20081026 Orthodoxy as the "Good Ground"
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St. Luke 8: 5-15 (Gospel) “A sower went out to sow his seed. And as he sowed, some fell by the wayside; and it was trampled down, and the birds of the air devoured it. Some fell on rock; and as soon as it sprang up, it withered away because it lacked moisture. And some fell among thorns, and the thorns sprang up with it and choked it. But others fell on good ground, sprang up, and yielded a crop a hundredfold.” When He had said these things He cried, “He who has ears to hear, let him hear!” Then His disciples asked Him, saying, “What does this parable mean?” And He said, “To you it has been given to know the mysteries of the kingdom of God, but to the rest it is given in parables, that
‘ Seeing they may not see, / And hearing they may not understand.’
“Now the parable is this: The seed is the word of God. Those by the wayside are the ones who hear; then the devil comes and takes away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved. But the ones on the rock are those who, when they hear, receive the word with joy; and these have no root, who believe for a while and in time of temptation fall away. Now the ones that fell among thorns are those who, when they have heard, go out and are choked with cares, riches, and pleasures of life, and bring no fruit to maturity. But the ones that fell on the good ground are those who, having heard the word with a noble and good heart, keep it and bear fruit with patience.
---
Christ is giving us an amazing parable today, describing how different people respond to Christ. All of the people he describes hear the Good News and accept Christ into their hearts, but it only flourishes in one group of people: the ones whose hearts are “good ground”. Unlike the others, they “hear the word with a noble and good heart, keep it, and bear fruit with patience.”
We cannot live life in joy without God. We cannot truly enjoy our relationships with one another unless we ourselves and those relations are grounded in the Truth. This is the way to salvation, so it is vital that we understand what Christ is telling us. What is it about the last group that allows them to keep the word in their hearts, that protected it from the thievery of the evil one; that allowed the Truth to take root and grow in them; to avoid the temptations that would pull them into error and lies; that would insulate them from the hedonistic cares, riches, and pleasures of life that would render them barren; in short, how does one develop a “good and noble heart”?
To develop Christ’s parable a bit, what can we do to prepare the grounds of our hearts for the seed of His Word? A farmer prepares the ground for planting in a very careful and intentional way. He removes rocks and thorns and weeds; and does whatever he can to make sure it is fertile. How do we remove the rocks, thorns and weeds from our hearts? How can we make it fertile so that the Truth will grow in us?
Let me give you the short answer: Orthodoxy.
Some people wonder why we have all this stuff: all the icons, the iconostasis, the altar, the vestments, the rituals, the prayers, and the customs; why we cross ourselves, bow, and make prostrations; thank God in the morning and the evening and before and after each meal; why we fast on Wednesday and Friday, before Communion, and in preparation for major feasts; why we get our houses blessed; why we make such a big deal about Baptisms, first Confessions, and Marriages; why we follow customs like kissing the bishops hand and asking for his blessing; and why we are gathered here today to celebrate the Divine Liturgy. The deep theological answer to “why do you have all this stuff”? is that it flows naturally from the Incarnation of God as Jesus Christ, and that His Incarnation continues mysteriously in His Holy Orthodox Church. But the more immediate answer is that we have all this stuff because it is what keeps our heart’s fertile for the flourishing of Christ’s word within us. All this stuff prepares the soil, removes the stones, pulls the weeds, and allows the seed within us to yield a “hundredfold” as described in the parable.
Plenty of people want to know if all this stuff is really necessary. Our pews are not full, so I have to assume that most people are trying for an “easier way”; that they are going to make a go of it without all the stuff. I wish them good luck, but the parable today leads me to fear for their failure, to wonder if they are doing enough to allow for a full harvest.
Friends will tell you that they love God and see Him everywhere. They do not need Church to keep Christ’s word in their hearts. They experience God in other ways: in a walk through the park, time spent with friends, caring for the poor, tending their garden, or taking care of animals. They really do not need something as old fashioned as Church. It may not be Orthodox, but the seed is the same.
Others will tell you that they have found an easier way to worship, a way that is simpler, more modern, more entertaining, and far less demanding. That it may not have all the stuff of Orthodoxy, but that all that stuff isn’t necessary – the only thing you really need is to accept Christ into your heart. The rest is just a celebration of this decision, so why make it so hard? Why not make it more fun? No, it’s not Orthodoxy, but the seed is the same.
On the face of things, both arguments have merit: you can and should see God everywhere; every motion and encounter should be a sacrament that works to bring you into closer union with Him. It is also true that the most important thing is to accept Christ into your heart. But when you look at the alternatives to Orthodoxy using today’s parable, you understand how incomplete and how dangerous they are. God would not be warning us about the many ways the Word can leave our hearts if it were as easy as all that. It’s not easy. Nothing worthwhile is. We can pretend it is easy – like when we buy lots of cool stuff on credit – but eventually reality brings this fantasy to an end. The farmer can pretend that all it takes is to have really good seed, and that all he must do to gain a good crop is spread it everywhere; that he can just sleep in, take strolls through the park, and have fun while it grows on its own, then harvest it all in the Fall. Yes, he can pretend that it is easy to grow a nice crop… right up until harvest time.
The seed that God has given us good. It has the potential to change our lives. To grow us into perfection. But just having the good seed is not enough. The soil must be prepared. The garden must be tended. Orthodoxy is the practical wisdom and practice of spiritual gardening. It’s not always easy, and you may be tempted to take short-cuts and compromise your faith. But when you are tempted to do this, to ignore some of the “stuff” of Orthodoxy, think of the parable of the sower. Cross yourself and keep gardening.
In the name of the Father and of the Son and of Holy Spirit. Amen.
Sunday, October 26, 2008
Monday, October 20, 2008
20081019 Restoring Our Sense of Touch
20081019 Restoring Our Sense of Touch
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www.orthoanalytika.org
2 Corinthians 9: 6-11
St. Luke 17: 11-19
What is it that your heart desires? What is it that you long for? Or, to put it a different way, what is it that you fear; the one thing that you worry about so much that it keeps you from enjoying the manifold blessings we call life?
With the huge government bailouts and a looming depression, our first inclination towards answering these questions may have to do with financial security. In recent polling, most Americans listed economic problems (to include employment and heating costs) as their greatest concern. A reported increase in stress and decrease in levels of happiness seems to be correlated with increased economic woes. It seems obvious that our hearts desire security and prosperity, and that we fear not being able to make ends meet.
God is our loving Father. He does not want us to suffer from stress and uncertainty. Look at one of the most obvious expressions of that love: God took on flesh. He was incarnate among us; lived among us. Some people knock the Church and stay away from her services claiming that they do not offer real solutions to real problems. They are deceiving themselves and refusing the very help they need. God’s help is immediate. It is real. And it is imminently practical. Today’s lessons are great examples.
Let us look at the Epistle reading. Are you one of those people whose financial problems keep you up at night? Is money what keeps you from enjoying life? Is it what poisons your mind so that you know only stress and hopelessness? St. Paul has an answer for you: give cheerfully. [In tough economic times, this may seem like an oxymoron: giving and cheerfulness do not seem to fit together at all: but our faith is full of such seeming contradictions. For example the cross of crucifixion; a sign of torture and agony, becomes a joyous sign of victory over sin and death.]
St. Paul writes; “he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully”. Some Christian pastors have perverted this into the “prosperity gospel”, claiming that if you give money to the church, then God will give you even more money back. This is heresy. Our Church is the Church of the martyrs, not of billionaires. St. Paul is teaching something far more fundamental than this: he is teaching us how to attain joy even in difficult times. Even in the midst of poverty. Giving of yourself and of your money changes everything. It empowers you, reminding you that you were put here for more than groceries and heating bills; and in so doing, it puts all these necessities into perspective. How can you be happy if making rent is your highest monthly priority?
God knows that we have to pay our bills. If you are interested in the nuts and bolts of Christian budgeting, there are plenty of good resources out there [Dave Ramsey is my personal favorite, and we at St. Michael’s will cover the basics of fiscal responsibility in our adult education classes later this Fall]. But unless you change your attitude towards money, then fixing your budget is like straightening the deck chairs on the Titanic. Cheerful giving and making charity a priority in your life redirects the ship towards safer waters.
Another, related, piece of practical advice contained in today’s epistle has to do with gratitude. You cannot be a cheerful giver if you are not grateful for the things you have. If you horde over your possessions like a miser, then you cannot enjoy them or anything else. When misers give to charity, they do so reluctantly, grudgingly. For the miser, things like parish dues and tips for service become obligations; the giving of which sucks even more happiness out of their souls because they drain money that might be put towards things that are deemed more essential. Do you see how this poison works? How it commodifies and perverts our transactions with others and leads us into greater stress and depression?
Gratitude is a strong anecdote. Teach yourself to be grateful for the things you have, and tipping a waitress and charitable giving become ways to express and share that gratitude. They actually increase happiness rather than draining it. Do not think of these things as bills to be paid for services rendered: you should not give to the Church in return for sacraments, good singing, or useful programs; nor should you give to your waiter simply for bringing you your food; or to the beggar on the street just to leave you alone. You give because things have been given to you. Because you are grateful. Give so that it can become who you are. Give because it reifies and restores your humanity, your relationship with others, and your relationship with God.
Today’s Gospel reaffirms this lesson. Christ the God-man heals ten lepers and sends them to the priest, but only one returns to thank Him. Let’s explore this for just a moment. Leprosy causes terrible suffering. First, it deadens the sense of touch. There is no feeling. No direct contact with the outside world. So all feeling turns inward, to the creeping malady there. Second, lepers are ostracized. According to Jewish law, lepers were complete outcasts, totally cut off from any kind of fellowship. They suffered and died separate from family; separate from community. This is a terrible combination. So when Christ healed these lepers, He did more than give them a new lease on life, He restored their sense of touch, gave them the potential to regain contact with the community, the potential to develop strong reciprocal relations with families and friends. They were no longer sentenced to a life focused on internal stress and misery, but could share their lives – their joys and concerns – in harmony with others. But would they? Perhaps their attitudes had been so poisoned by years of introspective worrying that they were no longer willing to connect with others at any more than the most superficial level. The lack of gratitude of the nine suggests this to be the case, at least with them. This is a great pity.
But one did came back! When God renewed the possibility of a full life for him, he jumped on the opportunity. He reached out of himself by showing his gratitude - and look at what that did for him: it truly restored his connections with humanity and with God Himself. He was more than thankful: through his gratitude he had become a cheerful giver; a positive force for joy and restoration.
There is no greater metaphor for the way we live our lives in this fallen world than leprosy. Our senses have become dead to the touch of others; we have turned inward, focusing on the many potential points of failure in our lives and in our budgets; we have cut ourselves off from the enjoyment of community. Our interactions with others have become obligations, things that drain us.
Earlier, I asked you what you feared. If you thought about money, I want you to look deeper. I believe that our stress over financial challenges is just a symptom of a much greater malady. This malady is the utter aloneness and desperation of life lived apart from the shared love of community (ecclesia) in one another through Christ. A malady that the world misdiagnosis and against which it offers only snake-oil and narcotics, the peddling of which has brought us nothing but financial ruin and even greater numbness. I believe that our greatest fear is to live and die alone, unloving and unloved.
