In the reading from Deuteronomy, Moses announces that God would one day send a prophet to his people.  But not just any prophet: a prophet like himself.  Prophets were very important in the life of the old covenant: contrary to what you might think, a prophet is not a magician who tells the future.  A prophet is an instrument of God who calls his people back to his friendship when they stray, and who prepares them to receive God when he comes.  Again and again in the Old Testament, the Lord chose prophets to challenge his people, sometimes with very strong words.  These prophets, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Jonah, John the Baptist: they met with various degrees of success.  Sometimes they were very successful in converting the hearts of the people, sometimes not.  God was preparing his people in all these ups and downs, for the arrival of the perfect prophet: the one who would have such authority in his very being, that he would draw all peoples and nations to God: our Lord, Jesus Christ: God himself, who comes to earth to fulfill and bring to completion the role of prophecy. 

Like those who came before him, Christ calls sinners back to friendship with God, but he does so perfectly and completely.  Like the prophets of old, he prepares human hearts to receive God, but he does so by sharing his own life, the life of God, with them.  After Christ, there is no further need for prophecy: because, as the people in the synagogue recognized immediately, he had a unique authority: something in who he was, that made him absolutely trustworthy when he spoke of God.  Of course we know, in light of the Passion and the Resurrection, that this Jesus is no mere prophet, no mere man: but more than a prophet, more than a man: he is Messiah and he is God.  He doesn’t just invite us to turn from sin and grow in friendship with God; he gives us the path: he forms the connection for us, in himself.  The crowds were astonished at Christ’s teaching because he taught them as one having authority and not as the scribes did.  This power is demonstrated by Jesus’ action of casting out a demon, described here as an “unclean spirit.”  Even the demon recognizes our Lord for who he is and is absolutely powerless before him.  The people had never seen such great power, nor ever heard of it even, since the days of Moses.  The authority of Jesus went beyond performing miracles in the visible world.  He had the authority over the invisible world as much as over the visible: power over the spiritual and the personal. 

Most of us, thankfully, will never encounter evil as directly as the man in the gospel did: no experiences that look like a scene from The Exorcist, we hope.  But we all suffer from the effects of sin in our lives: our own sins, the sins of others, our weaknesses and our temptations and insecurities:  these things are real: but Our Lord has power over them, he has the authority and the love to heal us.  If we will only turn to him.  He does all of the important work for us.  We don’t have to save ourselves, or figure out our own path to fulfillment.  Our job in the spiritual life is very simple and uncomplicated: our job is to show up.  To continue to turn to God again and again even when we feel helpless in the face of our weakness.  To trust that, no matter what we’ve done, Christ our brother is always waiting for us.  Our job is to not give up: to give ourselves, imperfect, to Christ, and let him do the rest.  He waits for us with open arms: in the beautiful sacrament of confession in which we show him our weakness and open ourselves to his healing.  In prayer, which is a simple act of trust in him.  And most especially in the Holy Eucharist: our food for the journey: in which he nourishes us with his very Body and Blood so that we might have the strength to continue.  Let us go to him, confident that he will free us from the power of sin through the sacrifice he has made of himself: the great sacrifice of the Cross which saves us and heals us, the sacrifice which we are witness to, even today at this Holy Sacrifice of the Mass.