What a great week!  We got to meet our new granddaughter, Kelseigh Jean Mililani Funk, and welcome Efrain Frias into the family.  It was a typical hectic wedding week and we did not get as much time to spend with any one person as we would like to, but that is typical.  It was nice to get home Monday evening (to the heat), in spite of the challenges waiting here for us.

      The Life Journals have us reading Hebrews this week and I was once again impressed with how the author explained the absolute supremacy of Jesus as our Great High Priest, over the “old” system.  Like most of the “old” system, the priesthood was a place holder.  God established it as a means for us to maintain a level of righteousness as His people.  It also showed them how miserable they were at keeping the requirements of the Law.  All this until Jesus would appear on scene and do what no high priest could do.  He not only made us completely right before God, but His work lasts forever.

      The high priests had to make sacrifices year after year – only after they made a sacrifice for themselves first.  Add to that the continual sacrifices the people brought as they became aware of their sinful acts.  Not Jesus.  When He offered a sacrifice, it was not the blood of an animal, it was His own blood.  Not only that, when He offered it; He went to the source.  Even the Temple in Jerusalem was a place holder, a copy.  The real one is in heaven.  This is the one Jesus went to.  His offering was sufficient – so much so that the sacrificial system as a whole and the Temple in particular were destroyed.

    Jesus’ sacrifice was so far superior to all the previous sacrifices put together, and He is still alive and available to anyone who will draw near to Him.  So, we’ve got that going for us.

    Which is nice.