The irony is that there is a real cure, and it is here. You are Christians. Through the Sacraments of His Church, Christ has healed your spiritual leprosy as surely as he did those lepers in Samaria and Galilee. You are free to join humanity, to feel love, to grow eternally in your enjoyment of fellowship and community. Or you can be like the nine who never came back and continue to live and die inside yourself.
What does your heart desire? You will find it in Christ. You will find it, feel it, enjoy it, and share it though your gratitude to Him and all that He has given you.
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
2 Corinthians 9: 6-11
St. Luke 17: 11-19
What is it that your heart desires? What is it that you long for? Or, to put it a different way, what is it that you fear; the one thing that you worry about so much that it keeps you from enjoying the manifold blessings we call life?
With the huge government bailouts and a looming depression, our first inclination towards answering these questions may have to do with financial security. In recent polling, most Americans listed economic problems (to include employment and heating costs) as their greatest concern. A reported increase in stress and decrease in levels of happiness seems to be correlated with increased economic woes. It seems obvious that our hearts desire security and prosperity, and that we fear not being able to make ends meet.
God is our loving Father. He does not want us to suffer from stress and uncertainty. Look at one of the most obvious expressions of that love: God took on flesh. He was incarnate among us; lived among us. Some people knock the Church and stay away from her services claiming that they do not offer real solutions to real problems. They are deceiving themselves and refusing the very help they need. God’s help is immediate. It is real. And it is imminently practical. Today’s lessons are great examples.
Let us look at the Epistle reading. Are you one of those people whose financial problems keep you up at night? Is money what keeps you from enjoying life? Is it what poisons your mind so that you know only stress and hopelessness? St. Paul has an answer for you: give cheerfully. [In tough economic times, this may seem like an oxymoron: giving and cheerfulness do not seem to fit together at all: but our faith is full of such seeming contradictions. For example the cross of crucifixion; a sign of torture and agony, becomes a joyous sign of victory over sin and death.]
St. Paul writes; “he who sows bountifully will also reap bountifully”. Some Christian pastors have perverted this into the “prosperity gospel”, claiming that if you give money to the church, then God will give you even more money back. This is heresy. Our Church is the Church of the martyrs, not of billionaires. St. Paul is teaching something far more fundamental than this: he is teaching us how to attain joy even in difficult times. Even in the midst of poverty. Giving of yourself and of your money changes everything. It empowers you, reminding you that you were put here for more than groceries and heating bills; and in so doing, it puts all these necessities into perspective. How can you be happy if making rent is your highest monthly priority?
God knows that we have to pay our bills. If you are interested in the nuts and bolts of Christian budgeting, there are plenty of good resources out there [Dave Ramsey is my personal favorite, and we at St. Michael’s will cover the basics of fiscal responsibility in our adult education classes later this Fall]. But unless you change your attitude towards money, then fixing your budget is like straightening the deck chairs on the Titanic. Cheerful giving and making charity a priority in your life redirects the ship towards safer waters.
Another, related, piece of practical advice contained in today’s epistle has to do with gratitude. You cannot be a cheerful giver if you are not grateful for the things you have. If you horde over your possessions like a miser, then you cannot enjoy them or anything else. When misers give to charity, they do so reluctantly, grudgingly. For the miser, things like parish dues and tips for service become obligations; the giving of which sucks even more happiness out of their souls because they drain money that might be put towards things that are deemed more essential. Do you see how this poison works? How it commodifies and perverts our transactions with others and leads us into greater stress and depression?
Gratitude is a strong anecdote. Teach yourself to be grateful for the things you have, and tipping a waitress and charitable giving become ways to express and share that gratitude. They actually increase happiness rather than draining it. Do not think of these things as bills to be paid for services rendered: you should not give to the Church in return for sacraments, good singing, or useful programs; nor should you give to your waiter simply for bringing you your food; or to the beggar on the street just to leave you alone. You give because things have been given to you. Because you are grateful. Give so that it can become who you are. Give because it reifies and restores your humanity, your relationship with others, and your relationship with God.
Today’s Gospel reaffirms this lesson. Christ the God-man heals ten lepers and sends them to the priest, but only one returns to thank Him. Let’s explore this for just a moment. Leprosy causes terrible suffering. First, it deadens the sense of touch. There is no feeling. No direct contact with the outside world. So all feeling turns inward, to the creeping malady there. Second, lepers are ostracized. According to Jewish law, lepers were complete outcasts, totally cut off from any kind of fellowship. They suffered and died separate from family; separate from community. This is a terrible combination. So when Christ healed these lepers, He did more than give them a new lease on life, He restored their sense of touch, gave them the potential to regain contact with the community, the potential to develop strong reciprocal relations with families and friends. They were no longer sentenced to a life focused on internal stress and misery, but could share their lives – their joys and concerns – in harmony with others. But would they? Perhaps their attitudes had been so poisoned by years of introspective worrying that they were no longer willing to connect with others at any more than the most superficial level. The lack of gratitude of the nine suggests this to be the case, at least with them. This is a great pity.
But one did came back! When God renewed the possibility of a full life for him, he jumped on the opportunity. He reached out of himself by showing his gratitude - and look at what that did for him: it truly restored his connections with humanity and with God Himself. He was more than thankful: through his gratitude he had become a cheerful giver; a positive force for joy and restoration.
There is no greater metaphor for the way we live our lives in this fallen world than leprosy. Our senses have become dead to the touch of others; we have turned inward, focusing on the many potential points of failure in our lives and in our budgets; we have cut ourselves off from the enjoyment of community. Our interactions with others have become obligations, things that drain us.
Earlier, I asked you what you feared. If you thought about money, I want you to look deeper. I believe that our stress over financial challenges is just a symptom of a much greater malady. This malady is the utter aloneness and desperation of life lived apart from the shared love of community (ecclesia) in one another through Christ. A malady that the world misdiagnosis and against which it offers only snake-oil and narcotics, the peddling of which has brought us nothing but financial ruin and even greater numbness. I believe that our greatest fear is to live and die alone, unloving and unloved.
The irony is that there is a real cure, and it is here. You are Christians. Through the Sacraments of His Church, Christ has healed your spiritual leprosy as surely as he did those lepers in Samaria and Galilee. You are free to join humanity, to feel love, to grow eternally in your enjoyment of fellowship and community. Or you can be like the nine who never came back and continue to live and die inside yourself.
What does your heart desire? You will find it in Christ. You will find it, feel it, enjoy it, and share it though your gratitude to Him and all that He has given you.
Monday, October 13, 2008
20081012 Our Great Counselor
20081012 Our Great Counselor
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
Today, I would like to use the First Epistle of St. John to set the context for today’s lesson:
This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. (1 St. John 1: 5-9)
God is Light: the purest perfection. The purest joy. The purest love. The purest beauty. The purest peace. He desires that we join Him in that light. That we become pure joy, pure love, pure beauty, and pure peace. That we transcend the sin and darkness of this broken world to live now and eternally in abundant and rational bliss.
Is this something that you think you might enjoy? Wouldn’t you prefer a life of peace to one where you are beset by worries; a life of purest joy to one where your happiness is dependent on the stock market, the size of your paycheck, or the vicissitudes of bodily health? Wouldn’t you enjoy a life of shared love, fellowship, and communion with others who walk only in beauty and joy and who desire only the best for you? Isn’t that kind of success better than anything the world offers?And I say to you as God says to you: this goal is within your reach. The path is before you. It will take you to your heart’s deepest desire. Will you take it?
I have benefitted from the advice of many counselors. In my junior year of college, I realized that I liked studying political science and thought I might like to go to graduate school. So I went to the graduate school admissions counselor to find out how to get there. He pulled out my transcript and immediately put a wall between me and my new dream, saying; “you don’t have the grades to get into graduate school; I just don’t think you would do well. There are plenty of other things I am sure you are good at. Graduate school is not for everyone.” You see, I had not applied myself during my first two years of college. I made some really bad grade, and would have had more if I had not dropped several classes before their grades stuck. I did well at the classes I liked, but lacked the discipline to work at the ones I didn’t. But that had been two or three years before. Since then, my time in the army had taught me the value of hard work, perseverance, and self-discipline. During a year at the army’s language school, a year in which we lost 50% of my class, I learned how to learn. I knew that I had the skills to succeed at graduate school. Rather than giving up, I asked; “what would it take for me to get into graduate school?” To his credit, he gave me a target:; “a 4.0 from here on out, and a really good score on your GRE”. I smiled, thanked him, shook his hand, and left. I am sure he thought he would never see me again. But I followed the plan he set out for me and, despite working two to three jobs and taking extra classes, I hit the target [of course, Pani Tina played a big role in this; we were married between my junior and senior year]. Unfortunately, while I was able get into graduate school, I still haven’t figured out how to get out. One day I’ll get around to defending a dissertation :-)
As you know, there are all kinds of counselors willing to give us advice about how to improve aspects of our lives: career counselors can help us get better jobs; financial counselors can help us save for retirement; credit counselors can help us get and stay out of debt; marriage counselors can help us gain greater fulfillment from our marriages. But the value of advice even the best of these can give pales next to that given to us by God. Those other counselors can help you be more productive in your life; but Our Great Counselor can give you a reason to live.
The counselor told me that graduate school was not for everyone. Those who did not enjoy reading, writing, and working hard would only be hurt by the experience. St. John tells us that God is light; and that if we have sin or darkness in us that we cannot be with Him. So how do we become creatures of the light? What is the path that leads to the only goal worth achieving?
Glory to God that He has made the way straight. In today’s scripture lessons He tells us what we must do.
1. The first lesson come from the epistle reading: St. Paul teaches us that if we want to be true “sons and daughters” of God; then we have to separate ourselves from all the things that defile us. He uses the metaphor of the temple. We are to be temples of the Living God. Our church is a temple. We would never bring or do anything in here that was not holy, that did not reflect God, that did not help us move closer to Him. All of our icons, literature, banners, candles; everything is specifically and intentionally put here for our edification and God’s glory. We are to do the same with our lives; intentionally surrounding ourselves with things that are holy and removing and avoiding those things that defile us. As St. John says, God gave us the sacraments to cleanse our hearts; but don’t stop there. Intentionally order your life in purity. Purify your time through morning and evening prayer. Purify your house by removing temptations and putting up icons. We are in the midst of a financial crisis: purify your budget by removing those things that distract you from the Truth. All these things will allow us to “perfect holiness in the fear of God.
2. The second lesson comes from the Gospel reading: Christ Himself tells us that must “love [our] enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return.” It is not enough for us to love those who might love us back; or give to those who might reciprocate; or welcome those who might join; or console those who might console us. We must do these things despite the expected return. When we say that “God is Love” we mean that it comes out of Him like light from the sun. The sun does not give light because we want to see, or even because it wants light back. It gives light because that is what it does. This is how we are to live. We are to be love. We are to radiate Christ to everyone and everything.
