Offerings Of BloodOf Kings And Prophets : Seaso... [HOT]

Because they have forsaken Me and made this an alien place, because they have burned incense in it to other gods whom neither they, their fathers, nor the kings of Judah have known, and have filled this place with the blood of the innocents (they have also built the high places of Baal, to burn their sons with fire for burnt offerings to Baal, which I did not command or speak, nor did it come into My mind),

Offerings of BloodOf Kings and Prophets : Seaso...

"Therefore you are to speak this word to them, 'Thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, "Every jug is to be filled with wine."' And when they say to you, 'Do we not very well know that every jug is to be filled with wine?' then say to them, 'Thus says the LORD, "Behold I am about to fill all the inhabitants of this land--the kings that sit for David on his throne, the priests, the prophets and all the inhabitants of Jerusalem--with drunkenness! "I will dash them against each other, both the fathers and the sons together," declares the LORD "I will not show pity nor be sorry nor have compassion so as not to destroy them."'"

We come to your, Father, with praise and thanksgiving, through Jesus Christ your Son. Through him we ask you to accept and bless + these gifts we offer you in sacrifice. We offer them for your holy catholic Church, watch over it, Lord, and guide it; grant it peace and unity throughout the world. We offer them for Benedict our Pope, for name of Bishop in local diocese our bishop, and for all who hold and teach the catholic faith that comes to us from the apostles. Remember, Lord, your people, especially those for whom we now pray, names. Remember all of us gathered here before you. You know how firmly we believe in you and dedicate ourselves to you. We offer you this sacrifice of praise for ourselves and those who are dear to us. We pray to you, our living and true God, for our well-being and redemption. * In union with the whole Church we honor Mary, the ever-virgin mother of Jesus Christ our Lord and God. We honor Joseph, her husband, the apostles and martyrs Peter and Paul, Andrew, [James, John, Thomas, James, Philip, Bartholomew, Matthew, Simon and Jude; we honor Linus, Cletus, Clement, Sixtus, Cornelius, Cyprian, Lawrence, Chrysogonus, John and Paul, Cosmas and Damian] and all the saints. May their merits and prayers gain us your constant help and protection. [Through Christ our Lord. Amen.] * Father, accept this offering from your whole family. Grant us your peace in this life, save us from final damnation, and count us among those you have chosen. [Through Christ our Lord. Amen.] Bless and approve our offering; make it acceptable to you, and offering in spirit and in truth. Let is become for us the body and blood of Jesus Christ, your only Son, our Lord. Lord, you are holy indeed, the fountain of all holiness. Let your Spirit come upon these gifts to make them holy, so that they may become for us the body + and blood of our Lord, Jesus Christ. Father, you are holy indeed, and all creation rightly gives you praise. All life, all holiness comes from you through your Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, by the working of the Holy Spirit. From age to age you gather a people to yourself, so that from east to west a perfect offering may be made to the glory of your name. And so, Father, we bring you these gifts. We ask you to make them holy by the power of your Spirit, that they may become the body + and blood of your Son, our Lord Jesus Christ, at whose command we celebrate this eucharist. Father, we acknowledge your greatness: all your actions show your wisdom and love. You formed man in your own likeness and set him over the whole world to serve you, his creator, and to rule over all creatures. Even when he disobeyed you and lost your friendship you did not abandon him to the power of death, but helped all men to seek and find you. Again and again you offered a covenant to man, and through the prophets taught him to hope for salvation. Father, you so loved the world that in the fullness of time you sent your only Son to be our Savior. He was conceived through the power of the Holy Spirit, and born of the Virgin Mary, a man like us in all things but sin. To the poor he proclaimed the good news of salvation, to prisoners, freedom, and to those in sorrow, joy. In fulfillment of your will he gave himself up to death; but by rising from the dead, he destroyed death and restored life. And that we might live no longer for ourselves but for him, he sent the Holy Spirit from you, Father, as his first gift to those who believe, to complete his work on earth and bring us the fullness of grace. Father may this Holy Spirit sanctify these offerings. Let them become the body + and blood of Jesus Christ our Lord as we celebrate the great mystery which he left us as an everlasting covenant. (*Note: In Eucharistic Prayer I, special forms of the paragraph "In Union with the whole Church..." (Communicantes) are provided for certain feasts: Christmas and during the Octave, Epiphany, Holy Thursday, from the Easter Vigil to the 2nd Sunday of Easter, Ascension, and Pentecost. Special forms of the paragraph "Father, accept this offering..." (Hanc igitur) are also provided for use on Holy Thursday and from the Easter Vigil to the 2nd Sunday of Easter.)

