Homily for the Nineteenth Sunday After Pentecost & Fifth Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

2 Corinthians 11:31-12:9; Luke 16:19-31

 There is perhaps no more powerful example of our need for Christ’s healing of our souls than that contained in today’s gospel reading.  A rich man with the benefit of the great spiritual heritage of Abraham, Moses, and the prophets had become such a slave to gratifying his desires for indulgence in pleasure that he had become completely blind to his responsibility to show mercy to Lazarus, a miserable beggar who wanted only crumbs and whose only comfort was when dogs licked his open sores.  The rich man’s life revolved around wearing the most expensive clothes and enjoying the finest food and drink, even as he surely stepped over or around Lazarus at the entrance to his home on a regular basis and never did anything at all to relieve his suffering.  

 After their deaths, the two men’s situations were reversed.  The rich man had spent his life rejecting the teachings of Moses and the prophets about the necessity of showing mercy to the poor.   He had blinded himself spiritually to the point that he could not recognize Lazarus as a neighbor who bore the image of God.  He remained blind to the love of God after his death and could perceive the divine majesty as only a burning flame of torment.  When the rich man asked Father Abraham to send Lazarus to his brothers to warn them of the consequences of living such a depraved life, the great patriarch responded, “‘If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.’”

That statement applies to the corrupt nationalistic religious leaders who called for Christ’s crucifixion and denied His resurrection because they wanted only a warrior king who would slaughter their enemies and give them earthly power.  We must not rest content, however, with seeing how the Lord’s statement applies to others, for it should challenge us even more as those who have received the fullness of the mystery of God’s salvation.  Our responsibility is far greater than that of the Jews of old, for as members of Christ’s Body, the Church, the Holy Spirit strengthens and sustains us in seeing and serving our Lord in our neighbors.    Since every neighbor is an icon of God, how we treat them reveals our relationship to Him.  Christ taught that what we do “to the least of these,” to the most wretched people, we do to Him.  If we become so obsessed with gratifying ourselves or appearing successful that we refuse to convey His mercy to our neighbors, our actions will show that we have rejected our Messiah and denied the truth of His resurrection, for we will then be unable to bear witness to His victory over the corrupting power of sin and death.  Regardless of what we say we believe, our actions will demonstrate that we want no part of the salvation that He has brought to the world.   Like the rich man, we will exclude ourselves from the joy of the Kingdom.  Remember the words of the Lord: “Not everyone who says to Me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ shall enter the kingdom of heaven, but he who does the will of My Father in heaven.”  (Matt. 7:21)  

 Lazarus, like everyone else, bore the image and likeness of God.  There is simply no way around the basic truth that how we relate to our neighbors reveals how we relate to our Lord.  What we do for even the most miserable and inconvenient people we encounter in life, we do for Christ.  And what we refuse to do for them, we refuse to do for our Savior.  Our salvation is in becoming more like Him as we find the healing of our souls by cooperating with His grace.  While we cannot save ourselves any more than we can rise up by our own power from the grave, we must obey His commandments in order to open our souls in humility to receive His healing mercy as we become more like Him as “partakers of the divine nature.” If we do not do that, we will suffer the spiritual blindness of the rich man in today’s gospel lesson and bring judgment upon ourselves, regardless of how much or how little of the world’s treasures we have. 

 In the midst of our materialistic and consumeristic culture, it is easy to overlook St. Paul’s warning that “Those who want to get rich fall into temptation and a trap and into many foolish and harmful desires that plunge people into ruin and destruction. For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evil.”  (1 Tim. 6: 9-10)   It was surely the love of money that led the rich man in today’s parable to become so enslaved to gratifying self-centered desire that he closed his heart completely to concern for his neighbors, even those so obviously suffering right before his eyes. Because he would not show love for poor Lazarus, he degraded himself to the point that he could not love God.   St. John wrote, “If someone says, ‘I love God,’ and hates his brother, he is a liar; for he who does not love his brother whom he has seen, how can he love God whom he has not seen?” (1 Jn. 4:20) The Lord Himself taught that love of God and neighbor are the greatest of the commandments. (Matt. 22: 37-40).   It is no surprise, then, that the rich man experienced the torment of bitter regret after his death, for he was in the eternal presence of the Lord Whom he had rejected throughout his life.  He had turned away decisively from God’s love and was capable of perceiving the divine glory as only a burning flame.  As St. Basil the Great proclaimed to the rich who refused to share with the poor, “You showed no mercy; it will not be shown to you.  You opened not your house; you will be expelled from the Kingdom.  You gave not your bread; you will not receive eternal life.”[1]

 Unlike those whose who ground their identity in the world’s power and wealth, we must learn to see and serve our Lord in light of the apparent weakness of His Cross, for as St. Paul wrote, “God chose what is foolish in the world to shame the wise; God chose what is weak in the world to shame the strong.” (1 Cor. 1: 27) He refers to his own “thorn in the flesh,” about which he received the divine word: “’My grace is sufficient for you, for My strength is made perfect in weakness.’ Most gladly therefore [he wrote] will I rather boast in my infirmities, that the power of Christ may rest upon me.” 

To take the time to see and serve Christ in our needy and inconvenient neighbors will appear weak and foolish in the eyes of many in our self-centered, materialistic culture.  Doing so also may well go against the grain of our own desires for gaining all the comfort, ease, and status that we can in this life.  The more we invest our resources, time, and attention in serving the poor, sick, confused, and otherwise needy people in whom we encounter the Savior, the weaker we will be according to the standards of those who live only to serve themselves and impress their neighbors with the signs of wealth and power.  The more that we fight our self-centered desires to convey the Lord’s mercy to our neighbors, the more that we will cultivate the humility necessary to see ourselves clearly as those who remain weak before our passions. Our hearts will then be softened toward our weak neighbors who need us to convey to them the philanthropic generosity that we have received from Him.