In summary, God desires us to live in perfect joy, to become partakers of eternal goodness. He has given us the straight path of His Son so that we might attain this goal. Order your life around Him and become like Him. This is our calling; our life’s work. It is also our blessed assurance, our peace, and our joy.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
Today, I would like to use the First Epistle of St. John to set the context for today’s lesson:
This is the message which we have heard from Him and declare to you, that God is light and in Him is no darkness at all. If we say that we have fellowship with Him, and walk in darkness, we lie and do not practice the truth. But if we walk in the light as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus Christ His Son cleanses us from all sin. (1 St. John 1: 5-9)
God is Light: the purest perfection. The purest joy. The purest love. The purest beauty. The purest peace. He desires that we join Him in that light. That we become pure joy, pure love, pure beauty, and pure peace. That we transcend the sin and darkness of this broken world to live now and eternally in abundant and rational bliss.
Is this something that you think you might enjoy? Wouldn’t you prefer a life of peace to one where you are beset by worries; a life of purest joy to one where your happiness is dependent on the stock market, the size of your paycheck, or the vicissitudes of bodily health? Wouldn’t you enjoy a life of shared love, fellowship, and communion with others who walk only in beauty and joy and who desire only the best for you? Isn’t that kind of success better than anything the world offers?And I say to you as God says to you: this goal is within your reach. The path is before you. It will take you to your heart’s deepest desire. Will you take it?
I have benefitted from the advice of many counselors. In my junior year of college, I realized that I liked studying political science and thought I might like to go to graduate school. So I went to the graduate school admissions counselor to find out how to get there. He pulled out my transcript and immediately put a wall between me and my new dream, saying; “you don’t have the grades to get into graduate school; I just don’t think you would do well. There are plenty of other things I am sure you are good at. Graduate school is not for everyone.” You see, I had not applied myself during my first two years of college. I made some really bad grade, and would have had more if I had not dropped several classes before their grades stuck. I did well at the classes I liked, but lacked the discipline to work at the ones I didn’t. But that had been two or three years before. Since then, my time in the army had taught me the value of hard work, perseverance, and self-discipline. During a year at the army’s language school, a year in which we lost 50% of my class, I learned how to learn. I knew that I had the skills to succeed at graduate school. Rather than giving up, I asked; “what would it take for me to get into graduate school?” To his credit, he gave me a target:; “a 4.0 from here on out, and a really good score on your GRE”. I smiled, thanked him, shook his hand, and left. I am sure he thought he would never see me again. But I followed the plan he set out for me and, despite working two to three jobs and taking extra classes, I hit the target [of course, Pani Tina played a big role in this; we were married between my junior and senior year]. Unfortunately, while I was able get into graduate school, I still haven’t figured out how to get out. One day I’ll get around to defending a dissertation :-)
As you know, there are all kinds of counselors willing to give us advice about how to improve aspects of our lives: career counselors can help us get better jobs; financial counselors can help us save for retirement; credit counselors can help us get and stay out of debt; marriage counselors can help us gain greater fulfillment from our marriages. But the value of advice even the best of these can give pales next to that given to us by God. Those other counselors can help you be more productive in your life; but Our Great Counselor can give you a reason to live.
The counselor told me that graduate school was not for everyone. Those who did not enjoy reading, writing, and working hard would only be hurt by the experience. St. John tells us that God is light; and that if we have sin or darkness in us that we cannot be with Him. So how do we become creatures of the light? What is the path that leads to the only goal worth achieving?
Glory to God that He has made the way straight. In today’s scripture lessons He tells us what we must do.
1. The first lesson come from the epistle reading: St. Paul teaches us that if we want to be true “sons and daughters” of God; then we have to separate ourselves from all the things that defile us. He uses the metaphor of the temple. We are to be temples of the Living God. Our church is a temple. We would never bring or do anything in here that was not holy, that did not reflect God, that did not help us move closer to Him. All of our icons, literature, banners, candles; everything is specifically and intentionally put here for our edification and God’s glory. We are to do the same with our lives; intentionally surrounding ourselves with things that are holy and removing and avoiding those things that defile us. As St. John says, God gave us the sacraments to cleanse our hearts; but don’t stop there. Intentionally order your life in purity. Purify your time through morning and evening prayer. Purify your house by removing temptations and putting up icons. We are in the midst of a financial crisis: purify your budget by removing those things that distract you from the Truth. All these things will allow us to “perfect holiness in the fear of God.
2. The second lesson comes from the Gospel reading: Christ Himself tells us that must “love [our] enemies, do good, and lend, hoping for nothing in return.” It is not enough for us to love those who might love us back; or give to those who might reciprocate; or welcome those who might join; or console those who might console us. We must do these things despite the expected return. When we say that “God is Love” we mean that it comes out of Him like light from the sun. The sun does not give light because we want to see, or even because it wants light back. It gives light because that is what it does. This is how we are to live. We are to be love. We are to radiate Christ to everyone and everything.
In summary, God desires us to live in perfect joy, to become partakers of eternal goodness. He has given us the straight path of His Son so that we might attain this goal. Order your life around Him and become like Him. This is our calling; our life’s work. It is also our blessed assurance, our peace, and our joy.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Tuesday, October 7, 2008
20081005 Now is the Time!
20081005 Now is the Time!
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
2 Corinthians 6:1-10
St. Matthew 25:14-30
In these financial times, when people have taken our economy to the brink of destruction with bad loans and risky investments, it might be tempting to sympathize with the servant who buried his talent. But this is not a story about going into debt (which scripture routinely criticizes as unhealthy and dangerous), or about about taking on risk in an attempt to satisfy hedonistic desires for riches or property; or even about mortgaging the future to satisfy illicit desires now. This is a story about taking stock of what we have, rolling up our sleeves, and getting to work.
What have we done with the gifts God has given us? Have we used them for His glory, or have we been too afraid to do His work? Have we been so timid in our service to Him that we hid the gifts He gave us? Are we “good and faithful servant[s]”, or a “wicked and lazy” ones?
For there is no doubt that we are God’s servants: all that we have is given on loan to us as His stewards. In this sense, He gives us gifts as a farmer might give his tenants land and seed: so that they might use them to gain Him a great crop. To some He has given more than others; as He says in this parable, He gives “according to [their] own ability.” He does not expect a farmer who only has the strength to till and maintain one acre to farm ten; nor does he expect the weaker farmer with the smaller field to return as large a yield as the stronger farmer to whom he leased a larger field. Notice that God rewarded both the servant who returned five more talents and the servant who returned two more, calling them both “good and faithful servant[s]”, making them both “ruler[s] over many things”, and granting them both to “enter into the joy of your lord.” The problem with the servant who received one talent was not his ability, but his refusal to roll up his sleeves and get to work.
The Gospel tells us that the man refused to roll up his sleeves and get to work because “he was scared”. Specifically, it seems as though he was scared of failure. He was scared of failure, so he became lazy. Rather than confronting his fears, he did nothing. He did nothing, and as a result he was cast into “outer darkness”.
Being scared is not a sin. But anyone who has studied our catechism knows that laziness is. God can help you overcome fear; first and foremost by offering forgiveness as soon as we confess our shortcomings. You have to realize that God does not care about the talents, or the crops, or the obvious results of the work we do for Him: He is our great Father and Teacher, desiring only our growth and progression towards perfection and bliss. It is the work we do for Him more than the tangible results they produce [and that we then offer] that perfect us. What do we have that God really needs? All He wants is our perfection; and in order to grow us into perfection, He demands that we work. And He demands that we get to work right now.
Quoting and paraphrasing the prophecy of Isaiah, St. Paul tells us that “Now is the accepted time… now is the day of salvation”. There are things that we need to do, and now is the time to do them. Some of the things we are asked to do will put us outside our comfort zone; we might not like doing them. They might be hard. We might rather be doing something else. But let me share two pieces of advice my saintly grandmother gave me when I defended my [mile-wide] lazy streak: “everything worth having is worth working for” and the less philosophical; “they don’t call it work for nothing.” Work may be hard, it might move us out of our comfort zone, but look at the rewards God offers!
I agree with St. Paul: the time is now, this is the day of our salvation. Right now we are in the middle of the Divine Liturgy. [Some of you might rather be doing something else. We have many empty pews, and some are empty because some actually decided to do something else.] Liturgy means the “work of the people”. The “work of the people”. This is the Divine Liturgy. This makes it the most important of all the work we do. This may obvious for me as a priest [after all, this is what I am called and paid to do], but it is no less true for all of you.
So how are we doing at this Divine Liturgy? How are we doing at Our Holy Work? In what ways is it pulling us outside of our comfort zone, and how are we responding? This work demands our full attention – are we giving it our full attention, or is that too hard for us? Are we too lazy? I know that my mind is tempted to wander, but even more than in the secular world, my job here is not to daydream, but to serve attentively. Perhaps we are distracted by children or tempted to judge those around us; we may even be harboring hatred for past wrongs done to us or someone we love. These are real temptations, but they are no excuse: our Master told us to “suffer the little children”, never judge another, and to love everyone – even our enemies. This Liturgy, this encounter with Perfection, sanctifies us, but it takes effort. It takes work. It may not be easy for us. Unless we are already perfect, it probably should move us outside of our comfort zone.
Listen again, to how St. Paul puts it, as he describes the proper attitude towards doing this work:
This work of being a Christian can be hard, but look at the reward. In just a few minutes Christ will offer Himself to you; His Body and Blood for your salvation and eternal life. The time of salvation is now: Enter now into the Joy of Your Master.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
FWIW, this homily was matched with the following in the "Q&A section of our weekly bulletin:
Question: I know someone that has been away from the church for years, but wants to come back. What is the procedure?
Answer: Invite them to come home! In accordance with the Gospel (e.g. St. Matthew 20: 13-16 & St. Luke 15: 31-32), we welcome them with open arms: they are immediately restored to full communion through the Sacraments of Repentance and Communion (if penance is required, then that is largely a private matter). Again in accordance with God’s instructions (e.g. St. Matthew 18: 4-6), we should put nothing (to include grudges and hard-heartedness) between Christ and His children. The “devil” is only “in the details” if we put him there. It is my opinion that if we truly reached out to folks that have been away for whatever reason, not only would our pews be full: we would be one step closer to living the kind of life that Christ requires of those who bear His name. We always greet everyone who comes in our doors with love and compassion (e.g. St. Matthew 5: 43-48). This is how we grow (as persons and as a church).
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
2 Corinthians 6:1-10
St. Matthew 25:14-30
In these financial times, when people have taken our economy to the brink of destruction with bad loans and risky investments, it might be tempting to sympathize with the servant who buried his talent. But this is not a story about going into debt (which scripture routinely criticizes as unhealthy and dangerous), or about about taking on risk in an attempt to satisfy hedonistic desires for riches or property; or even about mortgaging the future to satisfy illicit desires now. This is a story about taking stock of what we have, rolling up our sleeves, and getting to work.
What have we done with the gifts God has given us? Have we used them for His glory, or have we been too afraid to do His work? Have we been so timid in our service to Him that we hid the gifts He gave us? Are we “good and faithful servant[s]”, or a “wicked and lazy” ones?
