) has been given to me all authority (rule, jurisdiction, dominion) in heaven and upon the earth.’ "

The authority is all inclusive.  In fact some manuscripts have heaven in the plural form, "heavens," as it is in Genesis 1:1 and as implied in John 1:3 with the terms that "all things through him became and without him became nothing that became."  (My translation).

This is the authority, dominion, the rule of Jesus!  The Word of God.  Yet, now, the reign of Christ is all encompassing, because the enemy of our souls has been defeated and is on the way out!

It was no mistake that our Lady is seen in Apoc. (Revelation) chapter 12 with St. Michael fighting for her and her seed in the wilderness and that Satan knows his time is shortened!  It is no mistake that a third of the "stars" are cast to the earth.  The Dominion, the Authority, the Rule is all that of Jesus!  Period!

Ergo, the command --

19  Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit,
20  teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age."

We are not orphans.

We are not loners.

We are not by ourselves in some impersonal deistic universe where God is a great "clock maker," and this "god" makes us tick and leaves us to our own devices to sink or swim until we dissolve back into a chaotic state from whence we are molded by the "creator."  No.

We are personally administered and cherished as individuals in the community of faith.

We are the people of God, whom God so loved and gave himself for in Jesus.

We are part of the human race that God still loves and demonstrated that Love to in order that whosoever will believe (have faith) and be baptized in the Name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit might be saved.  We have the privilege of being disciples that become true learners and followers of Jesus.

And, get this, we are called to spiritually reproduce others that we might teach-- "to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age."

And, how is this possible?

It is by these words-- "lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age."

JESUS HAS ALL AUTHORITY in the HEAVENS and the EARTH.  The Spirit of Jesus is with us in the Advocate, the Comforter, the Holy Spirit.  WE may respond now in faith, as a good fruit of the Spirit is faith.  Grace and more graces come.

And, lovingly, Jesus has made our Mother his chief ambassador of graces.  We are her children, the remnant of her offspring...

How fittingly, she shows us this in the Most Holy Rosary of our Lady.

The Resurrection of Jesus is followed by the Ascension of Jesus, which is followed by the Descent of the Holy Spirit on Pentecost, followed by Mary’s Assumption and Coronation in the what? -- the Heaven(s)!  This is the essential message of the last days.

This is the response to the Mercy of God that God desires of us, that we might go where Christ has gone before, even as Mary, our true Mother has gone before, that we might follow the Two Hearts.

He calls, and, he will strengthen!

We are not orphans or alone!

He is the One who Goes before us!

Let us follow Jesus with Maria!



Deus et Sanctissima.