Since the Savior taught that “where your treasure is, there your heart will be also,” this is a struggle that we must embrace if we hope to acquire the spiritual clarity necessary to overcome the blindness of the rich man, who could no longer recognize poor Lazarus as an icon of God or the divine glory as anything but a tormenting fire.  (Matt. 6:21) There is nothing like sacrificing in tangible ways for the sake of our neighbors to open our hearts to receive the healing mercy of the Lord.  That is why He said, “In that you did it to one of the least of these my brethren, you did  it to me.” (Matt. 25:40)

 

 

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[1]Basil the Great, “To the Rich,” On Social Justice, 49.

Homily for the Seventeenth Sunday After Pentecost and Sixth Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

2 Cor. 6:16-7:1; Luke 8:26-39

             St. Irenaeus wrote that “The glory of God is a man fully alive, and the life of man consists in beholding God” (Adv. haer. 4.20.7).”  To be a human person is to bear the image of God with the calling to become more like Him in holiness.  The more we do so, the more we become our true selves.  The God-Man Jesus Christ came to restore and fulfill us as living icons of God.  He enables us to become truly human as we participate personally in Him as the Second Adam.  As St. Paul wrote, “For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen, to the glory of God through us.”  (2 Cor. 1:20)

            If we need a clear example of how the Lord has extended the ancient promises to Abraham to all people in order to restore the beauty of our darkened souls, we need look no further than today’s Gospel reading about a man so miserable that he was barely recognizable as a human person.  He had no illusions about himself, for he was so filled with demons that he called himself “Legion.”  His personality had disintegrated due to the overwhelming power of the forces of evil in his life.  That is shown by the fact that he was naked, like Adam and Eve who stripped themselves of the divine glory and were cast out of Paradise into our world of corruption.  He lived among the tombs, and death is “the wages of sin” that came into the world as a consequence of our first parents’ refusal to fulfill their calling to become like God in holiness.  This naked man living in the cemetery was so terrifying to others that they tried unsuccessfully to restrain him with chains.  People understandably feared that he would do to them what Cain had done to Abel.  But when this fellow broke free, he would run off to the desert by himself, alone with his demons.  The Gadarene demoniac provides a vivid icon of the pathetic suffering of humanity enslaved to death, stripped naked of the divine glory, and isolated in fear.  His wretched condition manifests the tragic disintegration of the human person that the Savior came to heal.   

            Evil was so firmly rooted in this man’s soul that his reaction to the Lord’s command for the demons to depart is shocking: “What have you to do with me?...I ask you, do not torment me.”  He had abandoned hope for healing and perceived Christ’s promise of deliverance simply as even further torment.  By telling the Lord that his name was Legion, he acknowledged that the line between the demons and his own identity had been blurred.  He was in such bad shape that it was not clear where he ended and where the demons began.  The Savior then cast the demons into the herd of pigs, which ran into the lake and drowned.  In the Old Testament context, pigs were unclean, and here the forces of evil lead even them to destruction. 

            Perhaps there is no clearer image of how evil debases our humanity than the plight of this miserable man.    He is an icon of our brokenness and represents us all in many ways.  He did not ask Christ to deliver him, even as we did not take the initiative in the Savior’s coming to the world.   The corrupting forces of evil were so powerful in this man’s life that he had lost all awareness of being a person in God’s image and likeness.  We can also become so overwhelmed by our inflamed passions that we lose all sense of being a living icon of God.  When that happens, we would rather that Christ leave us alone to wallow in the mire of our sins than to heal us.  We can easily become overwhelmed with fear that His salvation will simply torment us, for sometimes we cannot even imagine living without the corruption that has become second nature to us.  

            After the spectacular drowning of the swine, the man in question was “sitting at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind.”  The one who had not been recognizably human returned to being his true self.  That was a very upsetting scene to the people of that region and they asked Christ to leave out of fear at what had happened.  We may find their reaction hard to understand.  What could be so terrifying about this man returning to a normal life?  Unfortunately, we all tend to get used to whatever we get used to.  What we have experienced routinely in ourselves or from others, no matter how depraved, becomes normal to us.  The scary man in the tombs was afraid when Christ came to set him free, but his neighbors seemed even more disturbed when they saw that he had been liberated.

            It should not be surprising that the man formerly possessed by demons and still feared by his neighbors did not want to stay in his hometown after the Lord restored him.  He begged to go with Christ, Who responded, “Return to your home, and declare all that God has done for you.”  That must have been a difficult commandment for him to obey.  Who would not be embarrassed and afraid to live in a town where everyone knew about the wretched and miserable existence he had experienced?  It would have been much easier to have left all that behind and start over as a traveling disciple of the One who had set him free.

            But that was not what Christ wanted the man to do.  Perhaps that was because the Lord knew that the best sign of His transforming power was a living person who had been restored from the worst forms of depravity and corruption as a sign of the glory of God.   There could not be a better witness of the salvation that the God-Man has brought to the world than a person who moved from death to life.  Such a radical change is a brilliant sign of the truth of Christ’s resurrection, for He makes us participants in His victory over death by breaking the destructive hold of the power of sin in our lives.   

The presence of the pigs in this story reminds us that the man to whom Christ restored his humanity was a Gentile, like the compromised and confused Christians of Corinth to whom St. Paul wrote in today’s epistle lesson.  Even as they kept falling back into their old ways of idolatry and immorality, he referred to them as “the temple of the living God” and applied the exhortations of the Hebrew prophets to them: “’I will be their God, and they shall be My people. Therefore, come out from them, and be separate from them,’” says the Lord, “’and touch nothing unclean; then I will welcome you, and I will be a father to you, and you shall be My sons and daughters, says the Lord Almighty.’”