For there is no doubt that we are God’s servants: all that we have is given on loan to us as His stewards. In this sense, He gives us gifts as a farmer might give his tenants land and seed: so that they might use them to gain Him a great crop. To some He has given more than others; as He says in this parable, He gives “according to [their] own ability.” He does not expect a farmer who only has the strength to till and maintain one acre to farm ten; nor does he expect the weaker farmer with the smaller field to return as large a yield as the stronger farmer to whom he leased a larger field. Notice that God rewarded both the servant who returned five more talents and the servant who returned two more, calling them both “good and faithful servant[s]”, making them both “ruler[s] over many things”, and granting them both to “enter into the joy of your lord.” The problem with the servant who received one talent was not his ability, but his refusal to roll up his sleeves and get to work.
The Gospel tells us that the man refused to roll up his sleeves and get to work because “he was scared”. Specifically, it seems as though he was scared of failure. He was scared of failure, so he became lazy. Rather than confronting his fears, he did nothing. He did nothing, and as a result he was cast into “outer darkness”.
Being scared is not a sin. But anyone who has studied our catechism knows that laziness is. God can help you overcome fear; first and foremost by offering forgiveness as soon as we confess our shortcomings. You have to realize that God does not care about the talents, or the crops, or the obvious results of the work we do for Him: He is our great Father and Teacher, desiring only our growth and progression towards perfection and bliss. It is the work we do for Him more than the tangible results they produce [and that we then offer] that perfect us. What do we have that God really needs? All He wants is our perfection; and in order to grow us into perfection, He demands that we work. And He demands that we get to work right now.
Quoting and paraphrasing the prophecy of Isaiah, St. Paul tells us that “Now is the accepted time… now is the day of salvation”. There are things that we need to do, and now is the time to do them. Some of the things we are asked to do will put us outside our comfort zone; we might not like doing them. They might be hard. We might rather be doing something else. But let me share two pieces of advice my saintly grandmother gave me when I defended my [mile-wide] lazy streak: “everything worth having is worth working for” and the less philosophical; “they don’t call it work for nothing.” Work may be hard, it might move us out of our comfort zone, but look at the rewards God offers!
I agree with St. Paul: the time is now, this is the day of our salvation. Right now we are in the middle of the Divine Liturgy. [Some of you might rather be doing something else. We have many empty pews, and some are empty because some actually decided to do something else.] Liturgy means the “work of the people”. The “work of the people”. This is the Divine Liturgy. This makes it the most important of all the work we do. This may obvious for me as a priest [after all, this is what I am called and paid to do], but it is no less true for all of you.
So how are we doing at this Divine Liturgy? How are we doing at Our Holy Work? In what ways is it pulling us outside of our comfort zone, and how are we responding? This work demands our full attention – are we giving it our full attention, or is that too hard for us? Are we too lazy? I know that my mind is tempted to wander, but even more than in the secular world, my job here is not to daydream, but to serve attentively. Perhaps we are distracted by children or tempted to judge those around us; we may even be harboring hatred for past wrongs done to us or someone we love. These are real temptations, but they are no excuse: our Master told us to “suffer the little children”, never judge another, and to love everyone – even our enemies. This Liturgy, this encounter with Perfection, sanctifies us, but it takes effort. It takes work. It may not be easy for us. Unless we are already perfect, it probably should move us outside of our comfort zone.
Listen again, to how St. Paul puts it, as he describes the proper attitude towards doing this work:
- ...we commend ourselves as ministers of God: in much patience, in tribulations, in needs, in distresses, in stripes, in imprisonments, in tumults, in labors, in sleeplessness, in fastings; by purity, by knowledge, by longsuffering, by kindness, by the Holy Spirit, by sincere love, by the word of truth, by the power of God, by the armor of righteousness on the right hand and on the left, by honor and dishonor, by evil report and good report; as deceivers, and yet true; as unknown, and yet well known; as dying, and behold we live; as chastened, and yet not killed; as sorrowful, yet always rejoicing; as poor, yet making many rich; as having nothing, and yet possessing all things. (2 Corinthians 6:3-10)
This work of being a Christian can be hard, but look at the reward. In just a few minutes Christ will offer Himself to you; His Body and Blood for your salvation and eternal life. The time of salvation is now: Enter now into the Joy of Your Master.
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
FWIW, this homily was matched with the following in the "Q&A section of our weekly bulletin:
Question: I know someone that has been away from the church for years, but wants to come back. What is the procedure?
Answer: Invite them to come home! In accordance with the Gospel (e.g. St. Matthew 20: 13-16 & St. Luke 15: 31-32), we welcome them with open arms: they are immediately restored to full communion through the Sacraments of Repentance and Communion (if penance is required, then that is largely a private matter). Again in accordance with God’s instructions (e.g. St. Matthew 18: 4-6), we should put nothing (to include grudges and hard-heartedness) between Christ and His children. The “devil” is only “in the details” if we put him there. It is my opinion that if we truly reached out to folks that have been away for whatever reason, not only would our pews be full: we would be one step closer to living the kind of life that Christ requires of those who bear His name. We always greet everyone who comes in our doors with love and compassion (e.g. St. Matthew 5: 43-48). This is how we grow (as persons and as a church).
Monday, September 29, 2008
20080928 Jars of Clay
20080928 Jars of Clay
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
2 Corinthians 4: 6-15
St. Matthew 22: 35-46
This is a difficult world. There are so many of us who are sick. There are so many of us that are hurting. Not just sick and hurting from physical ailments and pain, but also mentally and spiritually. We are a wounded people. And among almost all of us, there is the mistaken belief that we should bear our pain in secret. While there is a time and a place for stoicism, this is not it. Despite what the world teaches us.
You see, modern psychology has it exactly backwards. It teaches that you take care of the necessities first (health, food, clothing, shelter), then move on towards things like self-actualization later. But Christianity turns this hierarchy of Maslow on its head: we are to seek perfection and salvation through Christ first, trusting that He will take care of our other needs in turn. We do not wait to dedicate ourselves to Christ and His Church until everything else is taken care of: we seek Him first so that everything else is ordered around Him. So that everything else is established on a firm foundation. We do not wait until our pain is gone, until we are healed of all our ills, until we are perfect and have “everything together” to come to Church. We should never, ever, suffer alone, apart from Christ and the Church.
St. Paul teaches us the right way to approach our suffering in his epistle lesson today, and today we will go through this epistle in order to understand this teaching. St. Paul calls us “earthen vessels” to remind us of the frailty of our bodies; and to tell us that despite this frailty we can endure. We can endure because it is God Himself, the one who “commanded light to shine out of the darkness” [who created the world from nothing] has come into our hearts through the mercy of Jesus Christ. It is thanks to what fills us that we can endure.
“We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed.”
St. Paul is referring to the Roman practice of putting criminals under slabs of granite, adding weight until they were crushed beneath them. Have you felt this way? Of course you have. All of us have. I dare say that most of us probably do right now. We use the word “stressful” to describe modern life, and it fits with this metaphor. St. John Chrysostom says that these “sides” that press in on us are “concerning our foes, our friends, necessities, other needs, from them that are hostile and of our own household”. The responsibilities of this world – and our inability to address them all properly – seek to crush us. Despite this and the frailties of our fallen bodies and minds, we can endure.
“We are perplexed, but not in despair.”
St. Paul wrote this referring to the impossibility of getting every calculation right. He wrote this two-thousand years ago – how much more is it true now! The array of choices before us is bewildering, and often the consequences of failure seem so catastrophic as to be downright paralyzing. And none of us have gone through this computational gauntlet unscathed: everyone has miscalculated and suffered as a result. Worse yet, we have all caused others – people we love dearly - to suffer as a result of our own miscalculations. Such mistakes and the fear of making more can build over time, threatening to throw us into hopelessness; to suck the life and joy out of our world. Yet somehow we can endure.
“[We are] persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down but not destroyed”.
A person is persecuted for going against the prevailing law; it cannot happen unless those who administer the law hate you or see you as an enemy. They see you as an enemy and they try to destroy you. And please do not doubt that the powers and principalities of this world work for your destruction. But the ultimate power, the authority greater than those that rule this world, never turns against you. Never forsakes you. As long as we walk in it, this fallen world will strike us down. We fall so many times, both due to our weakness and the strength of those that oppress us. But we need not be destroyed. Somehow, we can endure.
This flesh and blood, this earthen vessel, is so fragile, so weak, but it need not break. It need not break because it is “always carrying about ... the dying of the Lord Jesus.” God does not will us to suffer- it is the evil we ourselves have planted here that does that – but God will (through the Christ we bear within us) preserve and strengthen us through our suffering.
To summarize St. Paul’s lesson, we are able to endure and thrive through suffering because Christ makes us more than the easily shattered jars of clay that we inhabit.
But there is something more; another way that Christ works through us in our suffering. We are made to live in community. Just as our miscalculations harm those around us, so too do the things we do right bless and strengthen those around us. I am not talking about making the right investments, keeping a sound budget or portfolio, or being attentive to the needs of our family. This is something more profound and more difficult for many to understand. St. Paul teaches us that we persevere despite our human frailty “so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh”. Christ endured suffering not for Himself, but so that we might endure through Him. And when we persevere, it is obvious to all that we do it in Christ; through Christ. We become victors that inspire others toward victory themselves.
I say that this is difficult for many to understand because endurance and perseverance are not always pretty. They do not always look like victory to the world. It, in its fallenness, thinks suffering to be humiliating; something shameful to be hidden. Worse yet, it teaches us to think this way. We hide our suffering in our hearts, in our veiled expressions, in our closed mouths, behind our closed doors. We do not think it proper to share our pain, to let others see our weakness. This is the culture we must break. And we must break it for at least two reasons.
First, the Church is not just for those who are well. It is the hospital and Christ is the Great Physician. You do not go to the hospital when you are well, but when you are ill. We should not wait until we have healed from the pain of broken relationships [or whatever else] to come back to Church, we come immediately and constantly so that Christ can hasten our healing. Remember that God ate with lepers, healed them, and brought them salvation. He wants to do the same with you. Do not hide your pain from Him and His Church.
Second, we suffer together so that the Love of Christ might grow among us. As a priest, I am occasionally allowed to see things that few others do, so let me share a short testimony. Part of my calling is to visit the sick, and especially those whose bodies have all but failed them. This is a very difficult time for everyone. To many it seems as though the sick have been robbed of all dignity; that they have been “brought low”; that, perhaps, it would be better for it all to have ended long ago. I sympathize with this sentiment – no one desires to see anyone suffer, much less those whom they love. It is difficult, but I always come away from such encounters moved. The tears they bring are not just of sorrow for the pain and loss; but due to the love the encounter has grown in my heart – for Christ is so strongly manifested in our mortal flesh. When we suffer alone, we keep this witness hidden, like a light beneath a bushel.
In conclusion, we suffer together because we are Christ. When we see the cross, we do not just see the suffering, but straight through it into the Resurrection. We are strengthened in suffering, knowing that “He who raised up the Lord Jesus will also raise us up.” As St. Paul ends today’s lesson, we suffer together because “all things are for your sakes, that grace, having spread through the many, may cause thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.”
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
2 Corinthians 4: 6-15
St. Matthew 22: 35-46
This is a difficult world. There are so many of us who are sick. There are so many of us that are hurting. Not just sick and hurting from physical ailments and pain, but also mentally and spiritually. We are a wounded people. And among almost all of us, there is the mistaken belief that we should bear our pain in secret. While there is a time and a place for stoicism, this is not it. Despite what the world teaches us.