All the other direct references to the drink offering in the prophets, bar one, as well as Ps.16:4, refer to idolatrous practices in connection with this offering. Isaiah 57:6, Jeremiah 7:18, 19:13, 32:39, 44:17-19,25 and Ezekiel 20:28 all refer to the pouring out of drink offerings by the children of Israel and Judah to the gods of the nations, provoking Jehovah to judge His disobedient people. Psalm 16:4 tells us that the heathen nations had changed the wine commanded by Jehovah to blood offerings, an abomination to Him, even going as far as to offer their own children in sacrifice upon their alters, shedding innocent blood (Ps.106:37-38). Every blessing that God has ever given to man, man has corrupted. This is true of the drink offering also. We must ensure that all our worship, and indeed all our thoughts, our words and our actions, are all directed to giving joy to God, anything else that aims at pleasing ourselves is like offering drink offerings to false gods, they are an abomination to God. Let us be careful to ensure that all our offerings to God are in a right spirit and according to truth.

Under the kings, this spiritual battle continued. By the time of Ahab and Jezebel, the fertility cults appeared to have the official sanction of Israel's leaders. Ahab, with his wife's encouragement, built a temple to Baal at his capital, Samaria. All the while, prophets like Elijah (which means ? Yahweh is God?), Hosea, Isaiah, and Jeremiah thundered that Yahweh alone deserved the people?s allegiance. It took the Assyrian destruction of Israel and the Babylonian Captivity of Judah to convince the Israelites that there is only one omnipotent God.

The true prophet accords God His rightful place. He is owned as the King of kings and Lord of lords, as the One who 'worketh all things after the counsel of His own will.' He is acknowledged to be the sovereign Ruler of heaven and earth, at whose disposal are all creatures and all events, for whose pleasure they are created (Rev. 4:11), whose will is invincible and whose power is irresistible. He is declared to be God in fact as well as in name: One whose claims upon us are paramount and incontestable, One who is to be held in the utmost reverence and awe, One who is to be served with fear and rejoiced in with trembling (Ps. 2:11). Such a God the false prophets neither believe in nor preach. On the contrary, they prate about a God who wants to do this and who would like to do that, but cannot because His creatures will not permit it. Having endowed man with a free will, he must neither be compelled nor coerced, and while Deity is filled with amiable intentions He is unable to carry them out. Man is the architect of his fortunes and the decider of his own destiny, and God a mere Spectator.

Against these practices Christ had spoken through theprophets. Samuel had said, "Hath the Lord as great delight in burntofferings and sacrifices, as in obeying the voice of the Lord? Behold, to obeyis better than sacrifice, and to hearken than the fat of rams." AndIsaiah, seeing in prophetic vision the apostasy of the Jews, addressed them asrulers of Sodom and Gomorrah: "Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers ofSodom; give ear unto the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah. To what purposeis the multitude of your sacrifices unto Me? saith the Lord: I am full of theburnt offerings of rams, and the fat of fed beasts; and I delight not in theblood of bullocks, or of lambs, or of he-goats. When ye come to appear beforeMe, who hath required this at your hand, to tread My courts?" "Washyou, make you clean; put away the evil of your doings from before Mine eyes;cease to do evil; learn to do well; seek judgment, relieve the oppressed, judgethe fatherless, plead for the widow." 1 Samuel 15:22; Isaiah 1:10-12, 16,17. DA 590.2 041b061a72