Contrary to the legalistic attitude of his fellow Pharisees, St. Paul knew that being a Jew was not a prerequisite for receiving the blessings of the Messiah, for all with faith in Him are now “Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.” (Gal. 3:29) His Kingdom is not defined according to ethnicity, nationalism, or geography. St. Paul also knew that being spiritually clean and separate from the corruptions of the world was not a matter of merely checking off the boxes of outward behavior.  The Corinthians had strayed far from the path of faithfulness to Christ, but the Apostle did not tell them that all was therefore lost. They had put on Christ like a garment in baptism and been nourished by His Body and Blood in the Eucharist.  He reminded them of who they had become by grace as “the temple of the living God” and called them to live accordingly.  Doing so was not an exercise in religious legalism, but required embracing the ongoing struggle for purity of heart as they did the hard work of reorienting their lives to the Kingdom.  As today’s reading concludes, “Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, and make holiness perfect in the fear of God.”

We must learn from the Lord’s deliverance of the demon-possessed man and St. Paul’s exhortation to the Corinthians that, no matter how consumed we are by our passions, we must never give up hope for healing.  Regardless of how far we have strayed from the path of faithfulness, we must refuse to define ourselves as spiritual failures cut off from the Lord’s mercy.  Instead, we must remember that, as “the temple of the living God,” we have the freedom to cooperate with the infinite healing power of the Holy Spirit poured out upon us as living members of Christ’s Body, the Church.  If we will do what we presently have the strength to do each day in embracing our true identity in the Savior, then we may all become like the man who was finally able to sit “at the feet of Jesus, clothed and in his right mind” and able to bear witness to the great salvation that He has brought to the world.  As the Apostle taught, “Since we have these promises, beloved, let us cleanse ourselves from every defilement of body and spirit, and make holiness perfect in the fear of God.”  That is how we may become fully alive and behold the divine glory.

 

 

 

 

 

Homily for the Sunday of the Holy Fathers of Seventh Ecumenical Council & Fourth Sunday of Luke with Commemoration of the Hieromartyr Jacob of Hamatoura in the Orthodox Church

 

Titus 3:8-15; Luke 8:5-15

     Many are strongly tempted today to allow the problems facing our culture and world to distract us from growing to maturity in the Christian life and bearing good fruit for the Kingdom of God.  That is perfectly understandable in light of our constant access to global media and the gravity of current events.  All Christians should mourn the ongoing slaughter in the Holy Land, which has now engulfed Lebanon, a traditional heartland of our Antiochian Orthodox Church.  Our father in Christ, His Beatitude Patriarch John X of Antioch, has joined with other Orthodox leaders there to call for an end to “the on-going killing that has claimed the lives of thousands of innocent civilians” and displaced over a million people.”[1]  We are all aware of the invasion by Russia of Ukraine, where bloodshed continues between historically Orthodox nations and some have threatened even to use nuclear weapons.  There is no telling how much further these conflicts will spread.  Regardless of our particular political opinions, many Americans today are deeply worried about the future of our nation.  In ways that transcend conventional politics, so much of what we had taken for granted about our culture is being called into question.  And on matters including our health, our finances, and our families, most of us know the temptations of worry and fear all too well.  It can be very difficult, then, to “lay aside all earthly cares” in order to focus on “the one thing needful” of hearing and obeying the Word of God. 

 

That is why we all need to concentrate our attention today on commemorating the 367 Holy Fathers of the 7th Ecumenical Council, which met in Nicaea in 787.  The council rejected the false teaching that to honor icons is to commit idolatry, for it distinguished between the worship that is due to God alone and the veneration that is appropriate for images of Christ, the Theotokos, and the Saints.  The council’s teaching highlighted the importance of the Savior’s incarnation, for only a truly human Savior with a physical body could restore us to the dignity and beauty of the living icons of God in every dimension of our existence.

 

The 7th Ecumenical Council addressed matters that strike at the very heart of how we embrace our fundamental vocation to become like God in holiness in a world that so desperately needs the peace of Christ.  Too often, however, we think that iconography simply has to do with wood and paint, and is unrelated to the question of whether we are becoming more like Christ and gaining the strength to seek first His Kingdom.  The icons are not merely religious art, but reminders that to become a truly human person is to become like Jesus Christ, who, according to St. Paul, “is our peace… and has broken down the middle wall of separation” so that “He might reconcile…both [Jew and Gentile] to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity.” (Eph. 2:14-16) The more that we become like our Lord, Who worked this reconciliation, the less we will see anyone through the darkened lenses of those who place their hopes in earthly kingdoms of whatever kind.   

 

Today’s gospel reading addresses these same questions with different imagery.  Christ used the parable of the sower to call His disciples to become like plants that grew from the seed that “fell into good soil and grew, and yielded a hundredfold.”  He wanted them to become “those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bring forth fruit with patience.”  Not all who hear the Word of God will do so, even as not all seeds will grow to fruition.   Some never even believe, while others make a good start and then fall away due to temptation or “are choked by the cares and riches and pleasures of life, and their fruit does not mature.” 

 

This parable warns us about what happens when we fail to fulfill our potential as those who bear the image of God.  Our vocation is to become more beautiful living icons of the Savior, but we diminish and distort ourselves when we refuse to become who God created us to be.  Plants must grow and flourish as the kinds of plants that they are in order to become healthy and bear fruit.  Farmers must care for them accordingly.  The sun, soil, moisture, and nutrients must be appropriate for that particular type of plant in order for them to flourish.  In order for us to bear good fruit for the Kingdom, we must attend to the health of our souls with the conscientiousness of a careful farmer or gardener.  We must do so in order to become more fully who we are as living icons of Christ.  If, to the contrary, we become obsessed with worry and fear about earthly cares of whatever kind, we will never gain the strength to bear good fruit for the Kingdom.   