You see, modern psychology has it exactly backwards. It teaches that you take care of the necessities first (health, food, clothing, shelter), then move on towards things like self-actualization later. But Christianity turns this hierarchy of Maslow on its head: we are to seek perfection and salvation through Christ first, trusting that He will take care of our other needs in turn. We do not wait to dedicate ourselves to Christ and His Church until everything else is taken care of: we seek Him first so that everything else is ordered around Him. So that everything else is established on a firm foundation. We do not wait until our pain is gone, until we are healed of all our ills, until we are perfect and have “everything together” to come to Church. We should never, ever, suffer alone, apart from Christ and the Church.
St. Paul teaches us the right way to approach our suffering in his epistle lesson today, and today we will go through this epistle in order to understand this teaching. St. Paul calls us “earthen vessels” to remind us of the frailty of our bodies; and to tell us that despite this frailty we can endure. We can endure because it is God Himself, the one who “commanded light to shine out of the darkness” [who created the world from nothing] has come into our hearts through the mercy of Jesus Christ. It is thanks to what fills us that we can endure.
“We are hard-pressed on every side, yet not crushed.”
St. Paul is referring to the Roman practice of putting criminals under slabs of granite, adding weight until they were crushed beneath them. Have you felt this way? Of course you have. All of us have. I dare say that most of us probably do right now. We use the word “stressful” to describe modern life, and it fits with this metaphor. St. John Chrysostom says that these “sides” that press in on us are “concerning our foes, our friends, necessities, other needs, from them that are hostile and of our own household”. The responsibilities of this world – and our inability to address them all properly – seek to crush us. Despite this and the frailties of our fallen bodies and minds, we can endure.
“We are perplexed, but not in despair.”
St. Paul wrote this referring to the impossibility of getting every calculation right. He wrote this two-thousand years ago – how much more is it true now! The array of choices before us is bewildering, and often the consequences of failure seem so catastrophic as to be downright paralyzing. And none of us have gone through this computational gauntlet unscathed: everyone has miscalculated and suffered as a result. Worse yet, we have all caused others – people we love dearly - to suffer as a result of our own miscalculations. Such mistakes and the fear of making more can build over time, threatening to throw us into hopelessness; to suck the life and joy out of our world. Yet somehow we can endure.
“[We are] persecuted, but not forsaken. Struck down but not destroyed”.
A person is persecuted for going against the prevailing law; it cannot happen unless those who administer the law hate you or see you as an enemy. They see you as an enemy and they try to destroy you. And please do not doubt that the powers and principalities of this world work for your destruction. But the ultimate power, the authority greater than those that rule this world, never turns against you. Never forsakes you. As long as we walk in it, this fallen world will strike us down. We fall so many times, both due to our weakness and the strength of those that oppress us. But we need not be destroyed. Somehow, we can endure.
This flesh and blood, this earthen vessel, is so fragile, so weak, but it need not break. It need not break because it is “always carrying about ... the dying of the Lord Jesus.” God does not will us to suffer- it is the evil we ourselves have planted here that does that – but God will (through the Christ we bear within us) preserve and strengthen us through our suffering.
To summarize St. Paul’s lesson, we are able to endure and thrive through suffering because Christ makes us more than the easily shattered jars of clay that we inhabit.
But there is something more; another way that Christ works through us in our suffering. We are made to live in community. Just as our miscalculations harm those around us, so too do the things we do right bless and strengthen those around us. I am not talking about making the right investments, keeping a sound budget or portfolio, or being attentive to the needs of our family. This is something more profound and more difficult for many to understand. St. Paul teaches us that we persevere despite our human frailty “so that the life of Jesus may be manifested in our mortal flesh”. Christ endured suffering not for Himself, but so that we might endure through Him. And when we persevere, it is obvious to all that we do it in Christ; through Christ. We become victors that inspire others toward victory themselves.
I say that this is difficult for many to understand because endurance and perseverance are not always pretty. They do not always look like victory to the world. It, in its fallenness, thinks suffering to be humiliating; something shameful to be hidden. Worse yet, it teaches us to think this way. We hide our suffering in our hearts, in our veiled expressions, in our closed mouths, behind our closed doors. We do not think it proper to share our pain, to let others see our weakness. This is the culture we must break. And we must break it for at least two reasons.
First, the Church is not just for those who are well. It is the hospital and Christ is the Great Physician. You do not go to the hospital when you are well, but when you are ill. We should not wait until we have healed from the pain of broken relationships [or whatever else] to come back to Church, we come immediately and constantly so that Christ can hasten our healing. Remember that God ate with lepers, healed them, and brought them salvation. He wants to do the same with you. Do not hide your pain from Him and His Church.
Second, we suffer together so that the Love of Christ might grow among us. As a priest, I am occasionally allowed to see things that few others do, so let me share a short testimony. Part of my calling is to visit the sick, and especially those whose bodies have all but failed them. This is a very difficult time for everyone. To many it seems as though the sick have been robbed of all dignity; that they have been “brought low”; that, perhaps, it would be better for it all to have ended long ago. I sympathize with this sentiment – no one desires to see anyone suffer, much less those whom they love. It is difficult, but I always come away from such encounters moved. The tears they bring are not just of sorrow for the pain and loss; but due to the love the encounter has grown in my heart – for Christ is so strongly manifested in our mortal flesh. When we suffer alone, we keep this witness hidden, like a light beneath a bushel.
In conclusion, we suffer together because we are Christ. When we see the cross, we do not just see the suffering, but straight through it into the Resurrection. We are strengthened in suffering, knowing that “He who raised up the Lord Jesus will also raise us up.” As St. Paul ends today’s lesson, we suffer together because “all things are for your sakes, that grace, having spread through the many, may cause thanksgiving to abound to the glory of God.”
In the Name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.
Monday, September 22, 2008
20080921 Humility and Offering
20080921 Humility and Offering: The Nativity of the Theotokos
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
Philippians 2: 5-11
St. Luke 10: 38-42; 11: 27-28
Today we celebrate the feast of the Nativity (the birth) of Our Holy Lady, Mary. In the hymns for the feast, we sing that on this day the barrenness of Joachim and Anna has been removed. It is also the removal of barrenness from the world – the one who is born today is the gate through which Christ the Messiah, the salvation of the world, enters. This means that we are celebrating something much more than the birth of a great saint today: we are celebrating the Incarnation of Our Lord, Jesus Christ. For without the Incarnation of Christ, the birth of even this most blessed Lady would not adorn our calendar; nor, for that matter, would her icon adorn our walls.
To make this point, the iconography of the Church rarely depicts Our Lady separate from Her Son. [Notice above you: this, like this one on my right, has her holding Christ. Even the one over the altar has her bowing to Him.]. Nor is this is not an insult to Our Lady. No icon is EVER written without reference to Christ – for when we reverence any saint, we do not reverence them, but the Christ who is in them; who has purified them. So today’s celebrations of Our Lady’s birth is proclaimed not just as the joy of her parents or of the holy life the newborn child would eventually lead, but within the context of the God-Man, Jesus Christ, the salvation of the world, and the salvation of all who believe in Him.
In the birth of Mary, you have a juxtaposition of weakness and strength; the weakness of the elderly and heretofore barren Joachim and Anna, [and] the weakness of their newborn babe; with the strength of God and the inexorable tide of history leading through their small efforts to the grand climax of the world’s remaking. St. Paul reminds us today of another juxtaposition, when he says that “Christ Jesus, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.” The point St. Paul is making is that Jesus Christ was one with God the Father. He was God. All glory and honor were His natural due. But He did not cling to this; rather, He humbled Himself to also become man.
We have much to learn from this example. There is so little humility in the world today. Whereas God did not cling to the glory and honor that really were His due; we devote all of our energy clinging to things we do not even own. I do not just mean the culture of debt through which we are destroying ourselves and our economy; we cling greedily to everything that lies within our reach: our homes, our cars, our collections, our time, our reputations, our children, our pride. Do we not realize that none of these things are ours by right? That even the good things in our care are just ours “on loan”; given to us by God in our roles as His stewards? Only a thief clings so hard to things that are not really his.
Everything really was God’s; but as St. Paul goes on to say in today’s epistle; “He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” God gave up so much; as Father, He gave “His only begotten Son”; as Son, He gave up His own glory to become man, then suffered immeasurably on the cross. God is shown to be so humble, so loving, that He gave up everything up for us. But there is more: not only was God willing to give up all the good things that really were His, He accepted pain and punishment for crimes He did not even commit. The death He suffered on the Cross was not for things He did: it was for our sins – it was punishment for what we have done. What a tremendous example and offering of humility and love!
But what about us? Just as we cling to all those things that are in our possession only through providence; so, too, do we reject all the punishment that we really have earned! How rare it is to meet a person in today’s world who will step up and take responsibility for the mistakes he has made! Rather, we like to present ourselves as victims of someone else’s crime, or of some huge conspiracy against us. We have created entire institutions to shield us from the results of our folly. We have come to the point where we do not even recognize “sin” and “heresy” as meaningful concepts. And as far as we are from taking ownership of our own sin, we are so much farther from being willing to sacrifice ourselves for the sin and mistakes of others.
In our greediness, our irresponsibility, and our lack of love; we are so utterly unlike Christ. And this is tragic. We are greedy and avoid blame because we are proud: we want to be recognized as good and worthy. Having lots of things and avoiding blame are signs of success here in this world. But here is the irony: the path of Christ, the one that takes us through poverty and self-sacrifice, is the one that really leads to Glory; as St. Paul finishes today’s epistle reading; “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
As Christian’s here at St. Michael’s, we have forsaken the ways of the world; we cling not to our possessions or our pride, but to the Truth. We acknowledge our own sins and we help others work through the consequences of their own. And through this, we receive glory. Through this, in Christ, we are perfected. Through this we look to a life of abundant riches, not just now, but for all eternity.
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www.orthoanalytika.org
Philippians 2: 5-11
St. Luke 10: 38-42; 11: 27-28
Today we celebrate the feast of the Nativity (the birth) of Our Holy Lady, Mary. In the hymns for the feast, we sing that on this day the barrenness of Joachim and Anna has been removed. It is also the removal of barrenness from the world – the one who is born today is the gate through which Christ the Messiah, the salvation of the world, enters. This means that we are celebrating something much more than the birth of a great saint today: we are celebrating the Incarnation of Our Lord, Jesus Christ. For without the Incarnation of Christ, the birth of even this most blessed Lady would not adorn our calendar; nor, for that matter, would her icon adorn our walls.
To make this point, the iconography of the Church rarely depicts Our Lady separate from Her Son. [Notice above you: this, like this one on my right, has her holding Christ. Even the one over the altar has her bowing to Him.]. Nor is this is not an insult to Our Lady. No icon is EVER written without reference to Christ – for when we reverence any saint, we do not reverence them, but the Christ who is in them; who has purified them. So today’s celebrations of Our Lady’s birth is proclaimed not just as the joy of her parents or of the holy life the newborn child would eventually lead, but within the context of the God-Man, Jesus Christ, the salvation of the world, and the salvation of all who believe in Him.
