ALL ABOUT CHRISTMAS: Christ Mass

 

THE DEATH MASS

 It is Christmas. The ‘Christ’ in that word comes from scripture. God in the flesh is called ‘Christ’ (Mat 1:16) and He was called ‘Jesus.” Pilate called Him both ‘Jesus’ and ‘Christ.’ The point is that Jesus is without a name; He is God with us, or ‘Emanuel.’

No matter how anyone looks at the man, He remains God. As such He called Himself the ‘Son of Man’ and the ‘Son of God.’

The Christ is therefore God in the flesh of a person. Jesus is the One and only God. He is as much God as the Invisible God. He is not three different Persons but the one Person of the Holy Trinity. However, the other substances are as much ‘God’ as Jesus. He is the Invisible God who was revealed to mankind… “He was manifested to take away our sins; and in Him is no sin” (1 John 3:5); “The Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil” (1 John 3:8).

That resoundingly identifies Jesus as both God and the Christ. This day is His holy day. It symbolizes the event in history when God confronted the Devil, and he was His to do with as He might. Jesus was born to destroy the devil, but to do so, He first would destroy Himself.

Judas committed suicide to rid himself of Satan who had entered him (Luke 22:3). If he had only waited for God’s time when God sacrificed Himself to destroy the Devil, then Judas would have been saved.

Christ served His purpose and died, and many saw it, among them Longinus, “When the centurion, which stood over against him, saw that he so cried out, and gave up the Ghost, he said, ‘Truly this man was the Son of God’” (Mark 15:39). Jesus proved who He claimed to be by dying. The Christ is God and no other. Only by that Name are you saved.

Jesus said, as He gave up the Ghost, “It is finished” (Mark 15:39). What was finished? For what reason did God visit Earth in Person? Why was He born?

“’He said, Father, into your hands I commend my Spirit:’ and having said thus, He gave up the Ghost” (Luke 23:46). The key word there is ‘commend.’ The purpose for which Jesus was born was to commend His Spirit. By commending His Spirit, Jesus served Himself as the holocaust, in place of in the Old Testament, a burnt offering.

Now back to the ‘mass’ part of Christmas. It is from the Latin, ‘missa,’ meaning a dismissal, or to send or dismiss (Douglas Harper 2001-2023).

The Catholic version of mass is for the dismissal of the congregation, and the ‘mass’ is more so about a massive number of people who are dismissed from the assembly wherein first the word is read (the liturgy), ending in prayer, and the congregation dismissed as they partake of the elements that were served at the Last Supper — the bread and the wine, or in their vernacular, the Body and Blood of Christ.

Catholic Mass is representative, being symbolic. However, is there a deeper meaning as well?

The statement, “It is finished” at the Crucifixion of Jesus was a sort of dismissal, or ‘mass.’ His service began with His birth and the mass was the Crucifixion, much more so than the Last Supper tradition.

When Jesus said, to the Father, “Into your hands. I commend my Spirit” that was the finish of His life, and the missa, or mass. Then, what happened? “One of the soldiers with a spear pierced his side, and forthwith came there out blood and water” (John 19:34). His side… of His Body, was the so called, ‘Bread,’ that was sopped with His Blood, or ‘Wine.’

Therefore, Christmas is as much about the death of Jesus as His birth. It is His death that should be celebrated for He was born to die — that was the funeral mass (missa), so to speakl 

After these things God said unto Adam, "You did ask of Me something from the Garden, to be comforted therewith, and I have given you these three tokens as a consolation to you; that you trust in Me and in My covenant with you. For I will come and save you; and kings shall bring Me when in the flesh, gold, incense and myrrh; gold as a token of My kingdom; incense as a token of My divinity; and myrrh as a token of My suffering and of My death. (Adam & Eve 31:1-2)

 Those three gifts came from centuries before and given to Jesus at His birth.  Just as the bread and wine were tokens of the body and blood of Jesus, the three gifts were tokens of the Kingdom of God, His Divinity, and His suffering and death, respectively. Jesus was born to die, and even the myrrh was significant. The myrrh was the missa, or mass.

Myrrh is an analgesic to ease the pain of suffering. It’s root means “bitter.’ The Egyptians were embalmed with myrrh before the time of Jesus. The production of the myrrh has great significance: 

When a wound on a tree penetrates through the bark and into the sapwood, the tree secretes a resin. Myrrh gum, like frankincense, is such a resin. Myrrh is harvested by repeatedly wounding the trees to bleed the gum, which is waxy and coagulates quickly. After the harvest, the gum becomes hard and glossy. The gum is yellowish and may be either clear or opaque. It darkens deeply as it ages, and white streaks emerge. (Neumann 1773)

 That the kings chose myrrh to represent the suffering and death is truly significant! The blood of Jesus was harvested in the same manner is myrrh. Isaiah, seeing the death of Jesus long before, described it; “He was wounded for our transgressions, he was bruised for our iniquities: the chastisement of our peace was upon him; and with his stripes we are healed” (Isa 53:5).

Jesus is the ‘Head’ of the ‘Godhead’ from scripture. The ‘Face’ of God is Jesus. The Tree of Life represents the Godhead with Jesus at its head — the cornerstone.

Jesus — The Tree of Life — was wounded and stripped in the same manner as myrrh is from its tree. Just as Jesus is dismissed from His ‘Tree’ — the Cross — so is the sap from the myrrh tree. Jesus gave up the Ghost, the living water, in the same manner as the myrrh tree gives up its liquid that eventually hardens.

Jesus birth, therefore, was symbolized by the myrrh tree wherein the Spirit became ‘hard,’ forming a mass of ‘myrrh gum’ (His Body) that was used as a salve to preserve life. The gift of myrrh points toward Jesus as born to die, for His ‘Sap’ to be harvested to be the ‘salve’ that would provide eternal line, and as it happened, the salve — the coagulated blood of Jesus mingled with water — as was the case then with wine, was pounded into the cure for mankind’s ailment (sin).

So, when you think of the Christmas Mass, thinking of the Jesus, the very missa for the dismissal of sin.