 

In today’s epistle lesson, St. Paul urged St. Titus to tell the people to focus on doing good deeds and helping others in great need.  He wanted them to avoid foolish arguments and divisions, “for they are unprofitable and vain.”  St. Paul did not want the people to waste their time and energy on matters that would simply inflame their passions and hinder them from attaining spiritual health and maturity.  He called them to care for their spiritual wellbeing with the conscientiousness of farmers who are single-mindedly dedicated to bringing in a bumper crop.  If they let down their guard to the point of being so consumed by pointless controversies that they ignored basic disciplines like loving and serving their neighbors, they would risk dying spiritually like a neglected plant overtaken by weeds. 

 

If we are to become “those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bring forth fruit with patience,” we must refuse to allow the passions of worry and fear to take root in our hearts and minds, regardless of what is happening in our world, our nation, or our families.  We must do the hard, daily work of learning to trust and hope in the Lord as we mindfully turn away from fueling our passions and instead invest ourselves in serving the living icons of Christ who are our neighbors. In order to bear good fruit for the Kingdom, we must refuse to focus on anything that will distract us from sharing more fully in His blessed, eternal life.  Unless we struggle mindfully against this temptation, it can easily choke the life out of our souls. Because our risen Lord has conquered even the grave through His glorious resurrection on the third day, we must refuse to become enslaved to the fear of death and instead focus on becoming more beautiful icons of Christ.  That is the only way to know true peace in this world.

 

The example of St. Jacob of Hamatoura should inspire us in this regard.  After a year of torture, he was beheaded for Christ in the fifteenth century in Lebanon. Centuries later, monks returned to restore the ancient monastery on the mountain of Hamatoura. The monastics and pilgrims then began to encounter the saint through visions and miracles, but his name was not known until the discovery of a manuscript in 2002, after which his relics were discovered also.  St. Jacob is a shining example of how even the very worst that the corrupt powers of this world can do can never separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord. (Rom. 8:39) Our Risen Lord has liberated us from slavery to the fear of death, which is at the root of all our  anxiety and despair.  So the next time that you find yourself worried and afraid about anything, mindfully commend that concern to Christ and invest yourself in prayer, fasting, and generosity with your time and resources to help the neighbor right next to you.  That is how we may become “those who, hearing the word, hold it fast in an honest and good heart, and bring forth fruit with patience.”   There is no other path for entering into the joy of the Lord.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

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[1] https://www.antiochian.org/regulararticle/2205

Homily for the Fifteenth Sunday after Pentecost & Third Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

2 Corinthians 4:6-15: Luke 7:11-16

            Across the centuries, there has been a persistent temptation for many Christians to view salvation as an easy spiritual escape from life in the world rather than as the demanding journey of pursuing its fulfillment and healing in God.  It is possible to abuse the hope of heaven as an excuse for not responding faithfully to the many challenges that stare us in the face in the world as we know it.   I am sure that many people have rejected the Christian faith because they believe it is otherworldly to the point of irrelevance before their very real suffering and pain, as well as that of their neighbors and loved ones.   A key problem with such escapist forms of Christianity is that the Lord brought salvation to the world by entering fully into its brokenness as the God-Man, even to the point of death, in order to bring us into the joy of a new heaven and a new earth through His glorious resurrection.  His Kingdom is not only a future hope, but also a present reality, for as Christ said, “the kingdom of God is within you.” (Lk 17:21)   Remember how He responded to the question of whether He was the Messiah: “Go and tell John the things you have seen and heard: that the blind see, the lame walk, the   lepers are cleansed, the deaf hear, the dead are raised, the poor have the gospel preached to them.” (Lk. 7:22) Those are the words of the New Adam who came to heal all the infirmities of His suffering sons and daughters.    

            Today’s reading from the gospel according to St. Luke comes right before that passage.  The widow of Nain was having the worst day of her life and had no reason to hope for a blessed or even tolerable future, for in that time and place a widow who had lost her only son was in a very precarious state.  Poverty, neglect, and abuse would threaten her daily; she would have been vulnerable and alone.  When contrary to all expectations the Lord raised her son, He transformed her deep mourning into great joy. He restored life itself both to the young man and to his mother.

The Lord’s great act of compassion for this woman manifests our salvation and provides a sign of hope in even the darkest moments of our lives in our fallen world.  We weep and mourn not only for loved ones whom we see no more, but also for the brokenness and disintegration that we know all too well in our own souls, the lives of our loved ones, and the world around us.   Death, destruction, and decay in all their forms are the consequences of our personal and collective refusal to fulfill our vocation to live as those created in the image of God by becoming like Him in holiness.  We weep with the widow of Nain not only for losing loved ones, but also for losing what it means to be a human person as a living icon of God in a world that seems so far from manifesting the fullness of the heavenly reign.

           The good news of the Gospel is that the compassion of the Lord extends even to those who endure the most tragic and miserable circumstances and the most profound sorrows.  Purely out of love for His suffering children, the Father sent the Son to heal and liberate us from slavery to the fear of death through His Cross and glorious resurrection. The Savior touched the funeral bier and the dead man arose.  Christ’s compassion for us is so profound that He not only touched death, but entered fully into it, into a tomb, and into Hades, because He refused to leave us to self-destruction.   He went into the abyss and experienced the terror of the black night of the pit.  The Theotokos wept bitterly at His public torture and execution, not unlike mothers today who weep at the loss of their children.  When He rose victorious over death in all its forms, He provided the only true basis of hope that the despair of the grave will not have the last word on the living icons of God.  His Mother and the other Myrrh-Bearing Women were the very first to receive this unbelievably good news.    