In the birth of Mary, you have a juxtaposition of weakness and strength; the weakness of the elderly and heretofore barren Joachim and Anna, [and] the weakness of their newborn babe; with the strength of God and the inexorable tide of history leading through their small efforts to the grand climax of the world’s remaking. St. Paul reminds us today of another juxtaposition, when he says that “Christ Jesus, being in the form of God, did not consider it robbery to be equal with God, but made Himself of no reputation, taking the form of a bondservant, and coming in the likeness of men.” The point St. Paul is making is that Jesus Christ was one with God the Father. He was God. All glory and honor were His natural due. But He did not cling to this; rather, He humbled Himself to also become man.
We have much to learn from this example. There is so little humility in the world today. Whereas God did not cling to the glory and honor that really were His due; we devote all of our energy clinging to things we do not even own. I do not just mean the culture of debt through which we are destroying ourselves and our economy; we cling greedily to everything that lies within our reach: our homes, our cars, our collections, our time, our reputations, our children, our pride. Do we not realize that none of these things are ours by right? That even the good things in our care are just ours “on loan”; given to us by God in our roles as His stewards? Only a thief clings so hard to things that are not really his.
Everything really was God’s; but as St. Paul goes on to say in today’s epistle; “He humbled Himself and became obedient to the point of death, even the death of the cross.” God gave up so much; as Father, He gave “His only begotten Son”; as Son, He gave up His own glory to become man, then suffered immeasurably on the cross. God is shown to be so humble, so loving, that He gave up everything up for us. But there is more: not only was God willing to give up all the good things that really were His, He accepted pain and punishment for crimes He did not even commit. The death He suffered on the Cross was not for things He did: it was for our sins – it was punishment for what we have done. What a tremendous example and offering of humility and love!
But what about us? Just as we cling to all those things that are in our possession only through providence; so, too, do we reject all the punishment that we really have earned! How rare it is to meet a person in today’s world who will step up and take responsibility for the mistakes he has made! Rather, we like to present ourselves as victims of someone else’s crime, or of some huge conspiracy against us. We have created entire institutions to shield us from the results of our folly. We have come to the point where we do not even recognize “sin” and “heresy” as meaningful concepts. And as far as we are from taking ownership of our own sin, we are so much farther from being willing to sacrifice ourselves for the sin and mistakes of others.
In our greediness, our irresponsibility, and our lack of love; we are so utterly unlike Christ. And this is tragic. We are greedy and avoid blame because we are proud: we want to be recognized as good and worthy. Having lots of things and avoiding blame are signs of success here in this world. But here is the irony: the path of Christ, the one that takes us through poverty and self-sacrifice, is the one that really leads to Glory; as St. Paul finishes today’s epistle reading; “Therefore God also has highly exalted Him and given Him the name which is above every name, that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, of those in heaven, and of those on earth, and of those under the earth, and that every tongue should confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father.”
As Christian’s here at St. Michael’s, we have forsaken the ways of the world; we cling not to our possessions or our pride, but to the Truth. We acknowledge our own sins and we help others work through the consequences of their own. And through this, we receive glory. Through this, in Christ, we are perfected. Through this we look to a life of abundant riches, not just now, but for all eternity.
Monday, September 15, 2008
20080914 Grateful Service
20080914 Grateful Service
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1 Corinthians 16: 13-24
St. Matthew 21: 33-42
In this Gospel lesson, the Lord is trying to open up the eyes of His audience, to help them understand that He is the Son of God, and that the natural way to receive Him is with repentance and gratitude. He does this through a parable and scriptural interpretation.
“The landowner established a vineyard, then leased it to with the ability to run it, and went to a far country.” The landowner here is God the Father. The vineyard can be thought of as Israel, a people set apart. The people that he leased the vineyard to can be thought of as the leaders of Israel, empowered with the tending and growth of Israel. The “far country” shows that God has given the stewards of His creation free will. The stewards are not micro-managed automatons or slaves, but people empowered with the abilities and resources for successfully implementing God’s will. His will in this parable is that vinedressers tend the vines and offer its fruit back to the owner – after all, the deal is described as a “lease”, which means that God remains sovereign and that the vinedressers owe Him rent. The meaning is that the leaders of Israel were to lead them into a deeper and stronger relationship to God; to grow them spiritually as a vinedresser grows grapes physically.
But what did these stewards do when the landowner sent his servants in order to receive the fruit? The proper thing to do would have been to show the servants hospitality and to give them the Master’s share. And they should do this not just because of the letter of the contract that they entered into with the landowner, but out of gratitude to him for allowing them to benefit from His vineyard. But they do not show the landowner gratitude. They do not offer hospitality to his servants. They do not even live up to their part of contract. Instead, they beat and kill the landowner’s servants and refuse to send him his due. He sends more, hoping to soften their hearts, but they do the same to them. Then he sends his own son, the ultimate sign of his power and authority. At this point they could and should have seen their folly, repented, and given to the son all that was due his father. But instead, they kill him as well.
The interpretation is clear: the Lord sent prophets to Israel, in order to gather Israel closer to Him, but the leaders rejected and killed them. When He sent more, they did the same. Then when He sent His own Son, the obvious sign of His authority, who told them to recognize their folly, repent, and give to the Son all that was due His Father, they rejected Him, humiliated Him, and killed Him. As in the parable, as a result of the vinedressers folly, the Lord has given the vineyard over to new stewards, with the expectation that they will “render to him the fruits in their seasons”. He has created the Holy Orthodox Church, with bishops, saints, and councils to tend it.
Christ’s audience knew what Christ was warning them about with this parable. He did not build it from scratch, but relied on scripture from the prophet Isaiah, something all of them would have immediately understood. And just to leave no doubt, he punctuated the parable with another bit of scripture (this time from the Psalms), saying “the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing and it is marvelous in our eyes?”
Christ was giving the Jews every opportunity He could to get them to repent and accept Him as the Messiah, the Son of God. But rather than being grateful for this opportunity and accepting it; they, like the vinedressers in the parable, rejected Him and killed Him.Can you imagine anything worse than ingratitude? But as difficult as this story is, it does not end here. I have told you before that the rule of thumb for understanding such lessons is for us to put ourselves in the place of the Jews.
God had given us His Creation to tend. He has given us all the tools and abilities to tend it well. All that He asks is that we gratefully offer up its firstfruits to Him. Are we doing any better than those whose place we took? Are we living up to our part of the deal?
Looking around at this world, I have to say that we are failing in our task. We are doing our very best to turn a beautiful vineyard into a garden of weeds.
More importantly, Christ is in our midst, just as He was with the vinedressers and Jews. And while we may not kill Him, we do something that may well be worse: we ignore Him. The vinedressers in the parable at least recognized the son for what he was; the Jews who met Christ conspired to kill Him because they recognized the dangerous potential of His message. But we, in our complete ingratitude and selfishness, do not even acknowledge that He is here, much less that we owe Him anything.
We act as if we created this vineyard ourselves, as if we – its laborers with God-given tools and abilities – were naturally due all of its fruit. You know, we react in horror at the ingratitude of children who completely ignore the role that good parents play in lovingly setting them up for a successful life. But how often do we behave like ungrateful children as we go about our own lives?
Christ is in our midst. As a Church, we turn to Him first in repentance for not putting Him first, then in gratitude and thanksgiving for His mercy and love for us (the word “Eucharist” means “thanksgiving”, and it is the very center of our lives).
You have accepted Christ, He is with You. Please, do not kill Him. Please, do not ignore Him. Be a good host to Your master. Offer Him His due. Not only is this “meet and right”, He takes these offerings and – like the bread and wine this morning – gives them back for our own salvation.
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
1 Corinthians 16: 13-24
St. Matthew 21: 33-42
In this Gospel lesson, the Lord is trying to open up the eyes of His audience, to help them understand that He is the Son of God, and that the natural way to receive Him is with repentance and gratitude. He does this through a parable and scriptural interpretation.
“The landowner established a vineyard, then leased it to with the ability to run it, and went to a far country.” The landowner here is God the Father. The vineyard can be thought of as Israel, a people set apart. The people that he leased the vineyard to can be thought of as the leaders of Israel, empowered with the tending and growth of Israel. The “far country” shows that God has given the stewards of His creation free will. The stewards are not micro-managed automatons or slaves, but people empowered with the abilities and resources for successfully implementing God’s will. His will in this parable is that vinedressers tend the vines and offer its fruit back to the owner – after all, the deal is described as a “lease”, which means that God remains sovereign and that the vinedressers owe Him rent. The meaning is that the leaders of Israel were to lead them into a deeper and stronger relationship to God; to grow them spiritually as a vinedresser grows grapes physically.
But what did these stewards do when the landowner sent his servants in order to receive the fruit? The proper thing to do would have been to show the servants hospitality and to give them the Master’s share. And they should do this not just because of the letter of the contract that they entered into with the landowner, but out of gratitude to him for allowing them to benefit from His vineyard. But they do not show the landowner gratitude. They do not offer hospitality to his servants. They do not even live up to their part of contract. Instead, they beat and kill the landowner’s servants and refuse to send him his due. He sends more, hoping to soften their hearts, but they do the same to them. Then he sends his own son, the ultimate sign of his power and authority. At this point they could and should have seen their folly, repented, and given to the son all that was due his father. But instead, they kill him as well.
The interpretation is clear: the Lord sent prophets to Israel, in order to gather Israel closer to Him, but the leaders rejected and killed them. When He sent more, they did the same. Then when He sent His own Son, the obvious sign of His authority, who told them to recognize their folly, repent, and give to the Son all that was due His Father, they rejected Him, humiliated Him, and killed Him. As in the parable, as a result of the vinedressers folly, the Lord has given the vineyard over to new stewards, with the expectation that they will “render to him the fruits in their seasons”. He has created the Holy Orthodox Church, with bishops, saints, and councils to tend it.
Christ’s audience knew what Christ was warning them about with this parable. He did not build it from scratch, but relied on scripture from the prophet Isaiah, something all of them would have immediately understood. And just to leave no doubt, he punctuated the parable with another bit of scripture (this time from the Psalms), saying “the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone. This was the Lord’s doing and it is marvelous in our eyes?”
Christ was giving the Jews every opportunity He could to get them to repent and accept Him as the Messiah, the Son of God. But rather than being grateful for this opportunity and accepting it; they, like the vinedressers in the parable, rejected Him and killed Him.Can you imagine anything worse than ingratitude? But as difficult as this story is, it does not end here. I have told you before that the rule of thumb for understanding such lessons is for us to put ourselves in the place of the Jews.
God had given us His Creation to tend. He has given us all the tools and abilities to tend it well. All that He asks is that we gratefully offer up its firstfruits to Him. Are we doing any better than those whose place we took? Are we living up to our part of the deal?
Looking around at this world, I have to say that we are failing in our task. We are doing our very best to turn a beautiful vineyard into a garden of weeds.
More importantly, Christ is in our midst, just as He was with the vinedressers and Jews. And while we may not kill Him, we do something that may well be worse: we ignore Him. The vinedressers in the parable at least recognized the son for what he was; the Jews who met Christ conspired to kill Him because they recognized the dangerous potential of His message. But we, in our complete ingratitude and selfishness, do not even acknowledge that He is here, much less that we owe Him anything.
