Today we bring the Year of Grace 2020 to an end. “Good riddance,” we might say, as we instead look a week hence to the First Sunday of Advent in the Year of Grace 2021. We surely pray today for a better year for us all and our world, too. 

     We hear it said today, “Woe is us. Nothing is as it was.” But I'd like to push back on that a little today as we look around us at our parish and our world, too. As I look out the tall windows on my house to the backyard, I can still see a large pot of what remains of last year's blossoms. Yes, the geraniums are long gone, but there are three tiny yellow blossoms that still endure against the November chill. This plant was a gift from Andrew Zellers, whose photo was in our gathering space along with his RCIA sponsor over the past summer. He's taken his first real job in Amarillo, Texas, and I spoke to him the other day to tell him that his plants still had those same blossoms. But he told me then that he had found a parish down there in Texas, and he was now part of their RCIA team. That church had become home to him. For Andrew, things were as they had been again. 

     And think of those autumn leaves that skitter across our lawns right on time, or the squirrels burying their nuts as they have always done. Consider the dog who still wants to curl up by the fireplace or the parents who tuck their children in at night with a kiss. College students are picking up their stuff and heading home for Thanksgiving and Christmas as they always have, and even though this year's Thanksgiving will be very different for many of us, there will still be a Thanksgiving. 

     The same, too, for Christmas. It will be different this year as well, but be assured: there will be a Christmas for us all. Outside the main entry of our church, the decorative lights are already in place and ready to be turned on, and our Christmas stable will be going up next weekend as well. And I saw on the news last night that the star on the Christmas tree in Rockefeller Center is also readied for the Christmas holidays as ever. 

     But here's the most important truth to remember for all of us: Jesus, the Good Shepherd of today's scripture readings, remains by our side and close to our hearts. This is the way it was last year, and that is the way it remains this year—and will be next year. And that shepherd-king will say to us, as he has throughout all of history to our present moment now, through natural disasters, world wars, or pandemics: “Come,” he will say, “you who are blessed by my Father. Inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry and you gave me food, I was thirsty and you gave me drink, a stranger and you welcomed me, naked and you clothed me, ill and you cared for me, in prison and you visited me.” This is the same shepherd who, in the Old Testament reading from Ezekiel, tells us once more: “…so I will tend my sheep. I will rescue them from every place where they were scattered when it was cloudy and dark. I myself will pasture my sheep; I myself will give them rest.” 

     Yes, on the one hand today, we can feel that nothing is as it was—that it's nothing but cloudy and dark. But in the middle of all that afflicts us today, let us always remember that when it comes to Jesus and our Church, everything is as it always was…always has been. 

     So let us then prepare to embrace the new Year of Grace 2021 that opens before us next weekend, knowing that our Good Shepherd will bring us back and bind up our wounds. And, as we say, “Hail, Christ our King,” just remember this as well: beneath the image of the Good Shepherd seated on his throne in our church, there is a verse, and that verse can be our prayer today. And that verse says: “Come now, king of heroes. Do not delay too long. We have need of mercies that you will free us.” And, indeed, we know that he will.