            The widow of Nain wept bitterly out of grief for the loss of her son.  Christ wept at the tomb of his friend St. Lazarus, not only for him, but for us all who are wedded to death as the children of Adam and Eve, who were cast out of Paradise into this world of corruption.  We weep with broken hearts out of love for those whose suffering is beyond our ability to ease, those who are no longer with us in this life, and those from whom we have become otherwise estranged due to their and our sins.  We must learn to weep for ourselves as those who have caught a glimpse of the eternal blessedness for which we came into being and who know how far we are from entering fully into the joy of the Lord.  The corruption that separates us from God and from one another takes many forms and the same is true of our healing and restoration.  The particular paths that we must follow in order to embrace Christ’s victory over death as distinctive persons will certainly vary.  But they must all be routes for gaining the spiritual clarity to learn to mourn our sins and take the steps that are best for our healing and restoration as whole persons in the world as we know it.  If we refuse to take those steps and simply wait passively to ascend someday into heavenly peace, we will only weaken ourselves even further as we refuse to do what is necessary to lift up our hearts to receive the Lord’s healing.  There is no way around the truth that we must do the hard work of taking up our crosses and following Him, if we want to share in His blessed life.  

            In today’s epistle reading, St. Paul reminds the Corinthians that “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God” shining in our hearts through Christ does not guarantee a life of ease and comfort, for “we have this treasure in earthen vessels, that the exceeding greatness of power is from God, and not from us.”  God created us from the dust of the earth, to which we will all return.  We are not only mortal, but also subject to all kinds of weaknesses, maladies, and imperfections in every dimension of our existence as embodied persons.   As the Apostle describes his ministry, “We are pressed on every way, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not driven to despair; persecuted, but not forsaken; smitten down, but not destroyed; always bearing about in the body the dying of the Lord Jesus, that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our body.”

            Those tempted to spiritual escapism forget that Jesus Christ came in the flesh with a body just like ours.  His humanity is whole and complete while being united with His true divinity:  He is one Person with two natures.  We unite ourselves to His great Self-Offering on the Cross when we take up our cross of struggling to be faithful in the midst of our weaknesses, infirmities, and corruptions, those of everyone we encounter, and those of our culture and world.  Christ does not call us somehow to escape from this difficult path, but to pursue it as He did.  As St. Paul stated, “For we who live are always delivered to death for Jesus’ sake, that the life of Jesus may also be manifested in our mortal flesh.”  We must die to the ongoing power of sin in our lives so that we may rise up with Christ in holiness, gaining the spiritual strength to manifest His loving kindness and merciful blessing to those as miserable as the widow of Nain.  In order for our lives to become signs of the presence of His Kingdom in our world of corruption, we must take up our crosses to the point that we may say with integrity: “I have been crucified with Christ; it is no longer I who live, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave Himself for me.” (Gal. 2:20)  

              The Lord said, “Blessed are they that mourn, for they shall be comforted.”  (Matt. 5:4) His mercy on the widow of Nain provides us all a sign of the hope for eternal life that is ours in Him.  In order to enter into the blessedness for which we hope, we must mourn our sins by embracing the difficult struggle to repent of them.  That is the only way that we may gain the spiritual strength to play our unique roles in conveying His comfort and blessing to those who suffer to the point of despair in our world of corruption.  The more that we unite ourselves to Christ in faith and faithfulness as we take up our crosses, the more that we will know the joy of His Kingdom even now and become instruments for bearing witness to His salvation, which is already breaking into the world as a “treasure in earthen vessels, that the exceeding greatness of power is from God, and not from us.”

 

"Love Your Enemies" : Homily for the Fourteenth Sunday after Pentecost & Second Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

2 Cor.  1:21-2:4; Luke 6:31-36

 One of the great challenges that many of us face is learning to see that being an Orthodox Christians may not be reduced to confessing certain beliefs about God, no matter how true those beliefs are.  Our faith may not be reduced to conscientious participation in the worship of the Church or keeping our own rule of prayer, fasting, almsgiving, or other spiritual disciplines.  Our faith may not be reduced to following a code of moral behavior or distinguishing clearly between actions that are good or evil.  These endeavors are all virtuous in and of themselves and we must not neglect or diminish them in any way, but our calling is much higher, for it is nothing less than to embody the mercy of God from the very depths of our being. That sublime vocation goes well beyond the demands of being a conventionally religious or moral person, for it requires nothing less than becoming “partakers of the divine nature” by grace.  Remember what the Lord said, “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.”  (Matt. 5:8)

 The laws of the Old Testament were necessary to make clear to the Hebrew people how they were to act as those in a covenantal relation with God.  Jesus Christ is not simply an especially insightful rabbi or prophet on such matters, but truly the God-Man in Whom the ancient promises, laws, and prophecies are fulfilled and extended even to Gentiles like us who respond to Him with humble faith.  He is a Person in Whose life we share as living members of His Body, the Church.  The Church is the bride of Christ and we must live as those in a “one flesh” union with Him in every aspect of our existence. In Him, we become truly sons and daughters of the Most High, for His eternal life becomes ours.   

 It is only in this context that we can understand our Lord’s teaching in today’s gospel reading:  “But love your enemies, and do good, and lend, expecting nothing in return; and your reward will be great, and you will be sons of the Most High; for He is kind to the ungrateful and the selfish.  Be merciful, even as your Father is merciful.”  In this passage from the gospel according to St. Luke, Christ does not rest content with calling His followers to limit their vengeance to “an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth,” even though that Old Testament principle had placed needed restrain on vengeance. (Matt. 5:38) He did not affirm the common attitude of the time, “Love your neighbor and hate your enemy,” an attitude that unfortunately remains with us today in so many ways, including religion, politics, and ethnicity.   (Matt. 5:43) Instead, the Savior called His followers to be in communion with Him from the depths of their hearts to the point that we embody the divine mercy, loving our enemies like God, Who cares even for “the ungrateful and selfish.”  Let us be clear:  That means that God cares even for people like me and you.