We act as if we created this vineyard ourselves, as if we – its laborers with God-given tools and abilities – were naturally due all of its fruit. You know, we react in horror at the ingratitude of children who completely ignore the role that good parents play in lovingly setting them up for a successful life. But how often do we behave like ungrateful children as we go about our own lives?
Christ is in our midst. As a Church, we turn to Him first in repentance for not putting Him first, then in gratitude and thanksgiving for His mercy and love for us (the word “Eucharist” means “thanksgiving”, and it is the very center of our lives).
You have accepted Christ, He is with You. Please, do not kill Him. Please, do not ignore Him. Be a good host to Your master. Offer Him His due. Not only is this “meet and right”, He takes these offerings and – like the bread and wine this morning – gives them back for our own salvation.
Tuesday, September 9, 2008
20080907 Just Follow Me
20080907 Just Follow Me
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www.orthoanalytika.org
1 Corinthians 15: 1-11
St. Matthew 19: 16-26
What a wonderful day to celebrate the Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ! In fact, could there be anything better than gathering together here in this beautiful temple and offering the first few hours of this new week in communal praise of God? No, brothers and sisters, this love that you feel – for one another and for Our Lord – is what we are made for and the thing that perfects us.
Evidently, the Christians at Corinth had forgotten this. They were a community divided, a community that was torn by division, immorality, and spiritual weakness. St. Paul addresses each of these in turn in his epistle, but today he goes to the very root of the matter: the Church at Corinth suffered because it had wandered from the fundamental Truth: “that Christ died for our sins, that He was buried, and that He rose again on the Third day.” (1 Corinthians 15: 1-11) He knew that this fundamental Truth was not only essential for their salvation, but that without it, any of his attempts to reform the community were doomed to eventual failure.
[Nor did St. Paul offer this Truth as if it were his opinion. If he had, those who loved him might have listened, but those who did not – or were threatened by the message he delivered – would have treated it as the opinion of a political adversary and denigrated or dismissed it. St. Paul, like all true apostles and preachers, shies away from offering personal opinion, instead relying on the Scriptures, the testimony of eye-witnesses, and what he had seen first-hand. He does not think of himself as offering a “lecture on a moral theme” (the definition of homily) so much as he is simply “declaring the Gospel” (1 Corinthians 15:1), which is the very same thing being preached by the other apostles (1 Corinthians 15:11). The fact that the Orthodox Church follows in this tradition is attested to by the fact that the homily is offered in the same place as the Epistle and Gospel during our Divine Liturgy.]
Today St. Paul is reminding the Christians at Corinth of the only thing that really matters; that Christ died for our sins and was resurrected so that we might be perfected in Him. This Truth must order everything in our lives, and everything that pulls us away from this Truth must be stripped away lest it eternally tether us to this fallen world and limit our sanctification. We cannot allow anything – not brothers or sisters of father or mother, or wife, or children, or lands – to come between us and Christ. As God said with His own mouth: “And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.” (St. Matthew 19: 28-30). Of course those whose relationships with their houses, families, and lands, are based on Christ need not forsake them. But in order to grow, in order to survive, we must identify and purge all those things in our lives that are not of Christ.
This was the message that Christ gave to the young man, and he went away sorrowful. He went away sorrowful because he liked all of his possessions more than he cared about eternal life; more than he cared about the Truth. Can you imagine such folly? Please do not follow his witness! Choose joy and eternal life over sorrow; chose Christ over your possessions. As Jesus says; ‘if you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
Returning to the example of Corinth, we can see that this choice is not just faced by individual people, but their communities and parishes. At the time St. Paul wrote his first epistle to them, the community of Corinth was at a crossroad – it could either hold onto its possessions … or it could surrender itself completely to Christ and follow Him without reservation. One would lead to further divisions, sorrow, and death, and the other to unity, fulfillment, and eternal salvation.
This parish of St. Michael’s is committed to Christ. As such, it is constantly identifying those things that are essential to perfection and growth and embracing them. Because the world is changing, this sometimes means giving up things that we cherish in order to better witness to Him. Today is Ukrainian Sunday, when we offer up most of our praises to the Lord in the Ukrainian language. This is our heritage, how our founders came to know and follow Christ, and we celebrate it. It was not that long ago that every service was offered in Ukrainian, but we now offer almost all of our services in English because this is what it takes to spread the Gospel to our newest generations and to the broader community. I mention this because it speaks to the faith and strength of the people of this parish. Offered the choice between the Gospel of Jesus Christ and something very precious and dear and that had, indeed, so long been such an integral part of sharing that Gospel, it chose Christ.
This faith in Christ is our Heritage. It is what we are really celebrating today both here in our Liturgy and later during our festival. This is the faith passed to us through the Apostles, through our Ukrainian forefathers, and through those strong men and women who brought it to us here in America: “that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” May God continue to give us the strength as individuals and as a parish to continue to embrace this and to order our lives accordingly.
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
1 Corinthians 15: 1-11
St. Matthew 19: 16-26
What a wonderful day to celebrate the Resurrection of Our Lord Jesus Christ! In fact, could there be anything better than gathering together here in this beautiful temple and offering the first few hours of this new week in communal praise of God? No, brothers and sisters, this love that you feel – for one another and for Our Lord – is what we are made for and the thing that perfects us.
Evidently, the Christians at Corinth had forgotten this. They were a community divided, a community that was torn by division, immorality, and spiritual weakness. St. Paul addresses each of these in turn in his epistle, but today he goes to the very root of the matter: the Church at Corinth suffered because it had wandered from the fundamental Truth: “that Christ died for our sins, that He was buried, and that He rose again on the Third day.” (1 Corinthians 15: 1-11) He knew that this fundamental Truth was not only essential for their salvation, but that without it, any of his attempts to reform the community were doomed to eventual failure.
[Nor did St. Paul offer this Truth as if it were his opinion. If he had, those who loved him might have listened, but those who did not – or were threatened by the message he delivered – would have treated it as the opinion of a political adversary and denigrated or dismissed it. St. Paul, like all true apostles and preachers, shies away from offering personal opinion, instead relying on the Scriptures, the testimony of eye-witnesses, and what he had seen first-hand. He does not think of himself as offering a “lecture on a moral theme” (the definition of homily) so much as he is simply “declaring the Gospel” (1 Corinthians 15:1), which is the very same thing being preached by the other apostles (1 Corinthians 15:11). The fact that the Orthodox Church follows in this tradition is attested to by the fact that the homily is offered in the same place as the Epistle and Gospel during our Divine Liturgy.]
Today St. Paul is reminding the Christians at Corinth of the only thing that really matters; that Christ died for our sins and was resurrected so that we might be perfected in Him. This Truth must order everything in our lives, and everything that pulls us away from this Truth must be stripped away lest it eternally tether us to this fallen world and limit our sanctification. We cannot allow anything – not brothers or sisters of father or mother, or wife, or children, or lands – to come between us and Christ. As God said with His own mouth: “And every one that hath forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for my name's sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and shall inherit everlasting life.” (St. Matthew 19: 28-30). Of course those whose relationships with their houses, families, and lands, are based on Christ need not forsake them. But in order to grow, in order to survive, we must identify and purge all those things in our lives that are not of Christ.
This was the message that Christ gave to the young man, and he went away sorrowful. He went away sorrowful because he liked all of his possessions more than he cared about eternal life; more than he cared about the Truth. Can you imagine such folly? Please do not follow his witness! Choose joy and eternal life over sorrow; chose Christ over your possessions. As Jesus says; ‘if you want to be perfect, go, sell what you have and give to the poor, and you will have treasure in heaven; and come, follow me.”
Returning to the example of Corinth, we can see that this choice is not just faced by individual people, but their communities and parishes. At the time St. Paul wrote his first epistle to them, the community of Corinth was at a crossroad – it could either hold onto its possessions … or it could surrender itself completely to Christ and follow Him without reservation. One would lead to further divisions, sorrow, and death, and the other to unity, fulfillment, and eternal salvation.
This parish of St. Michael’s is committed to Christ. As such, it is constantly identifying those things that are essential to perfection and growth and embracing them. Because the world is changing, this sometimes means giving up things that we cherish in order to better witness to Him. Today is Ukrainian Sunday, when we offer up most of our praises to the Lord in the Ukrainian language. This is our heritage, how our founders came to know and follow Christ, and we celebrate it. It was not that long ago that every service was offered in Ukrainian, but we now offer almost all of our services in English because this is what it takes to spread the Gospel to our newest generations and to the broader community. I mention this because it speaks to the faith and strength of the people of this parish. Offered the choice between the Gospel of Jesus Christ and something very precious and dear and that had, indeed, so long been such an integral part of sharing that Gospel, it chose Christ.
This faith in Christ is our Heritage. It is what we are really celebrating today both here in our Liturgy and later during our festival. This is the faith passed to us through the Apostles, through our Ukrainian forefathers, and through those strong men and women who brought it to us here in America: “that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He rose again the third day according to the Scriptures.” May God continue to give us the strength as individuals and as a parish to continue to embrace this and to order our lives accordingly.
Monday, September 1, 2008
20080831 Forgive or Die!
20080831 Forgive or Die!
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In today’s Gospel lesson, we are told of a king who forgave a servant of a very great debt, and how the servant then tormented a fellow servant who owed him much less, refusing to forgive him his debt. We are to notice the great contrast between the actions of the king and his servant, and to know that in this parable the king represents our merciful God, and the unforgiving servant represents all those people who accept the mercy of God, but hold grudges in their hearts and refuse to forgive others.
This parable comes immediately after the Lord told the Apostle Peter, when he asked how many times we should forgive others, that it is more than just seven times, but seventy times seven. Christ is teaching us that we are to develop an attitude of forgiveness. It is as silly to try to come up with a specific number of times we should forgive as it is to come up with the number of times we should love one another or how many times we should pray. The goal is Christ-like perfection, and this requires continual love, continual prayer, and continual forgiveness.
The problem is that some of us refuse to do this. We keep an account of wrongs done against us like a treasure in our hearts. Often it is not “seven”, or even “seventy times seven” wrongs that we hold between us and another, but one! How well we play the part of the petty servant! In so doing we not only do an injustice to our brother, sister, or community; we do immeasurable harm to ourselves, for the resulting bitterness becomes ingrained, coloring how we see not just that other person or community, but how we see the world. This bitterness and spite cripples us, rendering us unable to continue on our journey to everlasting peace.
A few weeks ago (Sunday of the Paralytic, 3rd Sunday after Pascha), we heard of the man beside the pool at Bethsaida who had been crippled for thirty-eight years. Before He healed him, Christ asked this crippled man “do you want to be made well?” The Lord was not being facetious when he asked this. Nor is He being facetious when He asks us this same question now. Of course, the rational answer to this question is “YES!”, but sin is not rational. Hate is not rational. We carry around the remembrance of wrongs committed against us despite the damage that it does. The Lord sees our spiritual infirmity and the willful pride that is its source, and in His infinite love, He wants to heal it – but not against our will.
Do you want to be healed of your spiritual infirmity?
If you want to be freed from your sins, then you must forgive others. If you refuse to forgive, then you cut yourself off from your brother and, in your lack of love and compassion, you cut yourself off from God and everything good. You see, there are only two roads: forgiveness and voluntary excommunication. There are obvious examples: if someone refuses to come to Church and to participate in her Sacraments because of wrongs committed against them here, then they have visibly excommunicated themselves. They have chosen pride over the salvation, peace, and unity in Christ that is found in its fullness within the walls of the Holy Orthodox Church. It is worse than cutting off your nose to spite your face. But even if someone comes to Church every day, if they hold grudges against their neighbor, then they are still resisting the salvific healing that our Lord offers. It is like going to the doctor every day but refusing to follow his advice. Why bother? Is it so much fun to be crippled?
I am not saying that it is easy to forgive. In the parable, there was a legitimate debt owed. I am not telling you to pretend that you have not been hurt by the actions of others. People sin against us and the resulting pain is very real. What I am telling you is that if you want to be healed, if you want to be made well, and if you want to be released from your own debt of sin, that you must let go of the hate threatening to fester in your heart.
Only through forgiveness and love can the peace that passes all understanding grow within your heart.
www.stmichaeluoc.org
www.orthoanalytika.org
In today’s Gospel lesson, we are told of a king who forgave a servant of a very great debt, and how the servant then tormented a fellow servant who owed him much less, refusing to forgive him his debt. We are to notice the great contrast between the actions of the king and his servant, and to know that in this parable the king represents our merciful God, and the unforgiving servant represents all those people who accept the mercy of God, but hold grudges in their hearts and refuse to forgive others.
This parable comes immediately after the Lord told the Apostle Peter, when he asked how many times we should forgive others, that it is more than just seven times, but seventy times seven. Christ is teaching us that we are to develop an attitude of forgiveness. It is as silly to try to come up with a specific number of times we should forgive as it is to come up with the number of times we should love one another or how many times we should pray. The goal is Christ-like perfection, and this requires continual love, continual prayer, and continual forgiveness.
The problem is that some of us refuse to do this. We keep an account of wrongs done against us like a treasure in our hearts. Often it is not “seven”, or even “seventy times seven” wrongs that we hold between us and another, but one! How well we play the part of the petty servant! In so doing we not only do an injustice to our brother, sister, or community; we do immeasurable harm to ourselves, for the resulting bitterness becomes ingrained, coloring how we see not just that other person or community, but how we see the world. This bitterness and spite cripples us, rendering us unable to continue on our journey to everlasting peace.
A few weeks ago (Sunday of the Paralytic, 3rd Sunday after Pascha), we heard of the man beside the pool at Bethsaida who had been crippled for thirty-eight years. Before He healed him, Christ asked this crippled man “do you want to be made well?” The Lord was not being facetious when he asked this. Nor is He being facetious when He asks us this same question now. Of course, the rational answer to this question is “YES!”, but sin is not rational. Hate is not rational. We carry around the remembrance of wrongs committed against us despite the damage that it does. The Lord sees our spiritual infirmity and the willful pride that is its source, and in His infinite love, He wants to heal it – but not against our will.
Do you want to be healed of your spiritual infirmity?
If you want to be freed from your sins, then you must forgive others. If you refuse to forgive, then you cut yourself off from your brother and, in your lack of love and compassion, you cut yourself off from God and everything good. You see, there are only two roads: forgiveness and voluntary excommunication. There are obvious examples: if someone refuses to come to Church and to participate in her Sacraments because of wrongs committed against them here, then they have visibly excommunicated themselves. They have chosen pride over the salvation, peace, and unity in Christ that is found in its fullness within the walls of the Holy Orthodox Church. It is worse than cutting off your nose to spite your face. But even if someone comes to Church every day, if they hold grudges against their neighbor, then they are still resisting the salvific healing that our Lord offers. It is like going to the doctor every day but refusing to follow his advice. Why bother? Is it so much fun to be crippled?
I am not saying that it is easy to forgive. In the parable, there was a legitimate debt owed. I am not telling you to pretend that you have not been hurt by the actions of others. People sin against us and the resulting pain is very real. What I am telling you is that if you want to be healed, if you want to be made well, and if you want to be released from your own debt of sin, that you must let go of the hate threatening to fester in your heart.
Only through forgiveness and love can the peace that passes all understanding grow within your heart.
Monday, August 25, 2008
20080824 St. Paul or Madison Avenue?
20080824 St. Paul or Madison Avenue?
http://www.stmichaeluoc.org/
http://www.orthoanalytika.org/
1 Corinthians 4: 9-16
St. Matthew 17:14-23
In today’s Epistle, St. Paul urges the Christians at Corinth – and us – to imitate his single-minded devotion to Christ and Christian living. As part of his witness here and elsewhere, St. Paul describes the manner in which his devotion to Christ has cost him; he (along with all the apostles) [is] a fool, weak, dishonored, hungry, thirsty, poorly clothed, beaten, homeless, persecuted, defamed, the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things until now. (1 Corinthians 4: 10-13).
What kind of witness is this? It is certainly not the kind of advertisement that Madison Avenue uses! Indeed, it is a direct contrast to the health, popularity, attractiveness, and success that commercials use as witnesses to their products. Why do you think it is that the Church uses sacrifice and martyrdom (the ultimate signs of worldly failure) to encourage us to live the way it wants; while the world uses promises of comfort and praise (the ultimate signs of worldly success) to get us to live the way it wants?
Whom do you trust to guide your decisions? St. Paul or Madison Avenue?
I can certainly tell you which one is most influencing the hearts and minds of this community, our neighbors, our families, and our friends! If you want to see where someone’s heart is, look to how they spend their time and how they spend their money. Most people will begrudge God a simple tithe of their time and treasure, but will scrimp and save and jeopardize their future with debt, doing whatever it takes to buy whatever the latest car, fashion, property, or what-not being pushed as the new sign of success. We send our children to schools that bankrupt us to give them a hope of future riches, but blanch at the thought of seminary or holy orders. Madison Avenue has all but won this war for man’s heart because we have accepted its version of success and failure: we trust Madison Avenue more than the Gospel of Christ, and we value comfort and popularity more than the Truth.
And this trend will be continue until we value all outcomes in terms of Christ and the Gospel. Was St. Paul a failure? He wore the wrong clothes and lived without a home. Was Christ a failure? He died the foulest criminal’s death, despised by all but a handful of his closest friends and family.
You have all accepted Christ into your heart. You believe that He is the source of redemption and eternal life. But do you have the faith to live the life that such belief requires? In His Gospel lesson today, Christ rebukes His disciples for their lack of faith. He teaches them that the way to grow in faith is through prayer and fasting; and promises that mature faith can move mountains.
Do we pray? Do we fast? By prayer, I do not just mean fitting in thanks and prayer requests before meals and whenever we feel so inclined; I mean the kind of prayers that Christ Himself offered up to His Father. I mean setting aside some of our valuable time to pick up our prayer books and actually offer fitting praise, repentance, and thanksgiving to the Lord – even if it means less time spent in worldly entertainment. By fasting, I mean what the Lord means: disciplining yourself by limiting the types and portions of food we eat. I am amazed at how we are so willing to follow the dietary advice of nutritionists but are so unwilling to follow the dietary advice of Christ and His Church!
Faith in Christ as the Son of God is the only thing worth knowing, the only firm foundation, the only path to eternal success, the only hope of peace, the only salvation. Yet instead of putting our faith in Him and His Guiding Love, we have chosen to put our faith in the ephemeral diversions and damnation offered by those who care only about making themselves rich off our naivety.
Trust St. Paul, not Madison Avenue. Put your faith in Jesus Christ. He is the Son of God. He loves you and has a plan for you that will bring you eternal (not ephemeral) peace and prosperity.
http://www.stmichaeluoc.org/
http://www.orthoanalytika.org/
1 Corinthians 4: 9-16
St. Matthew 17:14-23
In today’s Epistle, St. Paul urges the Christians at Corinth – and us – to imitate his single-minded devotion to Christ and Christian living. As part of his witness here and elsewhere, St. Paul describes the manner in which his devotion to Christ has cost him; he (along with all the apostles) [is] a fool, weak, dishonored, hungry, thirsty, poorly clothed, beaten, homeless, persecuted, defamed, the filth of the world, the offscouring of all things until now. (1 Corinthians 4: 10-13).
What kind of witness is this? It is certainly not the kind of advertisement that Madison Avenue uses! Indeed, it is a direct contrast to the health, popularity, attractiveness, and success that commercials use as witnesses to their products. Why do you think it is that the Church uses sacrifice and martyrdom (the ultimate signs of worldly failure) to encourage us to live the way it wants; while the world uses promises of comfort and praise (the ultimate signs of worldly success) to get us to live the way it wants?
Whom do you trust to guide your decisions? St. Paul or Madison Avenue?
I can certainly tell you which one is most influencing the hearts and minds of this community, our neighbors, our families, and our friends! If you want to see where someone’s heart is, look to how they spend their time and how they spend their money. Most people will begrudge God a simple tithe of their time and treasure, but will scrimp and save and jeopardize their future with debt, doing whatever it takes to buy whatever the latest car, fashion, property, or what-not being pushed as the new sign of success. We send our children to schools that bankrupt us to give them a hope of future riches, but blanch at the thought of seminary or holy orders. Madison Avenue has all but won this war for man’s heart because we have accepted its version of success and failure: we trust Madison Avenue more than the Gospel of Christ, and we value comfort and popularity more than the Truth.
And this trend will be continue until we value all outcomes in terms of Christ and the Gospel. Was St. Paul a failure? He wore the wrong clothes and lived without a home. Was Christ a failure? He died the foulest criminal’s death, despised by all but a handful of his closest friends and family.
You have all accepted Christ into your heart. You believe that He is the source of redemption and eternal life. But do you have the faith to live the life that such belief requires? In His Gospel lesson today, Christ rebukes His disciples for their lack of faith. He teaches them that the way to grow in faith is through prayer and fasting; and promises that mature faith can move mountains.
Do we pray? Do we fast? By prayer, I do not just mean fitting in thanks and prayer requests before meals and whenever we feel so inclined; I mean the kind of prayers that Christ Himself offered up to His Father. I mean setting aside some of our valuable time to pick up our prayer books and actually offer fitting praise, repentance, and thanksgiving to the Lord – even if it means less time spent in worldly entertainment. By fasting, I mean what the Lord means: disciplining yourself by limiting the types and portions of food we eat. I am amazed at how we are so willing to follow the dietary advice of nutritionists but are so unwilling to follow the dietary advice of Christ and His Church!
Faith in Christ as the Son of God is the only thing worth knowing, the only firm foundation, the only path to eternal success, the only hope of peace, the only salvation. Yet instead of putting our faith in Him and His Guiding Love, we have chosen to put our faith in the ephemeral diversions and damnation offered by those who care only about making themselves rich off our naivety.
Trust St. Paul, not Madison Avenue. Put your faith in Jesus Christ. He is the Son of God. He loves you and has a plan for you that will bring you eternal (not ephemeral) peace and prosperity.
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