             To become a person so radiant with the love of Christ that we convey His love even to people we do not like and who do not like us is obviously not a matter of being conventionally religious or moral.  To love our enemies as He loves us requires our deep spiritual transformation and healing as living icons of God.  It is not enough to be kind to our friends and allies, to those we think will return our good will, or to those with whom we have some characteristic in common. It is not enough simply to restrain ourselves from abusing our enemies verbally or otherwise or even to go through the motions of being decent toward them.  No, the God-Man calls and enables us to become brilliant with the gracious divine energies to the point that we convey His merciful love to everyone from the depths of our souls. 

            If we approach this sublime calling merely as a reminder to obey a religious law, we will either fall into despair or delusion about our ability to fulfill it.  The vocation to become like God in mercy and holiness is something we cannot accomplish by willpower or behavior modification alone, even as we cannot raise ourselves up from the grave.  And if we think that we have already fulfilled this calling, then we show only that we have become blinded by spiritual pride to the point that we do not see ourselves clearly at all.  The fact that we seem inevitably to fall short of loving our neighbors, and especially our enemies, as ourselves indicates that we have a truly eternal vocation that we should never think that we have completed.  The struggle that we all have in treating other people, especially those who have wronged or offended us, as we would like to be treated, reveals that we have not yet embraced fully the Lord’s gracious healing of our souls.  St. Silouan the Athonite saw the love of enemies as a clear sign of the presence of the Holy Spirit in our lives.  He taught that when the soul “grows humble, the Lord gives her His grace, and then she prays for her enemies as for herself, and sheds scalding tears for the whole world.”   These words reveal our need for ongoing repentance as we turn away from fueling the passions that make it so appealing to fixate on the wrongs of others and open our hearts in humility to receive the Lord’s gracious healing.  The more that we are aware of our own dependence upon His mercy as “the chief of sinners,” the less inclination we will have to misdirect our attention and energy to holding grudges and condemning our neighbors.

        In today’s epistle reading, St. Paul writes candidly to the confused Christians of Corinth that he knows he has caused them pain by correcting their many abuses of the faith as mostly Gentile converts who kept falling back into the ways of paganism and fell short of manifesting the unity of the Body of Christ in holiness. He did not pain them out of malice or a desire to dominate them, “For I wrote you out of much affliction and anguish of heart and with many tears, not to cause you pain but to let you know the abundant love that I have for you.”  In any sphere of life, it is so easy to fall prey to the temptation of thinking that whoever is disagreeing with us or criticizing us is simply trying make our lives difficult or show that they are in a superior position. So often, we are tempted to respond to them in kind, which usually tempts them to get back at us in a never-ending cycle of resentment. We so easily jump to the conclusion that this or that person is simply an enemy when our judgment is clouded by our own passions.  Paul’s statement should remind us that love for neighbor can certainly require telling people what they do not want to hear.  The healing of broken relationships can require confronting uncomfortable truths about ourselves and others.  It is rarely an easy or comfortable process when imperfect people come face to face with how they have wounded one another. It is only by finding healing for the soul as we unite ourselves evermore fully to Christ that we will gain the spiritual clarity to discern what it means to speak and act mercifully in such situations and not according to our passions.  

If we are truly in Christ, we must struggle to do what we can each day to treat those we are most inclined to disregard and condemn as we would like them to treat us.  We must take every opportunity to convey the mercy we have received from Christ to our neighbors, especially those we consider our enemies.  When we fail to do so, we must use our weakness to fuel our humility before the Lord and our sense of unworthiness to judge anyone else.  We must pray, fast, give to the needy, and mindfully reject the nonsense in our own minds, and in all factions of our culture today, that would encourage us to treat anyone as anything less than a living icon of God.  As hard as it is to accept, whether we are sharing in the life of Christ is most clearly revealed in how we treat those we find it hardest to love.  This is not a matter of being conventionally religious or moral, but of whether we are acquiring the purity of heart necessary to see God, especially as He is present to us each day of our lives in those we are least inclined to see as beloved neighbors.  That is the ultimate test of whether we are becoming radiant with the gracious divine mercy of the Lord as His sons and daughters.

 

 

Letting Down our Empty Nets in Humble Obedience: Homily for the Thirteenth Sunday After Pentecost and the First Sunday of Luke in the Orthodox Church

 

1 Corinthians 16:13-24; Luke 5:1-11

           Many people today lack perseverance.  We have become so accustomed to instantaneous communication and access to entertainment and information on devices that we carry in our pockets or wear on our wrists that many quickly now lose interest in anything that does not bring immediate results.  Then they move on to something else.  No wonder so many people report being lonely and not having sustaining long-term friendships.  Relationships with other people require patience and commitment, though we all make mistakes in them.  The same is true of our relationship with the Lord.  Sharing in His life is not a one-time event, a quick fix to a problem, or an opportunity to show that we are perfect, but an eternal journey that all of us have just begun and for which we all need infinite mercy.        

Perhaps many years of frustration as professional fishermen played a role in preparing Peter, James, and John to begin their long and difficult journeys as the Lord’s disciples.  They knew that they could not make fish swim into their nets.  They had surely fished all night and caught nothing more times than they could count and this was another one of those times.  They knew from experience to wash their nets, go home, and try again tomorrow.  But the Lord said, “Put out into the deep and let down your nets for a catch.”  Peter obeyed with a tone of frustration, saying: “Master, we toiled all night and took nothing!  But at Your word I will let down the nets.”  Then they caught so many fish that their nets broke and their boats began to sink.  This amazing scene helped Peter catch a glimpse of where he stood before Christ, for he said, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.”  The Savior responded, “Do not be afraid; henceforth you will be catching men.” Then Peter, James, and John left their boats and nets behind as they began their long and difficult journey as His disciples.

After leaving behind their fishing nets, the apostles had to keep letting down the nets of their souls time and time again in obedience, despite their lack of perfect faith.  Christ was certainly frustrated with their lack of understanding many times, even to the point of saying “’Get behind me, Satan!’” to Peter. (Mk. 8:33) Those to whom He taught plainly the mysteries of the Kingdom (Mk. 4:1) understood the Savior so poorly that they abandoned Him at His arrest and crucifixion and originally doubted the news of His resurrection.  He never abandoned them, however, and fulfilled the promise that they would draw others into the nets of the Kingdom by sending upon them the Holy Spirit, Who enabled them to manifest Christ’s ministry with power beyond any merely human ability.

If we want to pursue the Christian life with integrity, then we must follow the example of the disciples in struggling to persist in obeying our Lord’s command.  We must “let down our nets” in obedience each day of our lives. That is not something to be tried once and then abandoned if we do not get the results that we want from our efforts.  That is not something to refuse to do because it would be easier in the moment to do something else instead.  That is not something to be abandoned because there are so many direct paths to pleasure, popularity, and power in this world that we could take.  To “let down our nets” is to make obedience to the Lord’s commands a settled habit in our lives, a stable dimension of our character.  It is an absolute necessity if we are going to gain the spiritual strength to persist in following Christ into the blessedness of His kingdom.

            We must be prepared, however, for our faltering steps of obedience to open the eyes of our souls to the truth about where we stand in relation to the Lord.  After letting down his nets and catching that great haul of fish, Peter gained the spiritual clarity to know his unworthiness: “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man, O Lord.”  His reaction should remind us of how the Prophet Isaiah responded to his vision of the heavenly temple: “Woe is me! I am lost, for I am a man of unclean lips, and I live among a people of unclean lips, yet my eyes have seen the King, the Lord of hosts!” (Is. 6:5) When we attempt even the smallest act of obedience, we open our darkened souls to behold the brilliant light of Christ at least a bit.  The darkness in our hearts will then become all the more evident to us. At that point, we have to choose between enduring the tension of facing the uncomfortable truth about our souls or making ourselves blind to it by refusing to take up the ongoing struggle of obedience. 

 The only way to embrace Christ’s healing is to follow the example of Isaiah and Peter in humbling recognizing that we are sinners in need of the Lord’s mercy.  Theirs is the same spirit conveyed in the word received by St. Silouan the Athonite: “Keep your mind in hell and do not despair.”  For the next fifteen years, he did precisely that, confronting and experiencing the brokenness and sickness of his soul that separated him from sharing fully in the life of Christ. It was only through years of faithful persistence in doing so that he found healing for his passions.  Silouan refused to stop letting down his nets, and that is how he fulfilled St. Paul’s teaching in today’s epistle lesson: “Brethren, be watchful, stand firm in your faith, be courageous, and be strong. Let all that you do be done in love.”

 In order to follow the examples of these great saints, we must take up the struggle of obedience to the Savior, Who said, “If you love me, keep my commandments.” (Jn, 14:15) He spoke those words to disciples who would soon deny and abandon Him, not to people with an unbroken record of spiritual perfection.  Like the disciples did, we wander from the path of obedience with some regularity and often fall flat on our faces due to our weakness before the besetting sins that have become almost second nature to us.  Instead of allowing our pride and impatience to lead us to abandon the difficult way to the Kingdom, we must redirect the energy of our passions to fuel our persistent pursuit of obedience, no matter how imperfect it is.  Instead of despairing that there is no hope for the likes of us, we must humbly accept the truth that our failures reveal about our present spiritual state as we let down our nets time and time again for a catch.  We cannot heal our souls any more than the disciples could make fish swim into their nets, but we can put ourselves in the only place where we can receive the healing mercy of Christ.  That is the place of humility, which we cultivate a bit more fully every time that we see how far short we have fallen in keeping His commandments and call out from our hearts: “Lord Jesus Christ, Son of God, have mercy on me, a sinner.”

 Despite their imperfect faith and obedience, the disciples gained the spiritual strength to draw people into the nets of the Kingdom.  They did so not by earning a reward for impeccable behavior, but by continuing to stumble along the path of discipleship and returning to it when  they strayed from it.  That is how they learned to see themselves clearly and came to acquire the humility necessary to receive the Lord’s gracious healing mercy.  As Peter once said in response to Christ asking whether the disciples would stop following Him, “Lord, to whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life?” (Jn. 6:68)   Perhaps they had learned from experience that, apart from Him, their nets would always be empty. If we want to learn the same lesson, then we must persist in letting down our nets in obedience, especially when we are as frustrated as those who fished all night and caught nothing.  That is how we too may open our darkened hearts to become radiant with the healing light of Christ.

 

 

Homily for the Sunday After the Exaltation of the Holy Cross in the Orthodox Church

 

Galatians 2:16-20; Mark 8:34-9:1

 

            As we continue to celebrate the Elevation of the Holy Cross, we must remain on guard against the temptation of viewing our Lord’s Cross as merely a religious symbol that requires nothing of us. Through His Self-Offering on the Cross, Christ has conquered death and brought salvation to the world.  But in order for us to share personally in His eternal life, we must take up our own crosses, deny ourselves, and follow Him.  If we refuse to do that, then we will show that we are ashamed of our Lord and want no part in Him or His Kingdom. We will show that we prefer to continue in the old way of death rather than to enter by His grace into the heavenly reign.  

            Peter was in precisely such a state when he tried to explain to Christ that dying on the Cross had nothing to do with being the Messiah.  That is when the Lord famously said to Peter, “Get behind Me, Satan! For you are not mindful of the things of God, but the things of men.”  That is the context for today’s gospel passage as Christ teaches that following Him is not a way to gain anything at all according to the standards of this world, but a calling to offer ourselves without reservation, no matter the cost.  Our vocation is to lose our lives in this world for Christ and His Gospel in order to share in His victory over death.   

            The calling to take up our crosses stands in stark contrast to the persistent temptation to try to use religion to exalt ourselves.  Across the centuries to the present day, some have tried to use the Cross to gain earthly power by identifying some version of an earthly kingdom with our Lord’s heavenly reign.  Others have tried to use the Cross as a way to justify their own religious or moral superiority over their family members, friends, or neighbors.  The problem is not so much in the particulars of how anyone has used the Cross as in the very idea of using it, of making it an instrument for serving our passions in achieving anything at all in this world.  Quite to the contrary, our Lord’s Cross calls us to turn away from addiction to gratifying our self-centered desires as we offer ourselves in union with His great Self-Offering for the salvation of the world.     

In our epistle reading from Galatians, Saint Paul opposes fellow Jewish Christians who relied too much on their own ability to obey the Old Testament law and would have required the same of Gentile converts.  Refusing to trust in his own ability to obey religious rules, he writes that, “I have been crucified with Christ, nevertheless I live, yet not I, but Christ lives in me; and the life which I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me, and gave Himself up for me.”  Paul took up his cross by enduring many struggles and difficulties out of faithfulness to the Lord, ultimately dying for him as a martyr.   He wrote to the Colossians that “I now rejoice in my sufferings for you, and fill up in my flesh what is lacking in the afflictions of Christ, for the sake of His body, which is the church.” (Col. 1:24)

There is obviously nothing deficient in our Lord’s great Self-Offering.  All that is lacking is our taking up our own crosses in obedience to the Lord’s calling to deny ourselves and follow Him. Because of our own passions and the brokenness of our world of corruption, the struggle for faithfulness inevitably requires suffering, but not as though pain were somehow pleasing to God in and of itself.  Such suffering results from the inevitable tension we experience in embracing the struggle to offer ourselves fully to Christ. Truly taking up our crosses means fighting the difficult battle of confronting our own personal brokenness each day as we reject thoughts, feelings, and habits that would keep us focused on serving ourselves and the false gods of this world.  

  Christ prayed the night before His crucifixion, “Father, if You are willing, take this cup from me; yet not my will, but Yours be done.” (Luke 22:42) He ascended the Cross in free obedience, and no one forces us to take up our crosses either.  Many problems and pains come upon us without our asking for them in this life, even to the point of death, and it is so easy to refuse to suffer in a spiritually health way. As Job’s wife suggested, we can “Curse God and die!” (Job 2:9) in response to losses, obstacles, and disappointments.  We can refuse to offer our wounds to Christ for healing by ignoring them or convincing ourselves that we are still better off spiritually than the people we like to condemn.  Of course, doing so will simply fuel our passions, blind us with spiritual pride, and corrupt our relationships with others.   No one can keep us from refusing to take up our crosses, as freedom is an intrinsic dimension of being in God’s image.    

Only we can unite ourselves to Christ in His Great Self-Offering for the salvation of the world. Regardless of the circumstances, we have the freedom to refuse to fall into despair, for any instance of struggle, pain, disappointment, or suffering provides an opportunity to purify the desires of our hearts as we learn to entrust ourselves more fully to the Lord.  Difficulties by their nature present challenges to which we may respond in a Christlike way or according to our passions.  He offered up Himself fully upon the Cross and refused to respond in kind to those who hated and rejected Him.  Likewise, we may unite ourselves to Him in every dimension and circumstance of our lives, including those in which we are sorely tempted not to respond as He did. Illness, broken relationships with others, worries about the future, regrets about the past, crushed hopes, and even the worst losses imaginable all present opportunities to grow in “love, joy, peace, longsuffering, kindness, goodness, faithfulness, gentleness, and self-control.”  Saint Paul wrote that “those who are Christ’s have crucified the flesh with its passions and desires.”  (Gal. 5:22-24)

Our self-centered and distorted desires usually rear their ugly heads quickly when we face trying circumstances.  If you are like me, you sometimes react like Jonah when the vine that gave him shade was eaten by a worm.  That was a very small thing, but Jonah became so angry that he literally wished he would die. (Jonah 4:5-11)   Other times we face circumstances so grave that they rattle us to the depths of our souls and we must struggle mightily not to fall into despair about life itself.  Whether in matters small or great, there is no lack of opportunity to take up our crosses as we struggle to find healing for our souls. 

Doing so usually does not require anything particularly dramatic or extraordinary.  It is normally a matter of focusing on the basic disciplines of the Christian life, such as refusing to accept sinful thoughts into our hearts, forgiving those who have wronged us, and trusting that nothing “will be able to separate us from the love of God that is in Christ Jesus our Lord.” (Rom. 8:39) The more that we open our souls to the Lord’s healing strength through prayer, repentance, and serving our neighbors, the less time and energy we will have for stirring up and embracing the impassioned thoughts that lead to sinful actions.  The less that we worry obsessively or run our mouths thoughtlessly, the more we will be able to pray to God from our hearts to grant what is best for us, our loved ones, and our world.  We must follow the Apostle’s teaching, “Be anxious for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication, with thanksgiving, let your requests be made known to God; and the peace of God, which surpasses all understanding, will guard your hearts and minds through Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4:6-7) This is the path for gaining the strength to take up our crosses, deny ourselves, and follow Christ. 

In order to take up our crosses, we must choose to embrace the struggle of dying to our vain illusions about ourselves, other people, and our world.  Our hope is not in spiritual or moral perfection acquired merely by our own willpower, but in the gracious mercy of the One Who offered up Himself for our salvation purely out of love.  Through the Cross, He has brought life in the midst of death, light in the midst of darkness, and joy in the midst of despair.  We will receive His healing as we persistently offer ourselves to Him in humble faith, no matter what challenges and pains life brings us.  That is how we may die to the corrupting power of sin and enter into the blessedness of His Kingdom, which remains not of this world.  The only way to truly elevate the Holy Cross is by denying ourselves and taking up our own crosses to follow the Savior each day of our lives.